- Fraser McAlpine
- 6 Jan 09, 02:26 PM
If I can offer you one piece of advice when it comes to the listening and enjoyment of music in all it's many forms, it's this. NEVER do your research. If you went off and read the bare facts about how Lady GaGa came to be singing this song, and who for, and how it came to be the way it is before listening to it, it would almost certainly destroy it.
This is because, on paper, it's just another one of those Akon-affiliated mid-tempo dance-hop tunes which rely on his heavily-reverbed squeal and lyrics about going crackers in a night-club situation. He does about 23 of them before breakfast every DAY, after all.
Continue reading "Lady GaGa ft. Colby O'Donis - 'Just Dance'"
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- Fraser McAlpine
- 5 Jan 09, 04:43 PM
What with Christmas and everything, it's been a little while since we Top 5 High 5-ed, which is probably no bad thing, given the intensity of feeling there was surrounding Alexandra and her 'Hallelujah' cover. The shouting was really quite fierce for a while there.
Now we've all had a chance to calm down, how is everyone doing? Would you like to slap the screen in approval or slap the faces of the individuals in the Top 5?
Here there are in talkywordingform, in case you don't recognise the hitmakers in question:
1: Alexandra Burke - 'Hallelujah'
2: Leona Lewis - 'Run'
3: Lady Gaga ft. Colby O'Donis - 'Just Dance'
4: Beyonce - 'If I Were A Boy'
5: James Morrison & Nelly Furtado - 'Broken Strings'
Be warned though, the more people shout about Simon Cowell ruining the race for the Christmas No.1, the more tempted I am to go back through the list of previous festive chart-toppers and point out that it had already been comprehensively ruined by Westlife, the Spice Girls, Bob The Builder and so on.
So, are we happy or are we sad?
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- Fraser McAlpine
- 5 Jan 09, 11:20 AM
How I would love to have been an invisible spectator (and inaudible...and unsmellable, for that matter) when the chorus to this song was first being put together. Someone has clearly taken a shine to the expression "you've got issues", which came out of a boom in psychotherapy in the '70s, and is used to describe those mental injuries that come with extreme emotional situations, and which you just can't shift, so they become part of your personality.
So, to say you and your heart have got issues is a perfect shorthand for being massively unlucky in love, and therefore perfect for a pop song.
The trouble is it's a swine to find a decent rhyme for.
Continue reading "The Saturdays - 'Issues'"
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- Fraser McAlpine
- 31 Dec 08, 10:16 AM
My turn now. And I can't help but notice how all of our lists are dominated by female performers. I'd be tempted to suggest that this means that 2008 was officially The Year Of Women In Pop, but then that would mean 2009 would have to be The Year Of Some Other Arbitrary Thing In Pop, and we'd have to ask all the girls to pipe down. Plus it's more than a little bit condescending to lump all women together as if they're the same, so let's not go there.
Speaking of which...
The Ting Tings - 'That's Not My Name'
11 months on from writing about how this song had taken over my head, it's still there, and I doubt it's going anywhere any time soon. Built on loops, but played live, put together as a round (like London's Burning) but half sung, half yelped, and straddling the line between addictive/annoying in the manner of all great pop music ever.
(Here's the Jools Holland performance that kicked the whole thing off...)
The bit where Jules the drummer changes rhythm at the end - making the whole song seem to shudder and lift off the ground - actually brought tears to my eyes at Radio 1's Big Weekend. That's the power of perfect pop, my friends.
Continue reading "2008's Finest Five - Fraser McAlpine"
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- Fraser McAlpine
- 29 Dec 08, 10:11 AM
It's become a cliche of Keane reviews that you have to, at some point, refer to Tom Chaplin as a choirboy, and until fairly recently I assumed this was just because of his round little face, his easily-reddened cheekular area, his high, pure voice, and the fact that you can picture him in a cassock in a way which is just not true of, say, the lead singer out of the Pigeon Detecives.
But, since Terry Wogan launched his second ever attack on the Top 10, with a special guest star in tow, and Tom got himself a nice smart haircut, a new interpretation of the choirboy mantra has emerged. Look...
Spooky, eh?
Continue reading "Keane - 'Perfect Symmetry'"
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- Fraser McAlpine
- 27 Dec 08, 12:57 PM
And now it's Hazel's turn - Fraser
This year, my life has seen some huge changes. I accidentally became an adult, spent a total of about 70 million years on the phone to various customer services departments and enjoyed a lot of the year face down in my keyboard, dribbling lightly into something mysterious called 'mydissertation.doc.' Somewhere in the middle of all this, I found time to send some really late reviews and listen to post-rock. And here's what was really, really good this year, in my world:
Cyndi Lauper - 'Into The Nightlife'
Firstly, a song from an album by a lady who, to me, is basically roughly equivalent to God. You know people who go on and on and on about how only Morrissey / Paul Weller / David Bowie understands them? I sometimes do that with Cyndi Lauper. She is the most awesome lady ever and deserves constant adulation, not least because this late in her career she's released 'Bring Ya To The Brink,' an album full of edgy electropop and beautiful, blissy anthems.
(Here's the video)
This single, 'Into The Nightlife' perfectly summarises the album; all tough bloops and bassline seguing into shimmering synths and so much in love with sound.
Continue reading "2008's Finest Five - Hazel Robinson"
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- Fraser McAlpine
- 25 Dec 08, 09:59 AM
Here's your present - and a perfect way to revive those sprout-addled wits - a Top of the Pops game!
Have a smashing Christmastime, ChartBloggers!
Fraser
