The Singles Jukebox

It’s preposterously long credited artists Wednesday!

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[6.33]

Jonathan Bogart: I’m starting to formulate a theory that European dance music is an expression of the vast unconscious desires of humanity at this point in history. There are a lot of awkward attempts at reassurance in these records lately, there’s an acknowledgment (even if only by contradiction) that the world is dangerous and unpredictable, and there’s an increasing premium on childish images of security — physical desire (the great subject of dance music in the 90s) now gives way to first-order needs on the Maslow scale. Which probably says more about the state of the world than it does about dance, or about any particular record. Maybe because there’s nothing else to be said about them.
[4]

Edward Okulicz: Banging and comfortingly so, but it would have been even better if they’d gone the whole ridiculous hog and asked Stevie Nicks to do the vocal. I bet she’d have said yes.
[8]

Anthony Easton: Wasn’t Jacques Lu Cont supposed to be a superstar of pure genius? What happened to him? i I mean, I am glad that he is marginally producing this, but it’s a large step down from his heights.
[5]

Scott Mildenhall: Hyper-sincerity and over-overwroughtness might not be the healthiest modes of conduct in Actual Everyday Life, but they don’t half make for brilliant pop music. Malin Dahlström’s voice was made to express them too, and this combination of star-cross’d love and undiminishable devotion, the beauty and the banging is full of them, MASSIVE FEELINGS aplenty. Someone knew what they were doing holding back such an autumnal and chartbound-sounding record til September.
[9]

Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: Malin Dahlström has one of these individualistic voices that you can’t shake — on the tip of being a screech, her timbre picks up confidence, elongates vowels, adds emotional emphasis to every syllable. Her performance of “Safe With You” sounds fascinating enough that she can work through cliches with relative ease (“I’ll do anything… you’ll do anything” etc). Congratulations to Metric & Lu Cont, then, for pushing against her voice with all the aural thump they can muster. For all of its idiosyncrasies, Dahlström’s voice can’t muster up a good fight for long enough. She ends up buried.
[5]

Brad Shoup: It’s now, so Malin’s got to wring her cords out over a decent Morse code synthriff. And her repetition of the title grated at first, but what if the backing were her throwback Romantic swells or, I dunno, the whisper of taxi cabs on the sidewalk? Maybe the result wouldn’t have to lead with the banging. No matter, this still has melody to spare and it’s structured around the emotional throughline, not the rise.
[6]

Patrick St. Michel: Turns out I’ll take the overly dramatic and repetitive over goofy lyrics and big pop hooks, at least with Alex Metric. He produced “American Girl” by Bonnie McKee, and his collaboration with Jacques Lu Cont bares a few similarities to that hit mostly in how it builds up. He sounds a bit more interested in how everything sounds here rather than building up to a big chorus — fair enough! — and the synths here practically prick skin. Malin’s lyrics are a little goofy (especially the first verse) but the actual music works for the three and half minutes it is allotted.
[6]

Will Adams: It’s an exquisite melody. Not on its own terms, but for the way it interacts with the harmony. Each chord change makes the last note on “you” either consonant or dissonant. Malin’s pinched vowels highlight the alternation, but she also adds an uptick as she releases the note, which turns the declaration into a question — “safe with you?” This fits right in against the lockstep synths and giant kick drum, and both fill the sonic field to capacity. There’s an urgency here that makes “Safe With You” one of the year’s most affecting dance songs.
[9]

Alfred Soto: If I heard Malin’s cratered, crinkly voice over those undulating Lu Cont synths in a club, I couldn’t deny it. Indoors she’s Ellie Goulding at the shrink.
[5]