Ellie Goulding "Halcyon" Album Review

When Ellie Goulding released her debut album Lights in early 2010 she did so on the back of considerable hype, and it was no surprise to see the commercial  success she was enjoying across Europe. Goulding's arrival had been cleverly moved from the blog-friendly world of working with Starsmith and early releases with Neon Gold to a home with Universal and on radio playlists that ate up her clever mix of nu-folk touches and electro-pop ideas. She shone on singles like Starry Eyed but for me her debut crossed into twee territory too often, such as the schmaltzy The Writer which had little of the sparse, intricate feel that characterised her best work.

Following the success of the album, a reissue entitled Bright Lights arrived alongside her slow-burning take on Elton John's Your Song. It soundtracked a John Lewis ad, became an X-Factor staple and likely sold her a bucketload of albums. So far, so typical British pop success story. Then something funny happened. A track from that reissue, Lights (previously only an iTunes bonus track) was released as a single in mid-2011, appearing on the US chart in August before reappearing January of this year. It began a slow and steady climb on airplay and download charts before finally reaching no. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in August, having clocked up 3 million downloads.

Suddenly, without really having to try, Goulding had a huge hit in the US and added a huge territory into her arsenal. While Lights was a few years old at this point, Goulding already had new material ready to go after plenty of press coverage. She famously performed Your Song at William and Kate's wedding, dated high profile Radio 1 DJ Greg James before famously shacking up with electronic music superstar Skrillex. Goulding was already a big star but the last year has slowly shifted around her to give her second album Halcyon a sense of expectation even she couldn't have predicted.

The beauty of this second album then, is how Goulding not only delivers an album of songs that could garner many hits but that she amps up all the things that made her first album so strong.

The majority of the production comes from Jim Eliot of electro-pop group Kish Mauve who famously worked on 2 Hearts for Kylie (And co-wrote All The Lovers) and on the sophisticated downbeat disco-pop of Will Young's Echoes album from last year (including the stunning single Jealousy). That well balanced mix of electronic music flourishes allowing more pared down melodies to surface informs the strongest moments on Halcyon.

Opening track Don't Say A Word is all ghoulish humming, eerie chords and ambient vocals but it works as setting out the stall for the slightly darker tone of proceedings this time, the faint, gloomy bass not a million miles from something The Weeknd would do (apt given that Goulding covered one of his tunes earlier this year).

From there it's a back and forth between shades of growling electro-pop and more delicate moments. Some of these songs are already out there for fans to take in and give a decent sense of the album. Anything Could Happen, the sprightly lead single, is a real winner, a big uplifting chorus and tweaked vocal samples rippling along nicely. Explosions and I Know You Care are more traditional, winsome folk-lite pop ballads that make good movie soundtrack tunes (I Know You Care being used for the soundtrack of the Dakota Fanning weepie Now Is Good) but feel a little flat. Especially when an album track like Joy mines a similar territory but adds in sweeping choral vocals and a little more imagination to lift an already haunting tune or the delicate intensity of her Active Child cover Hanging On that debuted a couple of months ago.

However, the real gems come when Goulding lets loose, conjuring her own expansive, almost-gothic pop vision. My Blood is a tumbling piano driven number that builds with a Coldplay-esque sweep that Goulding pulls off with aplomb. Figure 8 scatters jumped-up dubstep production all over the place and works magnificently, one of the standouts, while Only You is jittery and infectious gloom-pop. There's an enjoyable bonus track tacked on too, I Need Your Love a Calvin Harris production featuring Goulding's vocals (it'll appear on his forthcoming album 18 Months) that is poles apart from the rest of the material but works on it's own merits.

Halcyon may drift into slightly twee territory at times but for the most part this is an impressive and engaging gaggle of electro-folk-pop building on the promise of her Starsmith days and Neon Gold buzz and maturing an already impressive sound. With an ever-growing audience and such a polished second wave of material there's little to stop this album being one of the biggest of the next 12 months.

Halcyon is released Friday in Ireland, Monday the 8th of October in the UK and the day after in the US. The single Anything Could Happen is out now.

