With No Strings Attached

Bröderna Lindgren featuring Britta Persson “Annan Sort”

I am used to hearing Britta Persson sing in English, but her vocal style can get so slurry that her words become a blur, so it’s not such a big adjustment to listen to her sing in Swedish. This collaboration with Bröderna Lindgren is intended to be a sort of children’s music, but to my ears it is indistinguishable from what I think most of us will recognize as carefully arranged upbeat Scandinavian pop. It makes me wonder if the Swedish have only given us access to the kid’s music all along, and they’ve been hoarding the grown-up music for themselves for decades. Maybe ABBA is just like Raffi to them, you know?

Visit the Bröderna Lindgren MySpace page.

Cold Cave “Youth & Lust”

There’s something very on the nose about the sound of this, as though on some level it’s actually a parody of Joy Division, New Order, and bored, sad, horny young people. It’s hard for me not to hear this as being at least somewhat deadpan, but at the same time, it’s not just some stupid joke. This is excellent icy synthpop, and the band’s apparent droll sensibility only serves to enhance the quality of the track. If they weren’t having a bit of fun, this wouldn’t be fun for me either.

Buy it from Amazon.