Perfume: Tokyo Girl – Track Review

The J-Pop Trios’ First Single of 2017 (and their first in 15 months) is their best A-Side in Years.

Perfume’s fifth album (last year’s Cosmic Explorer) turned out to be another solid slice of pristine pop from my favourite J-Pop performers. However, it was certainly one of their weakest albums to date and the lead up to the album’s release had been a bumpy road. Sweet Refrain was an enjoyable but unadventurous single, Cling Cling tried a little harder but relegated its best material to B-Side status, and Star Train was resoundingly disappointing. The best single of the Cosmic Explorer era was Pick Me Up and, for me, Tokyo Girl is not dissimilar.

Robyn and La Bagatelle Magique: Love Is Free – Mini-Album Review

For the last decade Robyn, since taking complete control of her music in the early noughties, has been delivering pop music that is not only at the top of its field but frequently innovative too. As a result, any new release from the Swedish pop maverick is greeted with joyful anticipation and followed by a wave of plaudits. Whilst Love Is Free will surely be met with similar critical adulation as her previous work its release has been a sadder affair as it follows the death of producer, and previous Robyn collaborator, Christian Falk last July. It’s fitting, then, that La Bagatelle Magique’s first (and presumably only release) is a joyous celebration of life and an empowering rejection of the fears that can too often overshadow life’s joys. No one would have held it against Robyn and Markus Jagerstedt (Robyn’s tour director/keyboardist and the final member of La Bagatelle Magique) for being unable to release these tracks but I am glad they did as it stands as work that all three can be proud of and a fitting tribute to the over 20 year career Christian Falk.

Little Boots: Working Girl & Better In The Morning – Track Reviews

Two Contrasting Cuts Offer a Promising First Glimpse at Little Boots third LP Working Girl.

With three of the four tracks from Little Boots brilliant EP Business Pleasure (released at the tail end of 2014) scheduled to appear on her forthcoming LP Working Girl (Due July 10th) fans have already been afforded a pretty big idea of what the album will offer. It’s still nice to hear brand new material from Little Boots though and with less than four weeks to go until the album drops we’ve two brand new tracks to whet our appetites. After the retro sound of her second LP, Nocturnes, Boots brought a more modern sound to her songwriting with the Business Pleasure EP. This marriage of forward thinking beats and a vaguely nineties’ electropop sound is still present on new tracks Working Girl and Better In The Morning but they also offer, as you’d expect from an album, a wider spectrum of styles: the title track remains submerged in the dark tone of the earlier EP but Better In The Morning is a disarmingly spritely pop ditty.