Rolling Pop 2016

The brand-new Pitbull song is... an interpolation of the Soup Dragons' "I'm Free" cover. Happy 2016!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj0K60d4dTo

what the hell

why do I find this shit irresistable

because it's audacious and great (i love it too)

SHUT IT DOWN, EVERYONE; PITBULL WON 2016

all through this song I can feel Will.i.am pouting in a corner

have you heard this? from late last year but

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSf4Vzxt6-U

sorry wrong clip

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fr8D_ph1Z4

"Freedom" isn't anything special, though it does serve as a reminder that my feelings have evolved on Pitbull, whom I once upon a time regarded as yucky and now at least kinda sorta appreciate as long as I regard him as )what Bruce LaBruce would call) Straight Camp.

omg I have not heard Psy feat. will.i.am

yeah that's in addition to the song that interpolates 'got it from my mama'

Is Pitbull also doing a quasi- Theme from Black Belt Jones interpolation in there as well?

Rolling Pop 2016 Thread Spotify Playlist
^ will update in early February

"I'm really happy about Zara Larsson's success in the UK and Europe and Australia but now I hope Lush Life becomes as big or a bigger hit than the one with MNEK."

On track to do so here, and given that the song scans to me like a new and improved version of "Lean On" I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up smashing everywhere. Threw it onto the end of my ILX ballot, it's been my early summer bop

― art baengels (monotony)

This is in the top 30 in the UK now (14 on itunes) with no radio 1 support (so she's got two tracks in the top 30). It has smashed in Australia already and continental Europe. There was a long while after Uncover hit some parts of Europe it seemed like she wouldn't have any other international hits but now there's a real big momentum.

Another NOR producer with another Astrid S collab, this time more trance-y than tropical house

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPAhbpzmQiA

playlist is up to date. back in a month

ILM's Rolling Pop Thread 2016 Spotify Playlist

This is actually from 2015 but CRJ just added it to her E•MO•TION playlist and it is great???

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z6TadBdrME

...what is this E•MO•TION playlist you speak of maura

https://open.spotify.com/user/carly_rae_jepsen/playlist/6Hod7TmTCscMoA8Y737FEb

you're right maura, this is really good

new zendaya is called "something new" but is all about something old

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VGCKaTbkHA

thought she'd nearly got away with it, as well as you can get away with such an obvious sample, until chris brown galumphs in and just sings "creep" over it

pop artist from Toronto, Canada Michaela May - with an addictive zesty pop track

Michaela May - 1954
https://soundcloud.com/michaelamayofficial/1954-michaela-may

spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/2373Syoto3C5C1p4oPqxBB

Look who is back, Florrie

Florrie - Real Love
http://vevo.ly/AhxKG4

via
The 405 Pop: A premiere of Florrie's 'Real Love' video
http://www.thefourohfive.com/music/article/the-405-pop-a-premiere-of-florrie-s-new-video-145

'Real Love' gets its "impact date" on 25 March on Xenomania/Epic Records.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyASdjZE0R0

chainsmokers ft. rozes - roses

lex otm, "something new" is actually pretty interesting until chris brown mangles one of my favorite vocal melodies ever

new uptempo Dua Lipa track, Last Dance

Dua Lipa - Last Dance (Official Audio)
https://youtu.be/f3HZ64dnRBY

spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/track/5VgVIhrH8TblQ5QRw7ILkn

the breezy synths on this track are reminiscent of Grace Mitchell - Jitter

Delaire - Don't Move
https://soundcloud.com/delaire-music/dont-move

spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/6f7aRSMx9zGszGUFksFUG0

electronic pop from Chelsea Lankes, Texas artist now based in LA

strong upfront vocal style

Chelsea Lankes - Bullet

soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/chelsealankes/bullet

spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/11gyr8CHS1SxPUtOOmtwec

bombastic uptempo pop from NYC duo Cardiknox

Cardiknox - Wild Child

soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/cardiknox/wild-child-1
spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/1PZct6J4kz27hyr1VptRvx

Playlist updated... slow winter for Pop discussion!

