A New Decade In Pop: Week #20

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Roll Deep still at number 1, Xtina limps in at #12.

[Poll #1565391]

Comments

[koganbot]

The accordion riff on "Stereo Love," which is from "Bayatılar" by Azerbaijani musician Eldar Mansurov (says Wikip), sounds extremely similar to "Lambada."* Pretty much anything that sounds extremely similar to "Lambada" will get a tick from me, even if I greatly prefer "Lambada," which I do in this case (also think I slightly prefer the version of "Stereo Love" featuring Alicia; I don't know who Alicia is, but it's a lovely name).

*Googling this gets too many hits to be useful, but I'm not finding this subject coming up, but it's what my ears tell me.

[koganbot]

Xtina limps in at #12

Which is better than she's done in America so far: entered at 23 four weeks ago, then immediately fell into the forties, and has been bobbing around there ever since, trying to get traction.

[koganbot]

Edward Maya ft. Viki Jigulina "Stereo Love": Little bloopy things that vaguely seem techno, and a vaguely "Mediterranean" Europop sound (or maybe that'd be the Black Seacoast), vaguely haunting, kinda vaguely pretty good. TICK.

Glee Cast "Total Eclipse Of The Heart": I've never seen the show, and I generally consign the singles to the category "Unnecessary outside the context of the show," but Lea Michele's goofball showbiz squeak is distinctive. The song demands more from her, so when she's trying to be round and rich in her tones she's another generic Glee striver, but there's enough of her Lea-ness and a good song to make this a BORDERLINE TICK. (I think this is only the second Glee track I've ever ticked. Perhaps the third.)

Christina Aguilera "Not Myself Tonight": Christina sounds anonymous, but she always sounds anonymous, and this time the facelessness fits the toughness of the music, just any old voice acting as a jousting pole on behalf of the track. Could imagine a career backup singer doing it better, actually, Xtina not being all that tough. TICK.

Fugative "Crush": Good cheesy girl riff at the start gives me false hope for a good cheesy week, but the rap guy's got a smile in his voice that's so wide it comes across as a physical deformity. NO TICK.

Glee Cast "Run Joey Run": Lea's squeaky over-emoting makes me grin (I suppose my grin is inappropriate for the song's melodrama, but, you know, the original wasn't exactly up to the Shangri-Las' level of emotion). The guy singers just sound grim. NO TICK.

Keane ft. K'naan "Stop For A Minute": Can we come up with a name for this subgenre? Blandly Emotive British White-Guy Singers Drain Talented Rappers Of Blood seems a bit long for a genre title. NO TICK.

[askbask.livejournal.com]

Random European acts have started popping up on the UK charts lately, with songs very reminiscent of the euro dance hits performed by random European acts which frequently popped up on charts in the late 90s. I almost get nostalgic listening to these _new tunes.

[lockedintheatti.livejournal.com]

Bah. Where was Edward Maya when I needed him while managing Romania in Europop 2004? Interesting side-note: he also wrote 'Tornero', Romania's 2006 eurovision song, and in my opinion best eurovision song of the last decade