This place is prison

The music video for McFly's new single, "Party Girl," is out.

The cynical part of me says that if you're already facing accusations of bandwagon jumping with your new more electro sound, throwing vampires in your video isn't exactly going to fend off those claims.

Maybe more importantly, it makes no sense, probably due to the fact that it seems to be random clips from the online movie they've made (as opposed to, say, a music video length presentation of a plot), intercut with performance footage. It also literally features a stripper pole. Then again, they've hardly been making great videos as of late anyway.

The song is still solid but not fantastic (why couldn't there have been a stronger chorus?). Nothing's really going to knock the album off the top spot on my "most anticipated albums of the year" list, though.

In other news, the original b-sides for the single include "Hotel On A Hill" and "Sunny Side Of The Street," two songs from the set that leaked earlier this year.

If looks could kill, then we all would be doomed

When journalists made comparisons between the new McFly single and Lady Gaga, I thought it was just a bad description based on the Dallas Austin-produced "Party Girl" having some electro influences in it.

Party Girl (Clip) by poppostergirl

(Full credit and many thanks for that recording goes to here.)

I was wrong. Boy, those opening "ohh"s could have come straight out of a Lady Gaga song, couldn't they? Of course, after that, the song takes a different direction.

Apparently the full thing is getting played on British radio tonight, but as far as premature evaluations based on fifty-four second clips go, I'm pretty excited.

OK, that's an understatement: the verse and and bridge are both FANTASTIC, hard electro-pop with a great topline. They're shout-it-from-the-rooftops amazing. Though I have nowhere near the right persona to pull off an expression like this, they are in fact, as reported, "rocking." My only concern is that I hope there's more to the chorus than we're hearing, a second half that is irresistably catchy and as aggressive as the music from those earlier sections; so far, it's the least impressive part of the song. Still, we hear so little that I'm fairly hopeful that there's more to the chorus or that it makes sense in its complete form.

After being very underwhelmed by the single from their greatest hits and all the singles except "Falling In Love" from Radio:ACTIVE, it's such a relief to be excited and enthusiastic about a lead single from them again.

"Party Girl" is out September 6 (why so far out?), with the album probably out in November or so and preceded by a second single, "Shine A Light."

In her own world

British band McFly's new single, "Party Girl," comes out September 6, but we should be hearing it on British radio soon. Produced by Dallas Austin, it's been described by one set of people as having more of an electro feel than their earlier work and as being comparable to Enrique Iglesias's "I Like It" or as "Taio, Tinchy, Enrique and 3OH!3 all rolled into one." There will be more news forthcoming as journalists attend listening parties for three of the group's new songs, but we do know (from earlier news) that the group worked with Taio Cruz in addition to Dallas for their album, which is out in October or so.

Fans were divided over some demos that leaked a while back, some thinking they were too much of a departure from McFly's usual sound, but I really liked some of them, including the ones that sounded like they were actually from this fifth album's recording sessions. Sure, there are some electro effects, but they didn't really feel like that much of a departure and, more importantly, they were good.

There's also been "news"--blah blah blah logos blah blah blah famous movie poster designer etc.--about a fan community the group is setting up (the reason for the photo at left), but none of it is really all that exciting yet. Just give us some of the song to listen to, eh, boys?

To make you smile

We interrupt this Swedish pop binge to bring you the following news: Tom Fletcher...



...is looking mighty fine lately.

(On an unrelated note, Danny's voice is still, for lack of a better phrase, just what I want it to be.)

Please, pop gods and goddesses, let me love the next McFly album.

Anyway, further evidence for the prosecution:



To swerve back into music appreciation, the supposed raison d'etre for this blog, here they are performing one of my favorite, favorite songs by them, "Falling In Love."



The overlapping, in round part in the middle 8? In the studio version, one of the most swoon-worthy pop moments I know (here, they delegate some of the singing to the crowd, so the effect isn't quite the same).

Find a new way of falling in love

In news of the weird, British band McFly have been working on music for their new album with Dallas Austin. It's not that I don't have a lot of respect for Dallas--he's made some of the decade's best songs, no question--but it's a match-up I never envisioned. Hopefully he can refine the boys' sound into something that connects with me more than Radio:ACTIVE generally did. If you've read this blog since its beginning, you'll know how much I love McFly and think they don't get anything near the respect they deserve, but I never fell for the majority of their last album. I'm not sure whether the melodies weren't there for me or if the production wasn't my style, but even just thinking about it now gives me that fingers-down-a-chalkboard feeling of on-edge agitation, which is never a reaction I thought I'd have or wanted to have to the band's music.

