Tune in to me every day, I'm that hit you wanna play

With so many great songs flying around, it's tough to give an accurate representation of what I'm listening to based on just my individual song posts. Here's a quick rundown of some of the new songs getting frequent spins from me that I haven't mentioned on the blog yet:



Kylie Minogure, Aphrodite
Yeah, the whole album. It's really that good. Pop-dance bliss that's left me feeling like some giddy ten year old. Kylie promised euphoria, and she delivered. The title track, embedded above, with its martial drums backing empowerment anthem lyrics, is a standout, but the whole album is fantastic--possibly the best album I've heard in at least a few years. Preorder it already (out July 6, including in the U.S.).



Kent, "Gamla Ullevi"
The Swedish rock band's best single in years. The group's detour into a more electronic sound recently caught my ear, but it felt as if at the same time they'd lost the strong melodies to make those interesting-sounding songs truly worthwhile. "Gamla Ullevi," with its gunfire synths, earworm chorus, and catchy whistling, finally has the best of both worlds. Via Swedish Stereo.



Miley Cyrus, "Permanent December"/"Two More Lonely People"/"Scars"/"Robot"/"Take Me Along"
My picks for the best songs from the new Miley Cyrus. "Liberty Walk" may be seriously overrated, but that doesn't mean that infernally catchy electro-pop "Permanent December" (above) shouldn't be blaring out of cars all summer (heavy auto-tune or not), that the galloping "Two More Lonely People" isn't a perfect combination of Miley's electronic turn with what you feel are her more rock instincts, that "Scars" isn't an excellently made pop-rock song spiced up with a little more electro flavor that is a lot better than you'd expect a song with that title to be, that "Robot" manages to overcome Miley's vocals getting buried in the chorus to and "I'm throwing off the shackles of your pop production powerhouse to declare my independence" lyrics to actually really good, that "Take Me Along" isn't actually an excellent pseudo-ballad (emphasis on the pseudo, thanks to the production)--and doesn't mean that at least half of this album isn't worth your time and money.



Maroon 5, "Misery"
Speaking of blaring out of cars all summer...that's what I'm demanding happen for the new single from Maroon 5. "Misery" is begging to be played while you drive around in the sun for the next few months. It's a bit like a lighter, fluffier version of "Makes Me Wonder" or "If I Never See Your Face Again," but probably better. I love this group, but let's just take a moment: thank goodness for Mutt Lange. His production work is just so clean, so polished, so everything-just-where-it-should-be--there's workmanlike and then there's "I'm an effing professional/genius and I know what I'm doing, so just let me tweak your already great song in a million little ways you never could have thought of to make it so ridiculously appealing that RESISTANCE. IS. FUTILE." The man knows what he's doing.

Ed Drewett, "Champagne Lemonade"/"Parallels" (stream here)
Forget that whole Professor Green thing. Pop-R&B singer Ed Drewett (co-writer of the Wanted's "All Time Low") has been working with people like Cutfather and Paul Statham, with the best result so far being "Champagne Lemonade." Without hearing it in full quality, it's tough to fully judge, but the Calvin Harris-style production behind lyrics like "all because he buys you champagne, I buy you lemonade/Makes him something of a Casanova" is begging for summer airplay, at least on my headphones. Another demo on his MySpace, "Parallels," is by Cutfather and has a great ravey musical backing. The topline is a little simple, but maybe that's for the best given everything going on in the background.

05 Hitman (Remix) by poppostergirl

Jessie and the Toy Boys, "Hitman"
Popjustice introduced me to the new incarnation of Jessie Malakouti, this time backed by several mannequins. Though I still want to own Xenomania-penned "Who's That Man," the chorus of "Hitman" is going some way to making up for her moving on to new songwriters. Seriously, stick it out to the chorus (or skip ahead to it if you need to)--it's energy jolt kind of stuff. The clip of "Perfect Shade Of Red" over on Popjustice sounds great, too. Listen to more songs at her official site.



Brandon Flowers, "Crossfire"
Brandon is channeling second album Killers in both facial hair and music style. If you'd asked me about his new solo project ahead of time, neither would have been my first choice. Why, then, are both choices working so well for me? Maybe it just all comes down to a good melody...and someone pushing him away from the pervert-next-door grooming choices into just pleasant scruff.


Lolene, "Radio" (stream here)
As featured on Idolator and Pop Trash Addicts. Pop-dance that, to be honest, is a whole level above what I was expecting from this British girl being launched in the U.S. I always just saw her as (eek) one of those "Internet buzz acts." The sweet, fresh "Radio" implies she's certainly more than that.



Tove Styrke, "Million Pieces"
Swedish Idol contestant goes commercialized-indie-electro-pop for her debut release. On the first listen, "Million Pieces" starts off slowly, in a style a bit like a quicker Lykke Li's "Little Bit," but the poppier chorus is delivers and from the second chorus through the end, the song just gets better and better--it builds in just the way you'd hope a song from Tove would. Via Swedish Stereo.