ILM's Rolling Pop Thread 2016 Spotify Playlist

uptempo rhythmic pop from Norwegian artist, Julie Bergan

Julie Bergan - I Kinda Like It
https://open.spotify.com/track/5vrv1dNfzfIm2goUCCKYbt

London based, Australian (Originally from Melbourne) pop artist, Chiara Hunter

Funky Pop riyl Wendy & Lisa, Sheila E, Neneh Cherry

2 tracks from Strange Relationships ep released February 12th - powerful vocals

Chiara Hunter - Strange Relationships
https://soundcloud.com/chiarahunter/strange-relationships
https://open.spotify.com/track/0kHt4DkWA9tnRY6mjxghMs

Chiara Hunter - War feat. Gifted Gab
https://soundcloud.com/chiarahunter/chiarahunter-war-feat-giftedgab
https://open.spotify.com/track/4dM3JMacohwvNVJW3Qcr9l

this is such a great pop track

part Years & Years / part Human League with Jam & Lewis

Florio - I Want You
https://soundcloud.com/iamflorio/want-you

described by Glenn McDonald as "indietronic channeling of old disco-pop/freestyle energies." on the New & Noteworthy thread recently

So *this* is what other people are hearing in Years & Years! Great track.

this sounds like a future Rinse FM dance-pop banger playlist track:

RUGGED ft Michele Wylen - Bad Boi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iuL2zv2HFfs

spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/69UFP1wOA0VFZllQDsET0x

parts of this track have got the trendy deep tech shuffling / cuttin shapes groove

addictive euphoric Rave Pop from Scottish artist, HQFU (Sarah J. Stanley, aka HQFU)

bleeps, rave stabs, an addictive emotional vocal style, sweetness but with a dark poppy edge

HQFU - Good Reason

link only available via:
http://www.thelineofbestfit.com/new-music/song-of-the-day/hqfu-good-reason

released April 1st

"Good Reason" heads firmly back to the early 90s when the titans of the dance scene TTF and QFX ruled with glow sticks raised firmly aloft. While that music was euphoric, HQFU adds a grimy and dark edge as sharp staccato beats and Stanley's menacingly muffled vocal - liberally sprinkled with cuss words - cut across the melodic squelches and bleeps, hitting stunning crescendo after crescendo across the track's incredible five minutes.

"Good Reason" is out 1 April and HQFU's self-titled debut album follows on 8 April.

http://hqfu.bandcamp.com/album/hqfu

Annabel Jones from London

strong vocal flow on this track

Annabel Jones - IOU
https://soundcloud.com/okannabel/iou
https://open.spotify.com/track/37hr304EeFefwdyxmS8YXh

and a remixed version

Annabel Jones - IOU (AObeats Remix)
https://soundcloud.com/aokamura/iou-aobeats-remix

I am really into the Alex Newell EP

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idzP6kFv3NQ

That Florio track upthread is good shit!

This might fall on deaf ears, quite literally because it's a Dutch-language track, but I'm curious to know what people think of it. In the course of last year I've fallen hard for both producer Boaz v/d Beatz's sound and singer/rapper Ronnie Flex's voice, melodies and lyrics. I loved "Niemand" (posted it last year, and even voted for it in the EOY tracks), but follow-up "Wij Zijn Altijd" is even better, I think.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnXRvaCXFKk

Ronnie Flex, "Wij Zijn Altijd"

This is a very nice song from Nick Jonas with Tove Lo and I can't stop but think that Zayn would have done something way better if he had followed this kind of path instead of choosing the alt-r&b realm, for which he doesn't seem really well suited/doesn't know how to work within it

https://youtu.be/XgJFqVvb2Ws

Jonas is a total bore. I don't get all the love that he's suddenly getting from some pop fans.

"space is just a word made up by someone who's afraid of getting close" is a pretty terrible chorus. i always rooted for Nick but he's really squandered his momentum with everything he's done since "Jealous," and Joe really stole his thunder with the DNCE song.

I confess i didnt payed any attention to the words he was singing, only to the melody/production/etc. "it's my righ to be hellish" wasn't also any good. But I enjoyed the vibe of this one.
Never heard DNCE, are they ok?

"Cake By The Ocean" is an extremely silly song that at some point after a few months became irresistible to me/America

Danish pop artist Soleima, with an addictive chilled pop track

Soleima - Once Was
https://soundcloud.com/soleima-1/once-was
https://open.spotify.com/track/6iGlUD0U3X3nB3Nu5yMfNG

Playlist updated through end of March:

ILM's Rolling Pop Thread 2016 Spotify Playlist

Man, if the lineup of my local iHeart top-40 stalwart's spring show isn't a sign that pop is in crisis...