(Picture from Dallas Austin's blog.)

As incongruous a team as Dallas and McFly seem to make, maybe a bit of spit and polish from the man behind Pink's "Don't Let Me Get Me" and "Just Like A Pill" and Anastacia's "Left Outside Alone" is just what the group needs. It's no secret that I'd prefer them to return to the sound of "Transylvania," "Friday Night," and "We Are The Young" from Motion In The Ocean, but if that's not on the cards, I'll settle for music I love, plain and simple.

Let's take a moment for a Dallas Austin song which, although probably not sounding anything like his material with McFly, is perfect.



In other McFly news, the song I class as their best work since the best songs on Motion In The Ocean, the simple, beautiful ballad "Falling In Love," is apparently at #33 in radio play at Spain's biggest station. To steal from fans of a certain underrated Minogue, $ucce$$!

In even stranger news, they also wrote with Taio Cruz. I really like Taio, but once again, I can't say I ever saw this collaboration coming. Then again, it's so easy to think of Taio as "Break Your Heart," Tinchy Stryder-collaborating Taio that you forget he also wrote Will Young's "Your Game" (though even the former Taio is one that, as I said, I enjoy).

#99 McFly, "Lies"

And I'm just one drink away
And I'm back in Wonderland like it was yesterday
And I hope you get to hear me say,
"Who gets the last
Who gets the last
Who gets the last laugh now?"

Oh, McFly. One of my first true musical loves, at least post-my music renaissance. The group I've respected and loved, championed, cheered for for years. Why is it, then, that I've not been as swept away by their latest material as much as I want to be?

Let me just try to focus on the great things about this single that enabled it to make this list, much as it's difficult to ignore the voice in the back of my head pointing out that the group that probably would have topped my 2006 singles list had a I done it and that went top 20 and probably should have gone higher in last year's list is just barely making the countdown this year. First off, how on Earth are they able to afford videos like this post-apocalyptic one when they're now (by choice) on their own record label? Secondly, though, "Lies" is a dramatic horns- and string-featuring pop-rock attack. Early on in the single's life, I read something from the group about how the single was probably lyrically their darkest one yet and did a mental double-take--really? I mean, sure, it was complaining about a bad girlfriend and her lies, but that's hardly unusual; I'd only ever noted the lyrics for the clever reference to their second album they contain. Skeptical, I went back and listened to the song again, actually paying proper attention to all the lyrics this time...and couldn't believe what I'd missed out on all the previous times. Midway through the song, the references to weapons and destruction switch from metaphors to reality, a reality that ends up with a girl dead in a car accident while the narrator gloats. The situation then gets portrayed more as fantasy or what will happen than as what's actually happened, but it really is darker than I was expecting. If anything, though, that only enhanced my appreciation for a song that was already fun enough, even if tinged in musical darkness, to get plays from me. Bold, though not quite as bold as McFly can get even while making great songs ("Transylvania," which is a bit similar to "Lies," is both bolder and more fun than it), "Lies" is another fine addition to the McFly canon. I just hope their next album will contain more songs to love--for a group with songwriters and musicians as excellent as those of McFly, good is just simply not good enough.

Find it on: Radio:ACTIVE

Always better late than never

I could've fallen in love
I wish I'd fallen in love...

"Falling In Love" just might be my favorite straightforward ballad McFly have ever done...and that's saying something. There is, to be a fair, a little bit of the slight jaunt of "All About You" or "Obviously" in the music of the verses, but it's no more than part of the McFly style or, if you're feeling particularly over-the-top, a method of bringing about a brief flash of wistful nostalgia to accompany the song's lyrics of regret.

Regret and momentary hope, to be more accurate. Life in the aftermath of the one that got away is common enough songwriting fodder, and yet somehow something the band have done here has made the subject feel worthy of revisiting.

