“Golden” by The Pinup Saints
We interviewed the Pinup Saints for the June edition – if you recall they are a dance group that features So You Think You Can Dance Canada’s winner Nico Archambault, but apparently they have some real musical talent behind them as well. This unconventional album comes as a one-size-fits-all black thong with the album’s name emblazoned in gold. Where does the music come from? Well put the underwear on and you’ll find out…that there’s a drop card attached with the information you need to download your album off the internet.
There are a great many upbeat songs on this album with some real character. My first big-time favorite is title track “Golden”, a manic number about a boy who lusts after a woman that he only knows in a magazine. It’s full of naïve excitement, with a brief but hilarious moment where he realizes how sad his obsession really sounds.
“Mister” is a sassy number dripping with clever innuendo. “I feel I’m misbehaving, I’m hungry too. You wanna make a sandwich?” It has a heavy-beat reminiscent of Madonna’s “Hanky Panky”, accompanied by a mischievous saxophone and gratifying electric guitar.
“Make Me Over” is dynamite! It has a catchy but quirky melody, and alludes to the hardcore bonus track that appears after it. The bonus track is a teardown of labels and gender barriers when it comes to sex: “What if I like girls, does that make me a dyke? What if I like clit, isn’t that what you like? What if your girlfriend is my girl for the night? Am I a bitch?”
“POPular” Series by Centaur Music
The POPular series takes many favorites from the last year or so, remixed for the dance floor. I received the first 3 volumes to review, and found the albums to be hit and miss.
DJ Corey King chose to reconstruct his selection of songs from scratch in Volume 1, rather than hunting down samples from the originals. Perhaps this gave him more freedom but I wondered, why bother starting from scratch when the final result is a big step down in quality from the original? On my list of tolerable tracks were “Pocket Full of Sunshine”, “Hot N Cold”, and “Sandcastle Disco”. By far the most disappointing track was “Disturbia” where it was like DJ Corey King recorded weak vocals, hastily laid down a beat, and then gave up. A total wet rag of a song, and a slightly weak album over all.
Thank goodness for Volume 2 by Eastside, who came along and showed how it ought to be done - a very professional job. I’m not certain whether they used the original vocals or recorded their own – nevertheless they were seamlessly mixed onto their own instrumentation. Aside from that, I found the selection impeccably compatible with my musical taste. Favorites were “Let It Rock”, “Circus”, “Right Round”, “Keeps Getting Better”, “Cry For You”, and “My Life Would Suck Without You”. Other good ones were “Sober”, “Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)”, and “I Hate This Part”. This album definitely gets my strong recommendation.
Volume 3 by DJ Bob Wolcott continued the professionalism, but had a really odd selection of songs. Most of them were unfamiliar to me, and frankly they didn’t grow on me whatsoever by hearing them here. But he did have a couple of winners, for example, “Waking Up In Vegas” and “When Love Takes Over”. By far my favorite was “Second Chance” – a rock song that translated phenomenally well into a powerful dance number.
“Tonight” Single by Yuksek
Well, this weird looking European guy has some pretty snazzy dance tunes. It’s a really simple lyrical concept, with the line “take my hand tonight, go ahead tonight, play my game tonight, keep your head tonight” repeated over a bed of percussion and electronica. The album version is catchy in itself, but the Edit version gives it a slightly different melodic tilt. In my opinion, the best dance mix included on the EP album is the RAC Remix, but I was quite smitten with the “Bewitched” cover that turns it into a folk piece. I’m definitely interested to see what else Yuksek has to offer on his new album.
