Idolator: Alphabeat

Alphabeat Are Livin' In The '80s

Michaelangelo Matos — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 11:30:00 EDT

We can attest to the truth and rightness of Time Out New York arts editor Elisabeth Vincentelli about Alphabeat's new "Boyfriend (Pete Hammond Remix)," which she has an MP3 link for—it really is like a late-'80s time machine, and I say that as someone who actually sat through all of the three-CD Stock Aitken Waterman: Gold (third disc features the 7-minute megamixes!). Hammond was one of SAW's main men, and he takes Alphabeat's song back in time so effectively you'll start looking for jelly shoes to dance to it in. [The Determined Dilettante]

Alphabeat Reveal The Powers Lurking Inside All Your Mix Tapes

Maura Johnston — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 09:00:00 EDT

I really, really hope that Danish wonky pop outfit Alphabeat keeps releasing summer jams for the Stacey Q-raised set every month until September. Also: I would love to know just how many feet of magnetic tape were used in the climactic scene of this video, where Alphabeat singer Stine Bramsen unleashes the fury of the cassettes she's dedicated to the boy of her dreams. (If only I'd known how to employ that tactic back in ninth grade.) [YouTube / [MySpace]

Idolator's Summer Jam Tournament Reignites The Fierce UK-Denmark Pop Rivalry

Dan Gibson — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 13:00:00 EDT

The second half of Idolator's summer-jam semifinal is ready for tipoff (or whatever the musical equivalent is). Remember: These polls close tomorrow, so to have your voice heard, make sure you vote early and often—especially in this difficult matchup between Estelle's love letter to American men in baggy jeans and Alphabeat's ecstatically retro Europop party. Poll after the jump!

Alphabeat [MySpace]
Estelle [MySpace]

Idolator's Quest For The Ultimate Summer Jam Will Be Fascinated With You For A Long Time

Maura Johnston — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 11:00:00 EDT

New York City may not be in full-on bake mode right now, but our summer-jam journey soldiers on with a battle between the forthcoming single from Long Island's biggest diva and the wavers of the "wonky pop" banner. Vote after the jump!

Idolator's 2008 Summer Jam Tournament Kicks Off With A Battle Between Good Old Boys And Wonky Pop

Maura Johnston — Thu, 29 May 2008 11:00:00 EDT

As promised, our quest to find 2008's official summer jam in a reader-determined tournament starts today; over the next few days we'll roll out the rest of the nominees, which come from all over the radio map, including even those areas we aren't very excited to be traveling through. (Hey, we have to acknowledge the inevitable, although you should know that the Katy Perry song has been disqualified on principle—especially since its "controversial even though it wasn't all that controversial in 1995" subject matter is now garnering attention from the overly gullible media.) After the jump, our first two contenders—Brooks & Dunn's "Put A Girl In It" and Alphabeat's "Fascination"—duke it out, with accompanying commentary courtesy Dan Gibson and Kate Richardson, respectively.

Alphabeat, "Fascination"

Kate Richardson — Thu, 29 May 2008 00:00:00 EDT

When I wrote about so-called Wonky Pop movement and its brightest prospect, the big, goofy Danish band Alphabeat, I said of my summer-jam nominee "...it hits you like a load of laundry just out of the dryer...You get the feeling that "Fascination" should be playing on a radio in a suburban garage as someone washes a car on a Saturday afternoon." It seems I had preemptively prepared a sentence for this tournament's very purpose; after all, what's more summery than washing a car in your driveway out in suburbia? Alphabeat may seem a bit gawky and out of place when pitted against some of the smoother songs blaring across your neighborhood's byways, but the fact remains that "Fascination" is a like a sunburst in song form. It's light and breezy, but aggressively fun and entirely free of pretension. It truly embodies the relaxing-with-gusto spirit of the summer—and, best of all, it's the perfect song to get people dancing at a pool party and/or backyard barbecue. [YouTube]

Alphabeat And The Rest Of The Wonky Pop Brigade Are Here To Save The Day

Kate Richardson — Fri, 02 May 2008 12:00:00 EDT

The Guardian's profile of the Wonky Pop tour begins with an appeal to beleaguered music fans: "Tired of chart pop that's all manufactured groups and reality TV shows? Just as fed up of bland indie? Then Wonky Pop might just be the thing for you." It's almost crass in its resemblance to infomercial rhetoric ("Are you tired of your old, hard-to-operate pasta strainer?"), but it contains such a fundamental element of truth that it's hard not to read on. In many ways pop music is broken, and it's about time for a new regime. But is Wonky Pop the answer?

