Never thought that I'd fall in love love love love

(Note: ZShare is still, baffingly, not letting me upload things; it's only just dawned on me, though, that I can upload songs to Sharebee and then just take the ZShare link from there. A little bit weird, but at least it means the return of ZShare links.)

I have two possibly seemingly contradictory feelings to express:

1.) I am SO OVER songs getting passed around to various artists. Spanish singer Soraya's new album Sin Miedo (featuring a duet with Kate Ryan) is out and about now, and, predictably, the song titled "Love Is All Around" on it is, yes, a cover of the song already done by (deep breath) Agnes, Arashi, Ricki-Lee, Jody Williams, and Andriette. I mean, it's a great song and I understand that this sort of passing songs around allows writers to make more money from it, something increasingly important with illegal downloads being so big, and that for most people (including many of the artists, I'd imagine) this song reuse will never be an issue because they'll never hear more than one version, but I would much rather have songwriters giving us multiple great songs instead of passing the same (admittedly great) one around. That was my reaction to the news that Same Difference's new album will feature a cover of Marie Serneholt's "I Need A House," too. I love that song, but I want new brilliant songs, not reused ones. In better news, as Paul pointed out, you can listen to a clip of Same Difference's pure pop new single "We Are One" at PopJustice.


2.) On the other hand, I am more than happy for "Disturbia" and "Closer" and "Forever" to spawn some knock-offs--a lot more happy to see that around (for now) than more '60's stuff (note: this is NOT me knocking on Alesha's "The Boy Does Nothing," which 1.) we haven't even heard in good quality yet, and 2.) anything with that fantastic a middle 8 is not going to be drawing criticism from me in the near future). With that in mind, Craig David's "Insomnia," taken from his upcoming greatest hits, is pretty enjoyable, better than anything I heard off his last album (and I might even like it more than "Closer," which despite its more electro base it's quite obviously inspired by--and probably isn't as mature as--because of how much quicker the words come). I really adored Craig's earlier work--"Fill Me In" would contend for any list of my favorite songs of all time--and I even really enjoyed "Unbelievable" from mid-to-late career Craig. Everything I heard off his last album, though, just gave off a whiff of...cheapness, something which, with a voice like his, he really should be above; he's better than that. Releasing a song this obviously taking advantage of modern trends doesn't necessarily fulfill that wish, but the song does somehow feel like a step up--a step in the right direction. Keep in touch with those strings, Craig--I missed them.

Craig David's greatest hits isn't yet available for preorder anywhere, but in the meantime you can buy his debut, Born To Do It, here (physical) or here (digital).

It's like I've been asleep

Gosh, you lose power for a little while and the Internet explodes with new news. Among thing things that have happened (with no commentary for the moment) or that I just found out about, even if they happened earlier:

• Britney Spears will be releasing her new album, Circus, at the beginning of December, with the single "Womanizer" going out to radios September 22. Songs by Bloodshy & Avant, Max Martin, Dr Luke, Guy Sigsworth, and Danja.
  
• Girls Aloud's new single "The Promise" debuted on UK radio.
• Soraya's semi-danceable new single "Para ti" debuted on Spanish radio.
• Akcent's new single "Stay With Me" is out and about.
• Nick Lachey performed a new song, "All In My Head" on that High School Musical: Get In The Picture show he's hosting. It's not a ballad. Well, not really. If fan sites can be believed, it'll come out as a single, with an album, Coming Up For Air, following in January (YouTube says November). (There's also a clip of "All In My Head" from when it appeared on PromoSquad, but that's from a while ago, I think, so I'm not sure if it's still all the same.)
  
  
• The Killers' new Stuart Price-produced album is called Day & Age, comes out November 24, and is preceded by the synth-including single "Human."

(News taken from Popjustice and PubliSpain.)

Nothing would taste the same as before

Not too long ago I wrote about how the song "Brief And Beautiful" kept getting recycled, given to several artists who all recorded their own version of it. Here comes the next installment of an unplanned but apparently ongoing series...