Britney & Born This Way: 1 Month on Planet Pop

Holy crap. You wait a month (as in don't blog for a month) to blog about a huge pop tune and then two come along at once. This isn't an attempt to pit Britney's "Hold It Against Me" against Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" in some kind of do or die battle BUT two big artists, two big songs.. why not do one quick blog post? Here is your cheat sheet to the new tunes from both Britney and Lady Gaga

HOLD IT AGAINST ME

Who? Britney "Enigmatic or just crazy?" Spears 

The Team : Pop heavy hitters and hit makers who owned 2010: Max Martin, Dr. Luke and Bonnie McKee

The Song: A relentless club pop stormer that's about as subtle as a bag of glow sticks being ground up in a blender by a gaggle of pilled up drag queens. The underpinning beat is stompy and obtrusive but the vocal gives it a sense of desperation. The first time Britney croaks (and she sort of does, it sounds like they've let her voice sound a bit raspy for some reason) "if we could escape the crowd somehow" it's a weird moment of isolation and dread amid a song that takes a cheesy chat up line as it's main chorus. It combines a slightly disjointed Xenomania style structure with an out of the blue would be dubstep breakdown and a whizzing climax. It is in a word: A-M-A-Z-I-N-G

Sounds like:  Britney's Unusual You + Ke$ha's Take It Off + Magnetic Man's I Need Air with a smidge of Rusko for good measure

How has it fared?  Insanely good at first. With minimal promotion it broke US airplay records while shifting over 400,000 downloads all in one week and flew to the top of the Billboard Hot 100. It was instantly a top 10 smash in most major territories also. It has started to slide but this is a single that is still in the middle of it's chart run. With the immediate iTunes release this track has garnered a decent chart performance but we'll see how the video and possible promotion from Miss Spears allows this one to shape up over the next few weeks.

The Video : Directed by Jonas Akerlund (squeal) and already the subject of fourteen seperate online teasers to be released daily until the official premiere next week. Sounds like it'll be a chaotic affair, heavy on the dancing according to dance-commander Brian Friedman. Exciting.

Do Say: "It's good for dancing isn't it? It's bit like a rave, a bit like that moment you come off something and feel a bit weird and a bit like that time you ended up at dubstep night and spent the night wobbling around"

Don't Say: "I preferred If U Seek Amy"

BORN THIS WAY

Who : Lady "Why would I take a nap, when there's so much WORK TO BE DONE?" Gaga

The Team : Gaga, Fernando Garibay and DJ White Shadow

The Song : Well to say this has arrived with a bit of hype is an understatement. Gaga has declared this her anthem for a generation, a song about loving yourself blah blah blah. Basically she talked it up way too much. After talk of a deeper heavier side to the music the resulting confection that is Born This Way is a tad dissapointing.  

Picture if you will Madonna, Kylie, Gaga and a desire to name check as many minorities as possible combined with a rattling cheesy dance pop beat and you have Born This Way. It's not that's a bad tune. It's actually tremendous fun. Infectious, catchy and feel good it's a pure pop blast that stands well amongst the current batch of chart ready electro inspired numbers. It's well crafted with a strong melody but you can't help but feel the urge to throw the kitchen sink of production at the track makes it too layered. Compared to how Telephone mastered the wall of pop noise alongside an airtight melody Born This Way sounds like a track in desperate need of a pruning. If you can get past the hype though (and let's face it, that's not easy now) this a great little pop tune.

Sounds like: Well, Express Yourself obviously. But also Kylie's Better Than Today. and also quite like Mandy Moore album track from years back You Remind Me. Seriously.

How has it fared: Well it was released Friday, topped the iTunes chart in 23 countries (it just debuted on the UK chart at number 3), broke that radio play record Britney had up until a few weeks ago and looks set to go to number 1 in more than a few places by next week. and there's a small matter of a Grammy's performance tonight, which as I write Gaga has just arrived to in a coffin. And a giant egg. Subtle.

The video: Directed by Jonas Akerlund (Squeal AGAIN), set in New York with talk of Gaga giving birth, trannies and we're sure more than a few jaw dropping outfit choices. Let's just pray it's 100 hours long like some of her previous efforts.

Do Say: "This song is good fun isn't it? and isn't it nice that she just wants us to be loved? Pass the cocktails, this makes me want to dance"

Don't Say : "UGH IT'S SO CONTRIVED, IT'S LIKE A MARKETING EXERCISE MORE THAN A SONG" Really?

To be honest I'm really enjoying both songs for different reasons but the fact that both artists are releasing new albums in the next few months is cause for much excitement. Britney's Femme Fatale feels like it might be a collection of brilliantly produced pop masterpieces with a slightly souless sheen while Born This Way will offer soaring melodies with a side order of cheese that might begin to grate. But who knows? As Gaga arriving to an award show in an egg shows you really can't predict the pop world sometimes. 

