#A lot of space stuff falls into repetitive generic or feel like repeats of older space games yknow

[venacoeurva]

I save so much money on video games because so many new ones are about space and I just cannot make myself care about games about space that aren’t like. (early) Spore because the concept just loses my interest in like 5 minutes

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 10th February 2019

Nothing happened, at all.

Top 10

For its third week, Ariana Grande is at the top spot of the UK Singles Chart with her single “7 rings”, from the recently released thank u, next album – which I personally think was pretty mediocre. Regardless, I don’t see this going anywhere, especially since nothing happened.

“Sweet but Psycho” is staying still, with Ava Max’s song still at number-two.

Similarly at number-three, “Dancing with a Stranger” by Sam Smith and Normani doesn’t move from last week.

Neither does Calvin Harris’ and Rag ‘n’ Bone Man’s “Giant” for that matter at number-four.

Finally, some movement – up two spots is Mabel’s “Don’t Call Me Up”, at number-five.

This means “Wow.” by Post Malone is down a spot to number-six.

Now, our first new arrival, as Billie Eilish debuts at number-seven with “bury a friend”, becoming her first top 10 hit in the UK, and her second Top 40. We’ll talk more about it later, but I’m impressed by how she’s been able to debut this high; definitely shows that new album will do big numbers.

“Nothing Breaks Like a Heart” by Mark Ronson and Miley Cyrus falls down two spaces to number-eight.

At number-nine, up a spot from last week is Lewis Capaldi’s “Someone You Loved”

Also down two spaces is Post Malone and Swae Lee’s Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse soundtrack cut, “Sunflower”, now at #10, slowly making its way off the charts.

FEATURED SINGLE: “Kids Turned Out Fine” – A$AP Rocky

Now, to interrupt your regularly scheduled programming is Featured Single, the segment where we look at a great song that is getting a single push of some kind but isn’t charting and spread some light on it briefly. Now this song in particular just got a really high-budget music video that combined some of its elements with Rocky’s other song “Changes”, which is all flashy but otherwise kind of unremarkable – but the song itself is great. There’s a catchy, psychedelic guitar sample that starts it all off, showered by scattered vocal samples and seemingly field recordings of playgrounds, before it switches to a slick trap beat that Rocky croons over, before everything slowly gets pitched down and slowed down as he mentions the drugs on his mind as a teenager, who is curious about venturing into substance use without caring about the consequences, and man, does it feel like it. This is psychedelic and confusing, once Rocky starts spitting and the bass actually appears, it just kind of explodes with only distorted guitar to accompany it, before a couple random “Yeah! Yeah!” ad-libs that cut it back to the beat as it was, and the verse continues normally as if nothing happened. Yeah, the album this is from, TESTING, is kind of like that, all of the time. Some of my favourite songs are trippy, chaotic messes, with moments like that random Diddy skit on “Tony Tone” about how he said something while her kids were listening that was vulgar, I suppose, that just cuts the song entirely and the transitions aren’t smooth, it’s just a miniscule interlude that takes place for no reason other than experimentation, and honestly despite lacking substance (Ironically), I love this song (Even though it is just vibe and nothing else, really) and how smooth it is in its controlled chaos, definitely one of the calmer moments on TESTING, but I can never see it being a hit, ever, despite how nothing happened. I think “Brotha Man” with French Montana, Snoop Dogg and Frank Ocean could have a better chance, perhaps “OG Beeper” with BlocBoy JB at a stretch. So let’s just get to the Climbers, Fallers and such.

Climbers

Did I mention nothing happened? This week was so dry and slow that Pinkfong rebounded with “Baby Shark”, up another five spaces to #19. That’s sad. It is alongside Kehlani and Ty Dolla $ign though, as “Nights Like This” is up 10 spaces from last week to #30, which is good because this is a pretty great song from two great artists, one of which I’m pretty sure is also serving 15 years in prison for cocaine possession. Yeah, okay, let’s get to the fallers.

Fallers

Now there’s a couple more here, to an extent. As expected, J. Cole’s “MIDDLE CHILD” is down five spaces to #14 – without a music video I don’t think this is a great lead single, sorry, Cole, I am excited for your next album but this song’s pretty boring. “Lost in the Fire” by Gesaffelstein and the Weeknd is down five spaces to #24, next to former #1 “thank u, next” by Ariana Grande down six spaces to #28 (This will rebound though, the album’s out now), while “18HUNNA” by Headie One and Dave is down nine spaces to #32. That’s it, though.