Also getting played: most of the new albums from Example and Delays. Possibly more later on at least one of those, though. Oh, and Kevin Rudolf's "You Make The Rain Fall," after #1 Hits From Another Planet mentioned it.

Now I'm falling asleep and she's calling a cab

If you've ever wanted to hear a low quality recording of amazing Swedish pop group Le Kid covering the Killers' also amazing "Mr. Brightside"...





...there you go. The original is one of my favorite songs of the past decade, but it makes total sense in their '80s pop version. Everything they do is so incredibly joyful or joy-inducing and it takes real intelligence to be as good as they are at composing (or arranging) music.

I love this group with my whole heart. If they're not successful, I don't know what I'm going to do. Their taste in music--impeccable. The music they make--fantastic. Their obvious love for what they do--the icing on the cake.

Eric Saade was also at the same event (singing "Break Of Dawn" and a cover of Linkin Park's "Leave Out All The Rest"), if you feel like watching more fuzzy quality live videos.

I see it tattooed all over your face

I know we're all still in Kylie mode (I know I am), but please tell me you have time for a biting, strutting, rock-edged pop-dance song of the highest quality.

Dirty Kissin' by poppostergirl

I enjoyed British soapstar-turned-popstar Preeya Kalidas's debut single "Shimmy" (out July 26) quite a good bit--it never stood out to me in its original incarnation on Janet Leon's album, but Preeya's version is a lot of fun in an Alesha Dixon-type way. "In My Heels" on her MySpace sounded promising, enough to keep me interested in the project. Today's song, though, which she's recorded, takes it all up a level. No, at least two levels. If this song isn't worth skipping a grade at popstar school, I don't know what is.

I'm not familiar enough with her voice yet to swear that this is her singing on the song I've posted above (to be honest, make me guess and I'd say it's a demo singer, but that's an uninformed opinion), but demo or final version--amazing. It's a hard-edged, attitude-filled pop track that demands aggressive action, be it the way one walks down a catwalk or pursues a boy. It shares a lyrical conceit or two with Sugababes' "Wear My Kiss" and maybe has a similar beat to Kat DeLuna's "Unstoppable," but it approximately 100 TIMES BETTER. It's faster, harder, punchier, catchier. Ohhh, can we talk about how catchy it is? I am going to be spitting out this chorus for days, and those guitar riffs, the biting electro pulses--yeah, they've all robbed me of my ability to write passable sentences and forced me into capitals and italics.

It's basically exactly you want as an attention-getting, "I am a proper popstar" debut. It's not an exact replica of the sound any other singer has going at the moment, and yet I have trouble seeing how fans of modern female-fronted pop-dance couldn't enjoy this. Whoever this is on this recording needs to release it NOW.

(Edit: maybe it's a little like Serebro's "Song No. 1," just in that hard beat beneath it?)

I toss and turn every night

My thought process still looks something like "KYLIE KYLIE KYLIE," but here's a fifteen second interruption to bring you the news that Swedish singer Jake Oh (of the 2008 single "Up In The Blue," which sounded like a remix of a Vincent Pontare song or, if you prefer a more recent reference, a ravier version of Mike Posner's "Cooler Than Me") has a new single out.



The "leh-leh-let you in" part is pretty catchy, no? Jake sees himself as an R&B singer and there are traces of that here, along with pop (the bridge reminds me just a little bit of Ola's "Feelgood," though that's not an apt comparison for the whole song), dance (big swooshy synths!), and rock (the guitars in the first half of the chorus). He's on either his own label or a small label, so the going won't be easy for him...which makes victories in quality even sweeter for him, I'm sure.

I also recommend his sparkly new string-featuring R&B-pop song "Last Time," streaming over at his MySpace.

"Let You In" isn't available for sale yet, but it should be soon, so keep on eye on Swedish iTunes or the stores listed in the sidebar if you like what you hear.

Use me, I know the way to paradise

How does the idea of JC Chasez singing something by the creator of Jennifer Paige and Nick Carter's charming duet "Beautiful Lie" from last year sound to you? Like not such a bad idea, right?

Don't Stop by poppostergirl

Swedish songwriter Carl Falk has an eclectic discography but has recently been delivering quality work in a way that gives you the impression he's just about to break out and get the credit he deserves soon (personally, I've got high hopes for his work with Darren Hayes). When he feels like it, he does a good job updating the Cheiron sound of the late '90s with the more electronic sound of today to create catchy, fun pop songs like this one, with its little percussion progressions sprinkled throughout the kicky, poppy beat. Unlike, say, "Beautiful Lie" or the Backstreet Boys demo "Fire & Water," "Don't Stop" is pure fun, an up-tempo romp without any real dark undertones (or any of the dirty funk of JC's own earlier work). Carl posted "Don't Stop" to his MySpace, so the safest bet is that he and JC wrote it together with the intention of selling it to another artist--it's just a demo, but it comes with the pleasant perk of being sung by JC.