Maighréad - Irish Electro Pop Alert!

One of the annoying things about not blogging lately has been dropping the ball when artists get in touch with tracks you think are cool and/or worth a mention. Case in point with Limerick electro pop artist (now based in London) Maighréad.

She sent me her video for the track Sea awhile back and it's well worth a look. The video is directed by Mark Video who has worked with Kanye West and Yazoo and there's definitely a hint of that in both the visuals and the sound of the track. Soulful vocals, sparse but sharp production and a neat chorus meld for a track that I've gone back to quite a bit over the last few months.


Check out the video below and check out her myspace for more on Maighread, who I think you might be hearing alot more about.

Spin That Record - Top Tunes of the Moment Circa April 2010

Again, inspired by Eimear's blog, just a list of tunes that have been spun by myself lately. Some old, some new. Various degrees of cheese too (of course) but I'm not going to go into detail here but a nice mix of electro pop, commercial R&B and remixes methinks!

BoA - Eat You Up

Black Eyed Peas - Rock That Body (Skillrex Remix)

Wynter Gordon - Dirty Talk (Laidback Luke Remix)

Christina Aguilera - Not Myself Tonight

Big Boi - Shutterbug

Kardinal Offishall feat. Akon - Body Bounce

Estelle - Freak (Disco Fries Remix)

The Bloody Beetroots - Domino

Lindsay Lohan - Stuck

Trina feat. Lady Gaga - Let Them Hoes Fight

Goldfrapp - Rocket (Tiesto Remix)

Kelis - Acapella (Dave Aude Remix)

Lil' Jon - Give It All U Got

Bitches With Wolves: The Great Irish Pop Hope

I often lament that we don’t have any proper popstars in Ireland. I mean you’ve got your Westlifes and all but it’s not the same. And while you can’t deny that everyone from U2 to The Script have flown the flag for bands in different shapes and sizes we’ve never had someone to be our Madonna as such.

Well thank goodness then for Bitches With Wolves and  their star in the making frontman James O’Neill. Bitches With Wolves have garnered plenty of buzz over the last year. Thanks to a strong live show, some high profile support gigs (I'm sorry did someone say Groove Armada, Fatboy Slim and Calvin Harris?) and a couple of exciting tracks on their Myspace BWW feel like a proper pop force in the making.

Their current track Broken Hearts is a fine example of what makes the group so exciting. Sounding like a MSTRKRFT remix, Goldfrapp on a boozy Friday night and early 80s Madonna  if she were born today all put in a pop blender, it’s a pleasing piece of crunchy, dirty electro pop.

If that weren’t enough the group have also announced a string of dates at the Academy 2 starting this Saturday (the 3rd of April). I can only imagine the kind of antics James and co. will get up to onstage but whatever they do it’s sure to be poptastic.

I can’t help but love that poster too. Who hasn’t sat on their disco ball and thought about the world? Get more info on the gigs here, add them on Facebook and make sure you check out Broken Hearts on the band’s Myspace and if you really like it, remind the fine folks at Spin 103.8 of the fact as they’ve added it to their playlist. Lovely stuff.

Bittersweet Bextor: Sophie Ellis Bextor Returns With A Killer Single

From her days of Groovejet to a consistent portfolio of top pop singles, Sophie Ellis Bextor has carved a niche as one of the most enjoyable yet slightly shy of the big time popstars around. Her last album Trip The Light Fantastic was painfully underrated, from the exuberant electro pop of Catch You to the Xenomania gem If You Go, it still stands up to repeat listens. After a successful collaboration with dance-pop wizards the Freemasons last year on Heartbreak (Make Me A Dancer) the pair show up on her new release Bittersweet (alongside pop songwriters supreme Richard "Biffco" Stannard and Hannah Robinson).


With the Freemasons on board you'd probably be thinking that Bittersweet is a stomper. And you'd be right. An epic slice of chilly electro pop, the chorus plays that fine line between desire and disdain that suits Bextor's vocals perfectly. It already feels like a proper stormer of a tune, the kind of thing Bextor needs to reaffirm her place on the pop heap. If that weren't enough there is a rather heavenly extended mix by the Freemasons that will probably go down something of a storm in the clubs.

The remix by Jodie Harsh is also pretty special and with rumoured producers on the new album reported to include Groove Armada, Richard X and the Sneaker Pimps it's hard not to be just a little bit excited about what's coming our way Sophie Wise.