Dropouts

“Baby” by Clean Bandit, Marina and Luis Fonsi is out from #29 (That’s been kind of a flop overall, I’m just surprised it lasted this long), while other than that, we have “Comfortable” by Yungen and Dappy out from #32, “Think About Us” by Little Mix featuring Ty Dolla $ign out from #34 and 15 years in prison for cocaine possession, “Psych Out!” by AJ Tracey out from #36 (I guess the album didn’t do all too well?), “Mo Bamba” by Sheck Wes out from #37, and surprisingly due to recent circumstances, “Advice” by Cadet and Deno Driz out from #39. Rest in peace to Cadet – tragic he died so young in a car accident, and just in his prime time to release more material, sucks that his life was cut short at this point in time, and we only have limited music from the guy, he was only 25. On a lighter note:

Returning Entries

Actually, this isn’t a lighter note at all, this song sucks. “Grace” by Lewis Capaldi is back at #40 (Who cares?). Maybe the new arrivals will be better, there’s four of them so there’s got to be something good there.

NEW ARRIVALS

#39 – “i’m so tired...” – LAUV and Troye Sivan

So, uh, LAUV’s back with another song, huh? I thought he’d end up a complete one-hit wonder but I suppose he’s attempting that second hit, and you know what, I’m not complaining, I loved his last one (More on that when I post my best list; it’s concerningly high). Troye Sivan is okay, I guess, none of his stuff except perhaps “My My My!” has really grown on me all too much though. Sigh, what do these boring pop dudes have to say? That they’re sick of love songs? That all these fairy tales are full of it? That if they hear one more stupid love song, they’ll be sick? That they’re at a payphone trying to call home? Yeah, alright, enough playing around. This is LAUV’s first ever Top 40 hit in the UK (Congratulations) and Troye Sivan’s fourth, and is it good? Well, I can agree with the title’s message on the surface, I guess. Not that I’m tired of love songs, I’m just tired. The song itself? I mean, it is generic, but it’s quicker-paced than his last hit, and it seems to have some more energy, but that guitar strumming just kind of gets on my nerves, same with that mind-numbingly repetitive hook. There is a lot of genuine groove in the production though, especially the janky percussion, and Troye Sivan’s melodies are sonically sound. I can see this growing on me like LAUV has succeeded in before, but I could equally see myself hating this after hearing it more than five times (Because you know the radio will play the most bottom of the barrel stuff after the rise of trap-rap). It’s okay, I guess. Next.

#36 – “a lot” – 21 Savage featuring J. Cole

It’s about time this appeared, and I know exactly why. Back in late December, 21 Savage dropped his album as pretty much a Christmas present, with i am > i was being slightly inconsistent but there’s still a lot of quality there, and fun to be had, especially with the powerful opening track. Now that there’s a music video and now that 21 Savage has been detained by ICE for overstaying his Visa (Apparently he’s actually from the UK, but he’s been freed now), I can only see this rising from now on, and that’s good because it was going to be my Featured Single for this week if it didn’t appear. This song is fantastic, all three versions of it. It starts with a few different 21 Savages just repeating ad-libs while that great soul sample croons in the background of the trap skitters, “I love you for so many reasons, I love you for all seasons”. The bass hits behind 21’s insanely catchy hook with that multi-tracked, “A lot” playing after every line, until 21’s verse, which gets fittingly, broken down, for an unidentified sample to repeat, “I break it on down”, with random vocal samples and sound effects playing in between. While 21’s meaningful subject matter is arguably more important, and the section is totally filler, I love those little touches that show the layers of the production. 21 is essentially playing the underdog who’s seen and been through traumatic gang violence and experiences with women, who has still succeeded. But then you hear J. Cole drunkenly and tiredly say, “Yeah”, before going on a ramble about how 21 Savage had his kids in the studio or something, I don’t know, and then he goes off.

Some n****s make millions, other n****s make memes

Yeah, it may seem like I hate J. Cole’s guts from how all his charting stuff is really boring and always gets negative reviews from me, but he’s definitely one of the best rappers out when he really wants to bother. This whole verse is essentially a complete ramble, but he did warn us, although he does keep a general theme in his rapid flow and charismatic yet calm delivery, which is how the new-wave rappers and overall new-wave black society in the modern Internet age should have more guidance, and now that the older legends in that society are getting older and more mature, much like 21, he feels they should have more responsibility and that he feels bad for the even newer, younger wave of SoundCloud rappers who will regret all their decisions, including 6ix9ine, who I may add he doesn’t defend – he just feels bad for him as he knows at some point, Tekashi’s going to look back at what he did and ask himself, “Was it worth it getting myself into prison for essentially life?” I wonder if Ty Dolla $ign is thinking that while he’s serving 15 years for cocaine possession. 21’s alternate verse on the physical, live and music video versions also discusses people getting blocked at the border, and that families in ghettos still don’t even seem to have a right to clean water and are constantly stuck in financial situations and struggles with no way to escape, and it honestly seems like an anthem for 21, who’s gone through all this, with his verses combined probably being better than Cole’s, honestly. This song is like six minutes (At least the best version of the song is) so I’m surprised it’s gone this far, but it deserves it. Check this out if you haven’t already.