It's a song that's fully filled in, never left feeling sparse or acoustic, and an example of excellent songwriting--their sense of melody and orchestration has never been better--and yet fairly simple for all that, with no showing off. A little guitar strumming, just enough to keep the song moving forward, a little percussion, a few piano runs here and there, but it's all meshed together into a gentle backdrop verging on the swoonworthy, especially when the backing vocals come in. Danny and Tom's singing is spot-on, expressive but never overdone, and their combined middle 8, that moment where the sound drops and Tom sings a backing chant "sick of waiting, I can't take it, gotta tell ya" while Danny finally stirs up the courage to pick up the phone and then moves into the backing vocal-style "ohh"s of before, is nothing less than music at its most sadness-extinguishing-hope enchanting, both lighters-in-the-air and tragic. It's not a song that should be overanalyzed (much as my impulse is to do so): just a well-done pop song.

I've gone on the record at various times in the past as worried that McFly have turned or are going to turn into a band no different than, say, the Plain White T's--it's the "Friday Night"s, the "Transylvania"s, the "We Are The Young"s, the "Sorry's Not Good Enough"s that get me the most excited--but when they give us a song this perfect, that little voice telling me that they really are some of the most underrated songwriters going begins whispering in my ear again.

To buy McFly's fourth studio album, Radio:ACTIVE, go here (physical) or here (digital).

Next up: maybe that American singer...but probably not.

Sweet dreams tonight

Not only is today (technically tomorrow or Monday, but they're out digitally now due to time differences) a fairly brilliant day for British singles releases, it just so happens that the brilliance of three of those releases is enhanced by the dance routines in their music videos.

Same Difference's debut single "We R One," a bit like High School Musical crossed with Melodifestivalen, has been out for quite some time now, long enough to know that as a song it stands easily on its own two feet. The video, with its reaching-for-the-sky-and-jumping-inclusive dance routine, makes it just that little bit more exciting, though.



Even though I estimate there's a 55/45 chance Paul will come out of his vacation to post this video, I still feel obligated to post it for him: their performance from tonight's X Factor of said single. Confetti! That dance routine!



It's a relief, though, to know now for sure that George Sampson's sample-riffic "Get Up On The Dance Floor" survives without the (great) video accompanying it. It does benefit from being danced along with, though. I think possibly my favorite thing about the song is the way it teases you with the Yazoo sample before doing something else and then eventually coming back to it, using it in a really great way. Conveniently, the sample's return ties in with the best part of the video--starting with George breaking through a wall--if you're watching it. It's nice to know you don't have to be to enjoy the song, though.



Speaking of short but great songs with great videos, Frankmusik's "3 Little Words" (the Stuart Price-produced version) is out now, too. Sadly, EP track "Better Off As Two" (listen to a clip of it on PopJustice--it's the second one) doesn't seem to be available digitally, which is really tempting me to buy the physical EP (hence why I haven't purchased any of the tracks besides the main single yet). I've already praised "3 Little Words" and its video (as is true of both of the songs before this one, actually), but let me just say this again: brilliant exciting electronic pop with a video that only makes you love the song more.



Moving away from dance routines (sadly), Take That's new single "Greatest Day" is out as well. It comes accompanied by the great (that word's the motif of the day, apparently) b-side "Sleepwalking" (as well as album track "Here," which is apparently on some single version) and a performance on X Factor as well (with credit to Chart Rigger).



Still love the song, still love the cheesy video which perfectly captures the song's aura for me.



There's "Do Ya," that McFly single out, too, accompanied by "Stay With Me," a cover. I know I just posted this video, but for completion's sake, here it is again.



I'll still having trouble rallying up as much enthusiasm for this album as I want to be feeling (though there are some songs I love), but hopefully one day it'll just click.

I'm makin' a list of things that I miss whenever we're far apart

Is this really the video for the new New Kids on The Block single?



The mind boggles.


(Actually, I'm thinking now it must be some sort of Germany-only release tied in with a German movie. "Dirty Dancing" was one of my instant favorites on the album, though, so at least the song is great.)

Speaking of mind-boggling music videos, the video for McFly's "Do Ya" makes me pretty sure they are crazy. I just wish that craziness came through in this latest album more often.



I think Chart Blog put it best: "A nice Christmas video you say, Tom? Something to remind people of the spirit of giving, what with it being a charity single and all? Sounds brilliant. Oh, Dougie ordered a set of extras dressed as zombies, so they're all outside. You do know about that, right?"