Du är vild

Look, I'm sorry, but I love Jimmy Jansson. His music falls exactly into one of my favorite subgenres of pop; "Amanda," his Melodifestivalen entry this year, sounded very McFly-esque, and given my incredible love for McFly, it should come as no surprise that I loved it. Since I forgot to do the singles review thing for Paul last week, I missed my chance to rail against the Jonas Brothers. To be fair, I don't know very much of their original material, but at the very least they seem to sap every song they cover of any strength or quality it originally had. To me, they--at least in those songs--are an example of how to do fun pop-rock poorly; Jimmy Jansson, on the other hand, does it very well, and manages to slip in practically everything that makes that type of music great--catchy songs that don't let the guitars overwhelm the melody, repeated syllables, and handclaps, as well as loads of energy--I love it. (For more information about Jimmy himself, you can read my first post about him here.)

Vild och vacker--there are a lot of great songs on Jimmy's new album, and some that might even be better than this one, but I think this one might be the most immediate, especially for people who don't speak Swedish, so I'm going with it. It was also the b-side for "Amanda," which surprised me--if he was planning on another single from the album, this seems like it would be one of the logical choices; it's very singalongable and catchy--just wait for the chorus, and you're sure to hear what I mean. Although it's very easy to draw comparisons between Jimmy and McFly--I do so myself all the time--his songs often aren't actually ones I can imagine McFly releasing; he manages to be reminiscent of what I associate with McFly (and a bit of Busted in this song, especially whenever that high-pitched noise comes in) without actually making songs that I would expect McFly to make. There's also a certain rushing sound a lot of his songs manage to capture, and rely on--"Som sommaren" and "Vi kan gunga" don't show it (and actually, "Vild och vacker" doesn't show it too well either, though there are hints); out of his hits, "Godmorgon världen" probably is this best example. If you listen to his albums, though, it's a lot more prevalent.

To buy Jimmy Jansson's third album, Sån E Jag, go here (physical) or here (digital). I very much recommend it if you like this style of music and don't mind listening to lyrics you can't understand. There are a lot of great songs on it, but I'd especially say to listen out for "Farväl," which is very good (I'm just about dying to post it, and may do so in the future, even though I'm not sure how well it would go over; still, to me, it's one of those songs that casually sums up how to do this sort of pop-rock well). The album's also more diverse (and more mature) than one might expect, though it's not genre-hopping. I'm sure a lot of people won't like it--I can't imagine any music reviewer is going to give it positive reviews--but I'd defend its quality (or at least the quality of some of the songs on it) to anyone.

Next up: maybe that French song, finally, but who knows.