Even Swedishes get the blues, sometimes…
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[5.14]
Kat Stevens: The poor dude, he always seems so miserable. *Adds Erik to list of mournful electropop artists I would like to hear doing the Macarena*
[4]
Martin Skidmore: The electro-dancey backing is more likeable than the Coldplayish style on his last couple of singles, meaning it’s a bit easier to enjoy his fairly warm and emotional vocal. It doesn’t seem to go anywhere terribly exciting, but it’s okay.
[5]
Erick Bieritz: As one of the lonely defenders of Mr. Hassle in the past, I’d love to be vindicated here, but I can’t get behind the dour downturn of that repetitive chorus, which needs some livelier inflection to measure up to some decent verses. The only objection I can imagine having with whatever composite score this gets is if it does better than “Don’t Bring Flowers.”
[4]
Jer Fairall: Lyrically reminiscent enough of Bronski Beat’s revolutionary “Smalltown Boy” that I’m initially left to ponder what is at the heart of Hassle’s own small town ennui, but where the former was a mournful/hopeful call for a generational exodus to the possibilities lurking within the worlds within worlds of the city, Hassle is bound to his small town by some unfulfilled romantic nostalgia. Fine, but then why all the talk up front about how much better his sensitive soul is than his boring old hometown, the “small town boys” who don’t get his “big ideas”? A shame, really, because it spoils a solid bit of soft electro-pop, rich with pitter-patter synths and moody guitar washes, that might have really added up to something in hands that weren’t so busy patting their delicate genius of an owner on his own back.
[5]
Katherine St Asaph: Objectively, there’s not much here to like. The chorus is engineered for maximum whininess — putting all those long-E vowels on your highest notes would make any singer go flat — and the lyrics don’t help, especially when the best line, “all the small-town boys were busy being born,” turns out not to be that at all. But there has to be a reason this worked for me. The backing, like its “Dancing on My Own” counterpart after being left out in an empty house for weeks, does a lot. Then there’s the guitar lament that sneaks in during the pre-chorus and the way all Erik’s braggadocio disappears by the end. After this, the last chorus is a cop-out that fades away fast, leaving nothing behind but sympathy or empathy, your choice.
[7]
Michaelangelo Matos: This track fills a similar function as Adam Lambert’s “Whataya Want from Me” did last year — the car-radio ’80s-rock throwback, just like all the other throwbacks I’ve been digging on (Hassle is Swedish, and that part of the world seems to do throwbacks pretty well). A closer listen reveals a craftiness that I’m sure doesn’t deserve anyone’s support, but since I gave Adam a [5] initially, and it wound up being a [10] for me, I’m going to be generous here.
[7]
Iain Mew: Hints at an interesting darkness but remains too slick, too “The Boys of Summer”, to really do much with it. Actually the best bit is towards the end without much of Erik himself. He’s such a lumpen presence throughout that I get the impression he could ruin a much better song.
[4]