Jess’ guide to Electropop

Long ago, when fluoro was dying down and the world was entering into the “grunge” fad, Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade was getting it’s ass kicked by Batman at the box office, and The Monkees disbanded (only the first in many attempts to do this), the most amazing thing happened… I was born!

To get to the point, I am Jess and I basically have free reign over all of you (sort of). I shall be writing about anything and everything to do with music basically, & I believe that I will be doing you all a great service this year – keeping you up to date on what music is cool and what is not, and any new emerging talent I pick up on. Hopefully by the end of the year I will have some kind of influence over you all. Uh. I mean you’ll totally be able to make your own decisions and stuff.

Anyway, todays topic of one-(wo)man discussion is “Electropop”! You may be thinking “Uh.. what?”, however you are most likely more subconsciously aware of it than you may think, you just haven’t realised it yet. Electropop is actually quite prominent in society today, with New Zealand music television channels and radio stations jumping on the Fueled By Ramen (FBR) band-wagon, which is known to produce high amounts of electropop-inspired bands. The reason for the FBR franchise being so successful, is the influence it has over the “tweens” in this country, who are drawn in by the electropop “appeal”. Cool, I have the official right to call them “tweens”, we’re in uni now, right? We have so much more right to be elitist, it’s AuSM (pun intended).

Shying away from terrible first year puns, Electropop is what I like to think would happen when a big blob of “pop” were to insult a big nasty-looking blob of “electro” (for lack of a better word), therefore egging the electro blob on and engaging in physical combat. On impact, it would create something like the “big bang” theory – a big oozing mess that is one of the many music revolutions of our time.

It started out in the British underground world of music in the late 1970s, with heavy influence from the likes of David Bowie and Kraftwerk,  and their albums Heroes and Trans-Europe Express, respectively. The genre gives the feeling of slight darkness, relying heavily on the lyrics to tell the story of whatever the artists is trying to convey across, and this in turn works with the actual music creating suitable ambience to fit with the story. However, it is said that Electropop should not be confused with Disco-synth, that’s a completely different story.  If you’re thinking right now of Blondie, then you are seriously mistaken. If you were to strip down the genre, you would find that it is basically pop, intensified with keyboards, synthesisers and programming to fill out the overall sound, which is nice if what you’re looking for is something to tap your foot along to, but at the root of it all it is a pop song with catchy tunes and a universal message within the lyrics. It has also set up a base for other genres, such as power pop, techno pop and even “electro clash”, to evolve in their own way off to the side. We can see these becoming more and more evident in todays music scene, with bands such as American Hi-Fi and Barenaked Ladies taking on the challenge. The genre of electropop has been carried over into the present day, by bands such as Panic At The Disco (I mean the real songs in the middle of A Fever…) and groups like The Veronicas.

Now, don’t come running at me with flaming torches, wanting to burn me at the stake. I actually like their new stuff, as you can definitely hear the Electropop influence. They have even admitted their new record is influenced by that whole movement. Untouched, from the new album Hook Me Up, is a current favourite of mine of the moment, especially with the fast and catchy (or annoying and repetitive, however you wish to look at it) selection of words in each verse. The thing about this song that gets me is the actual instrumental sound, which stays very true to it’s “requirements” of the genre. The clash of violins against a very fast-paced drum beat, mixing with the guitar hooks and programming is a real innovation in music, keeping that gate of fresh ideas open for the future of electropop.

Whether you see this as a good thing is up to you, but it seems to me that 2008 may be full of this type of music, so you may as well get used to it.

So if you’re looking for something that you can dance and sing along to, when the heart of the song is a good old pop song then Electropop is probably for you, and so I recommend these bands to you:
The Veronicas, Bloc Party, The Brunettes, HelloGoodbye, Powerspace, Angels & Airwaves and Midnight Juggernauts.
(Bands suggested are based purely on opinion)

Right well now is my time to sign off! I hope this has informed some of you about at least something to do with Electropop. If not, then there is absolutely no hope for you at all.

Word Count: 892

Date published: TBA

Tags: article, electropop, jess, jessums31, journalism, spittingstars, the, veronicas