How about a pretty broken-hearted Swedish girl, then?
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[7.09]
Ian Mathers: I had assumed that my love for “White Light Moment” was going to be a one-off (after all, isn’t Styrke a Swedish Idol runner-up?), but “High and Low” is nearly as strong. Even more impressively, after a song that ultimately won me over through sheer force, “High and Low” is much more reserved, even melancholy. if “White Light Moment” was about chasing romantic transcendance so hard that the stars started falling around you, “High and Low” is the moment after: “What if there is nothing here for me? / You let me in just to get out… I feel your arms around me, but not the heat.” Its strength is quieter and sadder than its predecessor’s, but no less lovely or affecting. Now I actually want to hear the album.
[9]
Katherine St Asaph: All she continues to want is another “White Light Moment”; all she continues to deliver is another pretty-pretty chorus scrubbed of all the verses’ drama.
[7]
Brad Shoup: Haven’t given much thought to Tove Styrke since she emitted a series of beyond-doofy covers on Swedish Idol in ’09. Lack of vision is never a reason to write off a pop singer, though, and now I rejoin Ms. Styrke in mid-career form. Texturally, the song is flawless. Drums are recorded well, keyboards sound submerged, handclaps are melancholy. It’s the kind of tune that exists for the remixes, and that’s OK.
[6]
Pete Baran: So a couple of weeks ago, I invented a straw alien figure, who would destroy the earth in four minutes unless you could explain the appeal of Robyn. (“Call Your Girlfriend” was the Earth-saving response.) Anyhoo, said alien was sated for a few weeks and then came back to ask another world shattering issue. What marks out Robyn from other Swedish pop singers? That would require more than four minutes to answer and may include pictures of a slapped arse and bulldog sucking a thistle, but throwing in this perfectly pleasant Tove Styrke as exhibit B would probably be instrumental in saving the earth again. Though why this alien is SO obsessed with Robyn…
[6]
Zach Lyon: Hello? Robyn? I just met somebody new…
[9]
Michaela Drapes: I have a terrible, sinking feeling that I won’t end up liking anything else Tove Styrke releases. This song is one of those one-off slices of perfection; everything is perfectly smooth and serene, icy to the point of abject boredom, exactly metered out just so to fit a predetermined formula (awesome, thanks for that one, Robyn!). I hope I’m wrong about that, though.
[8]
Martin Skidmore: This Swedish disco pop number is rather likable: the backing is light and summery, and she sings it with a relaxed amiability, perhaps not expressing lows very much, but it’s a diverting listen, with a cute chorus.
[7]
Edward Okulicz: “High and Low” would have fit perfectly on Margaret Berger’s Pretty Scary Silver Fairy album: polite beats and permafrost melodies. In fact, it’ll do nicely while waiting for another Berger record — Styrke dances around swirls and whooshes, delivers a good tune amidst a dollop of vocal charisma and the heartstrings are tugged gently.
[8]
Sally O’Rourke: I’m so used to hearing pop singers sound like robots, Lolitas and old blues women that it’s disarming to hear one who sounds like a teenage girl. The cool synths and Studio 54 beat further mark Styrke as little-girl-lost in the world of adult relationships. “Love doesn’t hurt,” she sings, but her fragile voice betrays the irreparable wounds of a heart crushed for the first time.
[8]
Alfred Soto: She needs love and arms around her — a friskier beat too. The only way she can convince me that something’s at stake is to project over those frosty, fetching synthesizer block chords.
[5]
Jer Fairall: Moribund soft rock revivalism in the current Bon Iver/Destroyer/Toro Y Moi mode, made almost interesting by the dry cracks in her uneasy voice. From the singer who gave us the positively sparkling “White Light Moment,” though, it is disheartening to find her already falling in with the wrong crowd.
[5]