Halsey
Flo Rida
Iggy Azalea
Nelly
The Chainsmokers
Charlie Puth
Troye Sivan
Mike Posner
Daya
Bebe Rexha
Shawn Hook
Melanie Martinez

Melanie Martinez is quite good live and I like the Shawn Hook single okay, but what a pile of nothing. At least last year had Derulo.

For a while I kept confusing Shawn Hook with Shawn Mendes, except I was under the impression that Shawn Hook had yet to have a hit outside of Canada. And the song that I was most familiar with of his was Million Ways and not Sound of Your Heart.
Also I just learned that Shawn Hook is 14 years older than Shawn Mendes.

he's the third-oldest person on the bill.

new Broods track, a more forced radio friendly maximalist sound, Broods have lost something (dynamics, atmosphere, flow) with this new direction

Broods - Free
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDsxtBVLyss

https://open.spotify.com/track/5Vla5Oc0aCBIY9HPFXv7lF

Hmm, I like that new Broods song pretty well, actually.

pop artist from Pristina, Kosovo, Era Istrefi

Era Istrefi is Kosovo Albanian, this track is sung mainly in Gheg Albanian

the coolest video of the year, filmed in the icy winter

Era Istrefi - Bonbon

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cedoBlUvBlI

spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/3Uz8ZcQdlOF2qE6q1rcVpw

more info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Era_Istrefi

So this song just popped up as #2 on Spotify's Global Viral 50 chart, which is... weird since it's on my friend's independent label (it's also Maya Vik's label), he just signed them and I haven't seen any real promotion for it anywhere?

Anyway, it's a nice, breezy pop song and I like it a lot so I'm posting it in here in the hope that it'll somehow grow bigger, lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nR1jnsOpphs

https://soundcloud.com/oslo/kappekoff-all-day-long-1
https://open.spotify.com/track/7BSROePF8jz3tVHbafS2P9

That Kappekoff song was on Fresh Finds, both the main list and the Hiptronix one.

spotify:user:spotify:playlist:3rgsDhGHZxZ9sB9DQWQfuf
spotify:user:spotify:playlist:6tSPShkHtxVL8fWtJqxe7Z

Zara Larsson's had three songs on the UK top 10 in 2016. Two right now. On the way to her first Billboard top 10.

This should appeal to the CRJ fans:

Christie & the Dream Beats - Wasn't My Fault
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoRdIPyaAU8

I know absolutely nothing about this artist (thus far) except that she's Latvian and she sounds like PC Music if they didn't suck in concept and execution:

https://soundcloud.com/janahermann/jana-hermann-kults-2016

Playlist updated through end of April.

ILM's Rolling Pop Thread 2016 Spotify Playlist

That list Maura posted is pretty dire.

i like the new Alicia Keys song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YwHRTCyrEo

i do too!

meanwhile justin timberlake's new single sounds like a second-tier derulo cut

new veronica maggio album! this song is my favorite so far

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l58EfkZm1l0

This was already posted in the Charli XCX thread but I'm sharing it here cause it's ace!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8w08FnrmqTg

the fifth harmony album is really great! gosh between this and ariana it's so good to hear pop albums that feel effortless and natural rather than overthought/slightly desperate positioning

That's good to hear. I loved the last one too

thought the last was a bit clunky as an album, the difference seems pretty similar to the difference between the last two ariana albums

tropical house really suits them, "the life" is total dumblonde, it's so relaxed and breezy throughout

texts in the morning are a pretty low bar for a love unlike any other you've had before though, imo

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/29/arts/music/ariana-grande-fifth-harmony-dangerous-woman-727.html?ref=topics&_r=0

Part of Jon Caramanica's take on the pop chart world and how musicians adjust

But what’s striking about these albums is how gently they treat their stars, as if they were fragile artifacts in need of safe shipping. In the past, each act has delivered memorable singing, but something deadening is at play on these records, which reflect a pop universe not much interested in displays of vocal flamboyance.