Speaking of JC-penned and -sung demos, a few more have leaked this year: "Teenage Wildlife" is a "Mr. Brightside" imitator that AJ McLean recorded for his debut solo album and "Build Some Love" was a ballad Kris Allen considered using. JC has always been one of the more underrated American male singers and I still regret that his second solo album was never released. Schizophrenic, its predecessor, deserved more success than it found; it's a fun, sexy/ridiculous-in-an-entertaining-way summer album. I still carry the hope, no matter how in vain it might be, that he'll release music again in some way.

There's nowhere to buy "Don't Stop," but you can purchase JC Chasez's album Schizophrenic here (physical) or here (digital).

A lover's love song without a melody

A recent mention of Moám's "Last Night In Paris" getting a release in Denmark (though I could have sworn that happened ages ago) reminded me that I've yet to feature that fantastic song here. I always just thought I'd cover it in my 2009 Favorite Singles list (which I'm sure is still highly anticipated due to its timely nature), but given my track record with promised features...well, it's probably best to spend a minute on it now.



Supposedly "Last Night In Paris" samples the theme song to Miami Vice, which I've apparently not heard enough to recognize in the song. All I hear is a fantastic trance-pop song from Danish producer Moám (Morten Hampenberg) and Swedish singer and songwriter Alice "Ace" Gernandt. Alice's sweet voice and melodies and Moám's beats create a song that has appeal beyond just the electronica community--it's pretty crossover-friendly, at least in Europe...well, mainstream dance radio-friendly, at the least. The charged beats ensure that "Last Night In Paris" still has power despite Alice's delicate voice, while her singing adds a certain romanticism to the song--the idealized romanticism of a late-night rendezvous in a city known for both its romance and its darker underbelly.

Moám has also remixed Example's "Watch The Sun Come Up," which makes perfect sense; Example's original is poppier than "Last Night In Paris," but the songs share a nostalgic appreciation for a time together that can't be recaptured and hint at the "what if"s that spring up from a one night stand (as well as lyrics that enable you to connect them into a cross-song narrative, if you're, say, into overanalyzing tracks with no basis in reality), though "Last Night In Paris" is musically darker.

If you're interested in hearing more of Alice's work, I recommend the demo "The Music Goes On," streaming on her MySpace. It's by the men behind Margaret Berger's "Will You Remember Me Tomorrow" and "Samantha" and Ninja's "Hush Hush." "The Music Goes On" isn't an electronic pop attack in the same way those songs are, but it's a sweet little song. "2 Left Feet," also streaming there, is by the same team.

You buy Moám's single "Last Night In Paris" from iTunes here depending on your country of residence.

I've seen it all in a disco ball tonight

I've been sitting here, playing the songs of twenty-one year old British singer Ollie Wride, who the Guardian's New Band of the Day introduced me to, over and over again, trying to decide which one to feature.

I can't decide. I just can't.

I think there are two reasons for that, one bad and one good. Let's get the bad out of the way first: none of them really stand out as a smash hit single in the universe we currently live in, unfortunately--at least not as they and the charts currently stand. Ollie's songs sometimes still feel just a little more like great genre experiments, rather than hit songs, than they should. Nothing that a little refining couldn't fix.

HeadRush by Ollie Wride

Now, the good reason: each and every song has "cue PG falling madly in love with this artist's musical output" written all over it. Ollie, who had a development deal with a major label but is now unsigned, cites Freddie Mercury as one of his biggest inspirations, and you can hear that in his music; he may not bear a vocal resemblance to the Queen frontman, but there's a common interest in glam. On a similar tip, Ollie was brought in to write songs with Meat Loaf for what became Hang Cool, Teddy Bear and though none of his songs made the album, you can see why the match-up was made.

21st Century Love by Ollie Wride

Still, the '80s-inspired glittery synth-filled musical backdrops he and collaborators like Royworld's Rod and Crispin Futrille have created are unlike anything I've heard Freddie sing over--they're more like the foolhardy, party-ready, take-on-the-world teenage cousins of the instrumentals of songs by Performance, the Bang Bang Club, or Dyno. Apparently Ollie was also asked to write songs for Sophie Ellis-Bextor and, though once again I don't think any of his songs made the cut, it's just as easy to see why that match-up was made; there's a bold electronic pop shimmer to all Ollie's tracks.

This Isn't Paradise by Ollie Wride

The seven songs on Ollie's SoundCloud page are easy on the ear, like listening to a four out of five stars album that you can play over and over again without boredom setting in and with a sense of excitement that counterbalances the lack of the single. I love them all, but they also give you the sense that he's on the verge of something incredible...and you can't help hoping he takes that one more step, finds that one song that makes it all happen for him. His work right now, though, is highly recommended.

Spotlights by Ollie Wride

There's nowhere to buy Ollie Wride's music yet, but visit him on MySpace here.

Dance To Survive by Ollie Wride

(All right, I'll cut myself off there. The remaining two songs are JUST as great, though.)

Pop Music by Ollie Wride

(I mean, I'll stop there. Really. But how could I leave out the strings, going-underwater-a-la-"Love At First Sight," and big glammy chorus of that song?)

We Won by Ollie Wride

(*cough* OK, done. Though there is a song from his old band still up elsewhere on MySpace and one of his collaborators has a pretty cool project going and--"*yanked off stage*)