Swedish Idol winner Agnes Carlsson was the first to record "Love Is All Around," which was written for her, putting it on her second album; the bubbly upbeat musical followup to songs like "Stranded" and "Emotional" (itself a part of the recycling circuit), it was never a single for her, but, since it was by far the best song on that album, it really should have been. The last commercial material Agnes released was this past Christmas's cover of "All I Want For Christmas Is You," but she also recently appeared on Körslaget.

(I wasn't going to upload the song--another case of it being introduced to me by another blog--but somehow Agnes's version isn't totally on YouTube, so here it is for comparison purposes.)

Japanese boy band Arashi recorded a version of the song, one of those odd mainly in Japanese but with some random lines in English in the chorus sorts of songs. Strangely, though, the English lines aren't actually taken from "Love Is All Around;" instead, the song has been renamed "We Can Make It" and features the line "we can make it through." They added in a rap as well, but the end result is still very bubblegum. Unlike Agnes, they did release it as a single (in spring 2007).



Australian Idol contestant Ricki-Lee Coulter recorded the song for her second solo album, released in August 2007, her first solo album released after leaving the Young Divas, and made it her second single from the album. She lacks Agnes's accent, but there's something about Agnes's voice that makes me prefer Agnes's version of it; the song "pops" more and sounds richer to me. Sorry Mike! Like Arashi, Ricki-Lee released her version as a single, in her case in November 2007.



As if we didn't have enough Idol contestants covering the song, though, South African Idol winner Jody Williams released her version of "Love Is All Around" as her winner's single in December 2007. I still give Agnes the easy edge here, but wouldn't it be refreshing to have an Idol winner single this bubbly and upbeat? Speaking of Jody, she's got a new single out called "Kiss Of Life," but, since I haven't heard more than twenty seconds of it, I can't exactly judge it.



(Since "Love Is All Around" was the winner's song, both Jody and the eventual runner-up Andriette performed it, with both of their versions being released for sale digitally, though it was Jody's version that got actually "released.")

What prompted this post? I was reading about the work Spanish singer Soraya Arnelas (though she wasn't on an Idol show, she was on Operación Triunfo) is doing on her new album--due out this October--and couldn't help noticing one of the titles of the songs she's done.



Yup, you guessed it. "Love Is All Around." Could be another song, but given the history of this song, I'm not going to count on it. It's a fantastic song, but this is really getting kind of ridiculous. Then again, maybe we shouldn't be too surprised: Soraya's past two albums have been all covers...but those were of a different sort--those were known covers, covers of '80's songs (Kylie's "I Should Be So Lucky," Laura Branigan's "Self Control," Patti Smith's "Because The Night," Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Want To Have Fun," Baltimora's "Tarzan Boy," the Human League's "Don't You Want Me," Yaz's "Don't Go," the Eurythmics' "Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This)"...you get the idea), not a version of a song that modern day songwriters are selling artists in different regions the rights to. Don't get me wrong: I love Epicentre, the Swedish team behind the song; it's just that from the perspective of an international pop fan (which is admittedly much different from that of someone making a living via their job), I'd just much rather have new fantastic songs instead of many versions of the same fantastic song.

Further on the Soraya news front, the album is apparently super-danceable, has--in the first edition--ten songs in Spanish and two in English (titles including "Love Is All Around," "Rebound," "Duele," "Caminaré," "La noche es para mi," and "Sin miedo"), features three songs recorded with DJ Sammy, and she's given us the impression before that there's a duet with Kate Ryan on it, and not the one on Kate's new album. There'll be another version of the album, all in English, that comes out later, I think.

I know Soraya's not exactly the definition of classy, but I do hope this new album is...worthy. And makes good use of her voice and doesn't force it on songs it doesn't fit.

For more on Soraya, check out PopMusicWorldWide's opinionated post on her or Robpop's post on her.

Agnes's second album Stronger can be purchased here (physical).

Next up: maybe Kalomoira or Kate Ryan, finally. Or another Belgian singer.