I've gotta know if you wanna be

(Picture credit to Discogs.)

Part 2 of the Selma special. As I mentioned yesterday, before Eurovision (and after) Selma appeared in a lot of musicals (including Grease, which is starting to seem like a prerequisite for anyone who wants to represent Iceland at Eurovision--Jónsi [2004] and Birgitta [2003] played the leads together in 2003), but she'd also recorded some non-musical music already. Back in 1995, she was the lead vocalist for the dance group Fantasia who, as far as I know, released two singles. In 1997 or 1998, she recorded songs for the soundtrack to the movie Sporlaust; while the movie apparently didn't do that well, the songs did. Of her four songs on the soundtrack for Sporlaust--"Weekender," "All The Wrong People," "The Wannabe," and "Angels"--all except "The Wannabe" would go on to be on her debut album (released post-Eurovision) and all except "Angels" are on the darker side.

Seven--or "7," as I've seen it both ways. This song is from her time with Fantasia; it was their second single. At times, I'm very tempted to say this is the best song Selma has been involved with, but given what she would come up with for Eurovision 2005, that really isn't the case. Still, though it was released in 1995, I can still imagine people being thrilled about this song if it was released today, although that may just be due to my lack of knowledge about dance music--because dance is undoubtedly what "Seven" is. The beats are more...maybe "house" is the right word? More house than something like Catch's "Walk On Water." Still, if you like dancey music, there's a good chance you'll like this.

To buy Fantasia' single "Seven," go here (physical), where you'll get charged the absolutely insane price of $50, or here (digital), where you'll have to deal with really strict DRM.

Next up: Selma's first album.

Footnote for this whole series: all of this information is pieced together from what I've read online--I wasn't even listening to music when Selma released her last single, let alone paying attention to Icelandic music--so please let me know if any of it is wrong.