Goldfrapp Rocket Themselves Back Down The Disco

I wasn't entirely surprised when Goldfrapp promised a more upbeat direction with their new album Head First, due for release in March. The last effort, the sublime Seventh Tree was a deep and rewarding release but one that seemed like a brief turn to something softer. On the basis of their new single Rocket they've return to a more upbeat place with their music. But this time it's one dressed up in new-disco shine.

Unlike the slinky synths and sexuality of Black Cherry and Supernature, Rocket suggests a more playful side to Goldfrapp. It doesn't have the immediate hit of Oooh La La but it has a shimmer-y, sunshine feel and a deceptively catchy chorus.

Why it really works too is how it sounds utterly Goldfrapp but still fresh. That knack for continued growth has served this group really well and you can't help but be just the teeny bit excited about what else Alison and Will have up their sleeve.

Charming, catchy and utterly likeable this has all the hallmarks of a sizeable hit. And you can't help but feel the remixes of this one are going to be killer.

Six Pack: Six Songs to Get Excited About

Here you are, six songs I love at the moment. Just a selection but a fine bunch of tunes nonetheless.

Wiley feat. Chew Fu - Take That

At the risk of coming over all Annie Mac (no bad thing I suppose) this is a TUNE. I've been obsessed with Chew Fu for the last six months with his pile of mindblowing remixes getting bigger and bigger every week. Not least his work on many of Lady Gaga's recent singles. Still this collaboration with Wiley (he of "Wearing My Rolex" fame and darling of the UK garage/grime scene) is undoubtedly going to swallow the charts and the clubs whole over the next few months. And quite right too. Surprisingly off the wall and bonkers for a mainstream dance track, this is an abrasive, agressive slice of upbeat grime pop. Harder than some of the recent Chew Fu mixes and no doubt a bit of a retort to critics on Wiley's part it sounds a bit like Dizzee Rascal's "Bonkers" put through a blender and bashed off a wall several times. If that makes any sense.

The video is suitably bonkers too:

Janet Jackson : Make Me

Janet is one of my favourite artists of all time and my feverish love of her is mocked sometimes. But with the release of a new career spanning best of those who doubt her contribution to pop might do a double take. I don't want to bore anyone or go off topic but Janet has had a significant hand in shaping the last 10 years of pop videos, genre hopping R&B/pop and dance routines. Thankfully her new single, Make Me sums all this up in a few short minutes. Infectious, brash and charming this is a bouncy piece of effortless pop. The MJ references are obvious but its totally Janet too. And a new video that manages to make Janet look contemporary but not like mutton dressed as lamb (which has eluded Janet recently if I'm being honest) this should be the song to remind many what they've been missing. But if not its another treat for the long time fans. And the video is like a masterclass in how to wear shoulder pads. Work.

Kelis : Acapella

She set the internet abuzz with this David Guetta produced track a couple of weeks ago. And rightly so. A tad more stripped down than some of his recent big hit productions this is joyful and hard to resist. A simple laid back vocal from Kelis meshes with the blippy and smooth beat. Kelis has been hard at work with a gaggle of top producers (as is her style) including Crookers (see recent dubstep track "No Security"), Boyz Noize, and Burns for an album that will be released next year through Interscope. Kelis is one of the most interesting people in modern pop, handing out hits alongside offbeat gems and the signs are good for this new album to be another stonker.

Lady Gaga: Telephone feat. Beyonce

The Fame Monster is another piece of perfect pop from Miss Gaga. And this second single, a breathless piece of pounding dance pop is kind of brilliant. Featuring an urgent cameo from Beyonce (returning the favour for Videophone I'd imagine) it sounds ridiculously good blaring out of club speakers and features more hooks catchy chorus than your average pop single. This will be everywhere during the next six months and its easy to see why.

Not only that but this amazing unofficial video has been doing the rounds, a truly interesting piece of pop art:

Name The Pet : Club Kid

Found this rather lovely electro pop track over at Dödselectro. It seems a tad low key at first but this one works it way into your brain and is something of a floor filler. A sharp piece of electro to start of a particularly great weekend. And a track that makes me want to check out this artist in a bit more detail.

Rihanna : Russian Roulette

This song has really really grown on me. The Rated R album is one of the years best and this slow burner power ballad is one of the standouts. The emotion ripples throughout the track and it is hands down one of the best vocals Rihanna has ever done. She may not have as big a voice as other pop singers but she can sell songs like this with ten times more intensity. One of the best pop singles of the year.