#15 – “All I Ever Wanted” – Fredo featuring Dave

Now, back to some British stuff. Fredo and Dave are close friends, and honestly the chocolate frog and its mundanely-named partner are people I initially was just confused by, and you can tell during my review of “Funky Friday” months ago, which is a song I know oddly admire and adore for all its odd quirks. I didn’t think it was anything special at the time, but it’s slowly become one of my favourite songs of the past year. After listening to more stuff, though, as more from both has crept up on the charts, I’ve started to love them both, and seeing as this is the only song to enter the top 40 from the three Fredo album tracks entering on the top 100 this week from his album Third Avenue (That I’ll check out immediately after this episode), this is of course the one that left the most impressions on listeners. I’m really into British rap, especially the trap and the more low-key, soul and R&B stuff (Check out Tom Misch, he has some beautiful songs like “Good to be Home” and “Movie”, in fact the Free Form official Spotify playlist has some fantastic British hip hop, listen to some of it if you can and give these guys support), so hopefully this’ll be good, and, yeah, it is. It starts with a glittering piano and twinkling leads that are cheap but definitely symphonic and almost video game-like, with producer tags ham-fistedly appearing as the bass slowly creeps ominously. In fact, the whole song is really ominous as even when the hi-hats come in, there’s no real bounce and Fredo just yells at us. It’s pretty intimidating, and when the beat finally drops, we have that classic stock “Oh!” sound you hear in songs like “Leave Me Alone” by Flipp Dinero, “Dilemma” by Nelly and “3500” by Travis Scott, but here it has so much reverb that any other voice than Fredo’s troubled gang mindset feels distant. Dave is great here, referencing... Lil Baby of all people, with a more stable and serious flow, mentioning the people close to him who he’s lost to both prison and death, in a really long and fantastic verse. The emotionless vibe of this track makes it so much more full of emotion, and although it sounds slightly dated in its production, this is a dark and menacing yet almost sombre banger, pretty similar to one of Dave’s other songs, “Hangman”, and definitely deserves to be Dave’s sixth top 40 hit and Fredo’s fourth.

#7 – “bury a friend” – Billie Eilish

I’ve heard two other songs from Billie Eilish in full, and I love both of them; “when the party’s over” is a genius piece of songwriting from her brother Finneas, and “lovely” is a beautiful ballad with Khalid. Those were slow, minimalistic piano-lead songs, though, so what happens when she lends her voice to, uh... industrial funk? Yeah, this one is bouncier and this one is more danceable, and that’s why it debuted this high, especially with Eilish’s hype at an all time high right now, not because some British rapper cameos in literally less than one second at the start of the song. His name is Crooks, and I figured he would have an uncredited rap verse when I saw it had additional vocals from him,  but it’s literally just him whispering, “Billie”, and a couple ad-libs. Eh, okay, but how does the music stack up? It’s brilliant, of course. With Kanye’s “Black Skinhead” as a point of reference, the minimalistic 808s and claps only accompany Billie’s multi-tracked and pitch-shifted vocals, before the verse starts and sound effects are scattered everywhere, with pained shrieks, glass shattering and moans adding to the lyrics. Seriously, I love little details where musical elements actually relate to the lyrics directly, but then that bass hits slowly and that one 808 just keeps going on with a shrill synth, and then it just ends entirely, pretty abruptly. This song is eerie and honestly pretty scary, and Crooks’ ad-libs and backing vocals contribute to that greatly. Eilish’s sing-songy melodies make it even weirder, even, making the song feel like a possessed toy box. That intense moment where it’s just that ear-piercing synth and the 808 is such an interesting musical moment, man, this is pop brilliance. It’s creepy art pop not designed to be an indie darling, but designed for the radio (This is insanely catchy as well) and that hits a soft spot for me. The best art is made for mass consumption. That new album’s coming in March by the way, and I’m incredibly excited.