Pop, as ever, is struggling to identify its center — is it dance-music-centric wallops and bloops? Melodic post-hip-hop rap-singing? Ms. Grande, a boisterous soul singer by disposition, has never been a neat pop fit, but on previous albums has found ways to let her huge voice predominate. On “Dangerous Woman,” though, she’s curiously muted — several of the songs are strong, but they rely on her gifts less. Fifth Harmony’s album, especially, reflects a group of impressive singers fighting against technology and algorithms designed to flatten them into a homogenized whole. Much of the time, they are reduced to rhythmic components, serving up unmemorable lyrics at quick tempos.

In small part, that’s the result of the spread of tropical house, one of the most anodyne branches of dance music, into the pop mainstream over the past two years. (Kygo, a titan on streaming services, with a feather-light sound, contributed production to two songs on Fifth Harmony’s album.) Also, R&B has had diminishing influence over the sound of pop, as it’s been subsumed into hip-hop, meaning that singers inclined toward flash and power have found themselves stymied at every turn.

Add to this one additional recent phenomenon: the resurgence of lite-reggae on the pop charts, whether in the form of the Felix Jaehn tropical house remix of OMI’s “Cheerleader” last year, or the cloying, banal lovers-rock of “Rude,” by the Canadian band Magic!, the year before. In each case, the source genre is denuded, reduced to an unobtrusive lilt — reggae as signifier, not engine.

This isn’t novel, alas. ...

weird piece

Especially weitd that he doesn't mention that there's actually a Vybz Kartel cover version on the Fifth Harmony album.

also a pretty lame watered down interpolation of Mad Cobra's "Flex"

if i had time i would start a thread about the fifth harmony album, it's that good, but in the meantime i just want to make sure no one sleeps on the bonus tracks, esp "big bad wolf" and "dope"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cta9p7HgfAU

glad fergie has come back w/ something a bit more abrasive and audacious this time around

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsUWK-fixiA

I like this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRUt3FllRm8

Kossisko - "Hard"

Ok i never saw this the first time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBDNvlvR8vA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GL9JoH4Sws

surprised no one's talking about this, seems like total ILX-bait. tim f, lex?

it's extremely okay. never minded hearing it when it was on radio 24/7 but was never overjoyed either.

the chorus feels just a touuuuuch lazy but those harmonies at the end are pretty tight

it was discussed some on Rolling Worst Songs, what I said then: "I suppose it was inevitable that the "sharing economy" propagandic bullshit would make its way, however loosely, into song concepts. can't find a real job, ladies? don't worry, you can spend your time cheerily sexting your boyfriend, who has retconned "Bo$$"

fair criticism, but at least that song sounds semi-fun (despite repeating "work" relentlessly lol) in a year when most big pop albums seem...not all that fun? (i like a couple of em a lot, but still.)

the song is specifically about someone who works the night shift, but never let a close reading get in the way of a blurb that writes itself

anyway, i fux with this (also old) sia/sean paul song too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYh-n7EOtMA

i do not fux with that

"work from home" is okay. rugrats-theme mustard.

ha! that's a great description

i'm into "work from home" even though as a freelancer i find working from home an extremely unsexy metaphor, it's def rugrats mustard but it's never not enjoyable either

the album is excellent, surprisingly

have we really not talked about "work from home" on ilx???

give me "not all that fun" over queasy forced fun every day

if we're talking about like that timberlake song for example, then yeah def

that is an example definitely, "work from home" very much so

I do think it's interesting that a lot of songs right now have what could be seen as propagandistic choruses - "Work," the repetition of the first word in "Work From Home," Daya's "Sit Still Look Pretty," heck even "No" - especially in the age of excruciatingly narrow playlists

where are my THEY LIVE earbuds eh

https://soundcloud.com/strangetown-records/tired-of-love

pretty good, though i'm not sure about the farting synths at the end

now that i've been reminded of fifth harmony i would like to say that the pre-chorus (as the pop industryites call it now) to "flex" is so gorgeous that i'm mad it wasn't written into a better song

Playlist is updated.

The Petite Meller album is a lot of fun (and very good).

Love the fact that batshit crazy videos like this still exist in 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLwgeV7dXOI

Playlist is finalized for the year:

ILM's Rolling Pop Thread 2016 Spotify Playlist

Nice one.

Is there a 2017 thread yet?