The Wonky Pop artists are unmanufactured but unashamedly melodic and capable of playing live without recourse to lashings of dry ice, troupes of dancers and an interlude during which they fly around the stage on wires. As well as Alphabeat, it features the vaguely psychedelic pop-soul of Leon Jean-Marie, a dreadlock-sporting refugee from a Damage-style boyband who once toured with Steps, and Vincent Frank, a wiry 23-year-old who plies an intense brand of self-produced electro-pop under the name Frankmusic.
All three hark back to an 80s they're too young to remember, not just because of specific references in their music - Alphabeat's sound is not unlike a Dayglo take on Let's Dance-era Bowie, Leon Jean-Marie is audibly in love with Prince, Frankmusic vaguely resembles Soft Cell had they been produced by Daft Punk - but because they seem to embody the kind of pop star that held sway in the era before Stock, Aitken and Waterman's legion of interchangeable poppets took over the charts.

On the page—what with the harkening back to the '80s and use of the term electro-pop—it sounds as if Wonky Pop is just another watered-down nostalgia movement, but upon review of the music it's apparent that there's at least some undefinable quality to these bands that, in a perfect world, could potentially breathe some life into the bloated corpse of modern pop, or at least reanimate the dormant genre of smart chart pop that appeals to people over the age of 16. Of the three bands featured in the article, Alphabeat—already a huge success in their native Denmark and widely known in the UK—seems to be the most promising on first listen. Their latest single "Fascination" is like a long-lost number from Footloose, and it's delivered with an appropriately bubbly Broadway gusto.

At the same time, it's not completely enslaved to its heritage—there's definitely something fresh in the sound; it hits you like a load of laundry just out of the dryer. And while the band's look is indie-precious, the sound of the music is decidedly more populist. You get the feeling that "Fascination" should be playing on a radio in a suburban garage as someone washes a car on a Saturday afternoon. Their song "10,000 Nights" is perhaps even more indebted to the giants of '80s pop:

The first thing I thought when I heard this song was "Hall & Oates." The second was how happy I'd be if I were driving and it came on the radio.

Another thing Wonky Pop has going for it is variety. Leon Jean-Marie is, as The Guardian so tidily put it, "vaguely psychedelic pop-soul." His song "Scratch" sounds like it walked straight off a Beck album, and it's more or less indicative of his bass-heavy, loopy sound.

His other single, "Bed of Nails," is a shade banal, but it's got a nice melodic texture and practically dares you not to tap your foot along with the booming bassline.

Frankmusik seems to be the weakest link. If there's one genre from the '80s that almost always falls flat upon re-visitation it's "electropop." The minute a-ha unleashed "Take On Me" in 1985, this genre simply could not get any better—so acts like Frankmusik are just running around in circles, and often being kind of obnoxious in the process. Exhibit A:

The fact that he looks like a Blue States Lose regular doesn't exactly endear him to me.

Exhibit B:

What's the use of this song? I've tried to envision dancing to it and all I see is bored-looking people swiveling their shoulders around. It's got no life, and the vocals are a drag.

So Wonky Pop's got approximately one and a half out of three. Not terrible, but is it enough to save pop music? Obviously its overlords seem to think so:

Meanwhile, Watt, who also manages Mika, has cannily copyrighted the name Wonky Pop and is planning to extend the brand in a manner that would win the approval of Simon Fuller: he's preparing two further tours, a club night and a series of one-off dates in London. Whether this makes the whole enterprise seem a little less organic, unmanufactured and indeed wonky than it's perhaps making itself out to be is a moot point, but there are no shortage of artists who want to get involved. "There are at least 20 bands that fit loosely into this genre," says Watt. "I'm hoping it will be a self-fulfilling thing, that people who go to the gigs will want to go out and create their own version of it."

Please, let's not ruin the momentum of Wonky Pop by dragging Mika into this. He and Keane have proven that the world didn't care about a Freddie Mercury revival. But, come to think of it, that raises the very pertinent question of whether or not the general listening public would be any more receptive to a new Hall & Oates era of sharp, accessible chart pop produced more or less for adults. My guess is probably not, if only because top 40 radio (in the U.S., at least) is a barren wasteland that's about as likely to give a spunky Danish band that plays almost exclusively in London dive bars any rotation as it is to ever stop playing "Hotel California" on its "Mix" stations. Nice try, though.

'We are the outsiders with this music' [The Guardian]
Wonky Pop Tour [Official Site]
Alphabeat [MySpace]
Leon Jean-Marie [MySpace]
Frankmusik [MySpace]