Conclusion

That was a really freaking good week, actually, so I’m only having to force Worst of the Week out on LAUV and Troye Sivan for “i’m so tired...” (The song’s not even close to bad, it’s just my only option), with Best of the Week going to Billie Eilish again for “bury a friend”. Tied Honourable Mentions go to the equally amazing yet only somewhat flawed songs, with 21 Savage, J. Cole, Fredo and Dave all picking them up for “a lot” and “All I Ever Wanted”, respectively. See ya next week, but it won’t top this.

[lagroupie]

Interview : Klaus Johann Grobe (ENG)

I had seen them live twice already, yet I never really got the chance to meet one of my favorite swiss bands at the moment, Klaus Johann Grobe. After having toured the UK, the US and Germany, they did their first Swiss tour a few weeks ago. I met Dani, Sevi, Stephan and Mathieu before their concert at l’Ecurie in Geneva. I really liked how friendly and humble they were, and we shared some wine while talking about Spagat der Liebe, life as a musician, German and swiss German, and more.

Hello guys, welcome back to Geneva! The first time I saw you play live was when you opened for the Growlers at La Gravière three years ago. Have you ever come back since?

Sevi Landolt: No, it was the only time we played in Geneva. Nyon was maybe the closest to Geneva that we played afterwards. We played in Lausanne as well.

It’s crazy because you guys toured in England and in the US, but not much here in the French part of Switzerland!

Dani Bachmann: Yeah, we don’t play that often in Switzerland at all! I mean, we don’t play in the German part that often either. But for Swiss German bands, it’s difficult to play here in the French part.

Why?

Dani: I don’t know, you tell me! (laughs)

Sevi: I don’t know, I don’t think it would have been difficult for us to play in the French part. Because people always ask us to, we just never organized this. I think if we had told our booking that we wanted to play in the French part it would have been easier. And it’s the same with the German part. We played there more often than in the French part, but not that much either.

Dani: Yeah, but most of these things just happened without us doing much for it. We had a UK label, and we played in the UK. Now we have a US label, so we played in the US. And we have a German booking agency, so we play in Germany. Nothing happened by itself in Switzerland. We were busy playing abroad.

Sevi: That’s why we’re doing this Swiss tour now! It’s our first.

Why not sing in Swiss German (ndlr: dialect spoken in the German part of Switzerland. KJG songs are in classic, or high German) by the way?

Dani: Maybe it’s too close to us. We grew up learning high German, but it’s not our mother tongue.

Sevi: Yeah, it’s like a stage language for us. Being on stage and switching to high German makes it less personal I guess. It’s good to have some distance for us somehow. And it sounds so much nicer! That’s definitely the first reason we sing in German I think. There are so many ways to say things because there are so many words.

Yeah, you can even create new words!

Sevi: Yes, that’s a funny language as well.

Mathieu Voisard: It reminds me of those singers from Québec- they used to sing in “classic” French from France, even though it’s a totally different accent and almost a different language.

Stephan Brunner: I feel like it’s not about the aesthetics of the language, but the sound.

Dani: Yeah, and I think high German fits really well with our kind of music.

Sevi: We didn’t really think about it when we started making music. We just started to sing in high German for whatever reason, so it wasn’t like a decision we made. It came naturally.

How did people who don’t speak German from abroad react to your music?

Stephan: That’s funny, because they ask us to spell the titles of our songs.

Dani: Every country has its own culture, but in general I don’t think it makes a big difference during a concert. I think the way they listen to our record at home might be different, although some people really enjoy the lyrics. But I think they can listen to the music as well without caring about the lyrics.

Sevi: And it’s never been a big subject for other countries. Maybe in the UK, but in the States it wasn’t a big subject at all. It’s only natural for us to sing in German because it’s one of our first languages. But it’s nice, sometimes people ask us about the lyrics because they want to learn German to our music.

So now, to get to know you guys better, I wanted to know what a regular day was like in your lives when you’re not touring.

Dani: I get up and watch some tennis to be honest! (laughs)

Stephan: No, that’s tour life!

Dani: That’s tour life and private life!

Sevi: I don’t know, probably the usual stuff. We all have to work most of the time, we have daily jobs. I’m a self-employed graphic designer.

Dani: I work in a coffee shop.

Stephan: And I work in electronics and IT.

Mathieu: I put on shows and I do music.

Sevi: I mean, that’s the usual by now. We have a comfortable life. We enjoy ourselves, and don’t work all the time. We don’t need too much money to live well, so it’s kind of a chosen lifestyle that we all share I think.

Let’s talk about Spagat der Liebe. Firstly, the cover. Is it your work Sevi?

Sevi: Yeah, well I manage the studio together with my wife, who is a graphic designer as well, so we did it together. And of course, it was an interaction with Dani, we showed it to him to see if it’s alright.

