Song reviews

Those fertile fields of Scandinavian electro pop have produced yet another crop. Anwai’s rather fey “Move Along” sounds like a looped and sequenced take on the Snow Patrol sound but, nonetheless, the song remains easy on the ear.

Jade The Moon clearly live on the dark side of the electro pop moon with their song “5 6 7 8” tripping out on a music box melody, looped vocals driven by isolation and dystopian doom. Naturally, a song like this does not end. It just stops. Just like the world will one day.

Somebody has got the recipe book out for dark electro pop soup with GØSPEL’s “Ain’t Gonna Let You In” sequencing its way through Sakamoto and the special seasoning being Beth Anderton-Allen’s laconic yet still passionate voice.

There is always room in my iPod for some more slick electro pop from Scandinavia and Linnea Södahl provides just that with her song “Two Is An Army”. Her voice has an appealing effervescence that balances out the rather bleak concept behind the lyrics with the resulting musical concoction tempting me towards a comparison with Fallulah.

Glasgow’s own Superdiva Ashley Collins abandons the dance floor for the big ballad with “Falling” being so dramatically downbeat that some might even see the song as contrived. However, Ms. Collins clearly has the voice to carry such a song off and that is what she duly does.

Robust and as rifftastic as usual, Well Hung Heart rev up their musical V8 and turn “Throw It All Away” into a contender for the theme song to a rock radio revival. This may be their most mainstream song yet but Well Hung Heart still have their foot well and truly on the accelerator.

As bright and breezy as you like, Australia’s Mia Milan easily evokes the perfectly formed pop music of the Brill Building with “I Won’t Cry”. It’s a singalong summer song, without a doubt.

Danny Darko does not stray far from his dance floor roots with “My Favourite” sounding more like a remix of an original than an actual original song and it is Jova Radevska’s girlish, yet worldly, voice that actually gives the song its sonic appeal

You can’t keep a good funk rock band down and London’s Palumbo and the Funk duly get down on it with “Get It Right”. The playing is in the groove, right enough, but the song needs a more distinctive lead voice if it is ever to escape the wedding reception dance floor.

A middle of the road pop song, “Little Fun” shows that Theo Altieri lacks neither energy nor clean living charm and I wouldn’t be surprised if the song found a home on what is left of daytime radio.

One of the few bands in Glasgow to look forwards rather than backwards, the Girobabies hit another one into the back of the net with “Equinox” and, when you think about it, you can’t really go wrong when you have lyrics that are sharp and intelligent, jagged guitars and a manic beat that just calls out to your feet. In fact that fact is so obvious that you have to wonder why more bands don’t follow the same path. Most bands aren’t the Girobabies though.

Immaculately presented, as we have come to expect of Miss Lola Lamour, “A Little Of What You Fancy” takes us so far back in time that any gentleman would feel obliged to remove his hat in deference to this spirited three minute revival of fifties glamour. The lady is a star.