Lykke Li - 'Breaking It Up'
Lykke Li has an extraordinary voice. Some singers, like Mariah Carey or Leona Lewis, have extraordinary voices in the sense of sheer range and technical ability and some people have extraordinary voices in the sense of just being very weird. I can't work out the right words to describe the way Lykke sounds; it's not quite 'breathy' but certainly has an intimate quality generally associated with breathiness. And it's not quite reedy, in fact it's very full in some ways but it has a frailty to it that's very seductive. Not in the sense of romantic seduction but the seduction of an open fire or a really good book; cosy and soothing.
I find it faintly irritating that she chooses to use this voice for the powers of Twee, all too often. The first song I heard her on was the Christoffer Remix of 'Everybody But Me,' which I listened to on repeat for about a week until all of my housemates went completely insane. It had a brilliant, slightly 'Popcorn'-esque instrumental and was all sweetness and bubblegum, the sort of song you could imagine Annie doing, except that Lykke has none of the knowingness of Annie and the sweetly naive lyrics about not being asked to dance at the disco rung true, rather than sounding slightly bratty.
(Not to say I've got anything against Annie, it's just a difference of styles)
Un-remixed, though, I (like a lot of people) found myself frustrated that Lykke's voice was put in such twee instrumental settings, where no clash with its environment highlighted the interesting qualities of her voice and as a consequence, nothing more extraordinary than a very self-conscious affair happened. On this song, however, that doesn't happen at all.
The instrumental is subtle but fairly uptempo, like on 'Dance Dance Dance' but instead of the gentle lilt there, this song almost marches along. The shuffling beat belies the lyrics, about the fragility of a relationship that has to save itself at every second whilst the minimalist instrumental gives it an almost hip hop-ish feel. Lykke's voice is sharply highlighted by the playground chanting underneath the chorus, which shows up all the warmth and depth of her own sound and the whole song comes together in a fascinating way.
This uses Lykke in the way she's best suited to, this ironically being on the songs which (conventionally) least suit her voice. The juxtaposition of sweet, rambling vocals and rather sharper instrumentation makes this song stand out as well as or the aforementioned Christoffer remix and as a consequence, the emotional hit that's the 'point' as it were, of Lykke Li songs for me has much more impact. If only she'd leave The Twee alone permanently.
Download: Out now
CD Released: August 25th
(Hazel Robinson)
PS: Lykke Li is going to conquer the States, according to the . Conquer, I say!
Comment number 1.
At 23rd Aug 2008, thranjax wrote:She reminds me more and more of the Poison Girlfriend (japanese popster). A good thing.
Also didn't Frazier mention Popcorn a couple of blogs back? Are we angling for some kind of rerelease or remix? Bloc Party do Popcorn would be kind of cool.
Thranjax
Complain about this comment (Comment number 1)
Comment number 2.
At 27th Aug 2008, -RachelS- wrote:Oooh Thranjax... there is no person by the name of Frazier in Chartblogdom.
You're lucky Fraser's on holiday - you've got time to put that right before he gets back or he WILL NOT BE PLEASED!
...screen tippex? Hack into the 91Èȱ¬ computers? Plead selective dyslexia? You know you're just asking to be called 'Anthrax'?
Complain about this comment (Comment number 2)
Comment number 3.
At 28th Aug 2008, thranjax wrote:er... what's this? A blog from me misnaming chartblog's chief reviewer? I have no memory of putting this here. Someone must be hacking my account, or my evil twin is playing up again!
Thrandribble
or alternatively it may have been me after several beers... but no, I don't believe that for a minute. Must be the evil twin.
Complain about this comment (Comment number 3)