Dani: And I just said yes! (laughs)

Sevi: Yeah, Dani said “yes it’s good, it’s good!”. This time, we tried to do the cover the way the music felt for us, like this bubbly kind of floating stuff with the clouds and everything. Cheesy, soft colors that reflect the music as well and the soft sounds of it. And the foot- it’s basically at Spagat if you look at the front and the back of the cover.

Wait- I looked it up on Google and I thought Spagat meant balance!

Sevi: No no, Spagat is when you spread your legs really wide! Like an artistic thing to do, in gymnastics for example.

Stephan: I think it’s “splits of love” in English.

Dani: But I prefer the Google translation! (laughs)

Sevi: We were in the studio making jokes and having fun through the microphone, and then this expression came out. We liked it so much and thought that it fitted the music perfectly. And of course there’s meaning in it and space for interpretation as well. But it wasn’t really thought over.

Stephan: And since we are a romantic band, love is very important.

That’s funny, with what you just said I would have thought that this title had a more sexual meaning!

Sevi: That’s what we meant, there is room for interpretation.

Dani: It’s the same with the lyrics in general. Most of the time, we think about something but we don’t explain the whole idea. We can’t explain the whole thing, because it doesn’t make sense. So everyone is free to see- we don’t know what lives other people are living in. So if you want to reach them you have to leave them some space.

To create distance in order to get closer?

Sevi: Yeah, maybe. That’s a nice way to put it I think. And it’s nice to see it, for example when you talk to people about the lyrics after the show and they saw something totally different from what we intended them to be. It has a very deep meaning for them and it’s very nice to hear.

Also, I wanted to ask you about the recording- to me, this record sounds warmer than your previous ones, who seemed more aggressive.

Dani: Yes, it was the only thing we had planned before going to the studio. We wanted to have a kind of dry, really warm sound for the record.

Sevi: That was almost all we had before entering the studio! (laughs) We had sketches of songs, but just knew what we wanted to sound like. In the previous record, we experimented more- we did different drum and bass sounds for almost every track. In this one, we have the same setting for all the tracks .

Dani: Also, we knew that the songs would be different for this record. There are disco songs, some ballads or whatever. And we thought that because these songs are really different, we want to have one sound to keep them all together.

I think my favorite song from the album is Ohne Mich. I wanted to know what the story was behind it.

Dani: It’s one of my favorites!

Sevi: I think it’s the poppiest one! It’s about youth memories, how you acted around puberty or older, and finding yourself as a person maybe. Usually when we write, we start with the music, then we create the melody that we think connects to the song, and finally we write the lyrics and finish it.

A lot of critics compare your music to hypnosis. What do you think about this? Maybe it’s got to do with the fact that it’s a bit psychedelic.

Sevi: Yeah, it’s a bit psychedelic- it used to be more repetitive or motoric. Maybe it’s easy to fall in a kind of trance? I don’t know, but maybe that’s why people may think that.

Dani: A pink trance! (laughs)

Sevi: We never intended to hypnotize people! (laughs) But I mean, it’s also something positive- people lose themselves in the music, which is really nice I think.

Stephan: To play all our stuff is a bit hypnotic I think. Because it’s repetitive, especially for me on the bass! But yeah, for me it feels a bit like it. But I like that about it! Our new stuff is definitely different though.

Sevi: Yeah, and if you talk about hypnosis- when you hypnotize one person, you do it on purpose, and that’s definitely not the case here. So if people think it’s hypnotic, why not. But I don’t think it is.

Stephan: No, but it’s floating.

Sevi: Yeah, the word in German is einlullen- it means something soft comes around you and then you’re surrounded by it, you lose yourself in it because it feels so comfortable. Or when you have two very soft cushions, then you’re lying in bed and you feel like “aaah!” (laughs)

What can we expect from Klaus Johann Grobe in the future?

Sevi: Good question. We don’t know, it’s our last tour. Then we take a break for the rest of the year. We didn’t make any plans, so we’ll see what happens. We don’t want to repeat ourselves musically, and those two years have been so intense. So we thought it would be good to have a break to just…

…have a normal life.

Sevi: Yeah, have a normal life and not being on tour all the time. Then things will happen automatically.

Dani: We need some space in our heads to get new ideas.

Sevi: The first record was done with songs we played many times before we went to the studio, and the second record was done within a very short time. We didn’t really know what it would be like when it would be finished. So now we’ll see. Maybe we’ll work on the next record forever… I have no idea!

Stephan: This project is a lot about enjoying what we’re doing. So we don’t know what we will enjoy in a year. We’ll see.

http://www.klausjohanngrobe.ch/