Robyn

I've finally heard this now. On first listen "Cry When You Get Older" is the real standout for me. It's got all those harmonies everywhere! And I love how the synth does a sort of call-and-response with Robyn's voice. I also like how unpredictable/complicated it is, it seems to dive and fold in on itself in interesting ways.

It's true that "Fembots" is pretty one-note but it is irresistable.

She really has gone totally into this shiny clean and crunchy sonic territory - everything gleams and glistens. Everything sounds like it's incredibly close-miked, like you're 1mm away from all the pistons and churning robo-parts. I'd like to hear her mix it up a little - like the kind of sound she used on "Keep This Fire Burning" for instance - or just some kind of other textures, roughed-up a little for variety.

Maybe my own selfish preference is for her to just do more R&B.

But surm when you say "she doesn't know exactly why she's singing this pop music that she's singing" I don't think that's right at all! I think she's pretty clearly doing it because 1) It allows her to play different parts, assume different roles; she does this more explicitly than any other singer I can think of off the top of my head and 2) well, obviously she can sing, can write a good lyric (usually) and has great taste.

u make a good point. there's just something in her voice that doesn't compel me. i recognize that her composition is good, and that she has taste, but i don't feel engaged with her vocally. maybe she plays so many different parts because she's not sure who she is, as a singer.

... Or maybe she knows exactly who she is, ie someone who likes fucking around with a bunch of different things.

maybe. maybe i just don't feel like she's connecting fully with any of those things. or maybe i plain don't like her voice very much.

holy shit fembot is fucking great great great

surm she does lean kind of heavily on a coquettish little girl thing sometimes, which is probably my least favorite part of her schtick. Is that what you're reacting to maybe?

you know what i think it is: i think she's very playful -- which is a good thing, definitely. but i think i react more personally to a bit more soul in my pop. however, i'm sure a lot of ppl listen to Robyn precisely because she is as playful as she is, and no more heavy, which i can totally appreciate.

there's something about her delivery that's very physical, and not overly cerebral, which i think some ppl really appreciate (my boyfriend is like this - he's one of those people that reacts very physically to songs).

personally i dislike her voice because she always sounds so pert and pleased with herself - like surm i don't get much emotion there beyond an inane tee-hee-aren't-i-cute

jeez i'm just listening to "fembot" for the first time and this is one of the worst fucking songs i've ever heard no joke

hahaha it sounds like something written 10 yrs ago i think. like, wasn't it?

but "with every heartbeat" is still great, i think we all agree?

i'm giving kleerup a lot of credit for that

seriously if this was by any random new pop chick people would be rushing to post it on the I AM SO FUCKING APPALLED thread

the robot stuff was lame the first time around

anyone stuck on the robots-in-pop meme needs to eat a dick, seriously. SO BORING.

looking forward to sparring with you on SJ with this one then lex, cuz I think it's awesome.

Natalie Imbruglia's "Want" has made a lot of Robyn's affectations look redundant; that record does everything most of Robyn's stuff is supposed to do.

the title "fembots" - and the other title "dancehall queen" - pissed me off so much that the merest mention of robyn's name to me right now is liable to send me into a RAGE BLACKOUT

― لوووووووووووووووووووول (lex pretend), Thursday, April 22, 2010 7:50 AM (1 week ago)

jeez i'm just listening to "fembot" for the first time and this is one of the worst fucking songs i've ever heard no joke

― لوووووووووووووووووووول (lex pretend), Sunday, May 2, 2010 5:55 PM (2 hours ago)

It really sounds like you had already mind up about this song before you had heard it. Personally I love it and the rest of the album.

I'm a huge fan of her vocals especially on last years The Girl The Robot which had her sounding as powerful and vulnerable as she did on With Every Heartbeat and Be Mine.

Really like Robyn too.

Does anyone know if she intends to release an album this year, or just a bunch of singles?

She's putting out three mini albums throughout the year. Body Talk part 1 is the one being discussed which is out June 14th and has 8 tracks on it.

Fembot steals teh Pea's schtick and makes me actually like it.

Which is a monumental accomplishment IMO.

X-Post: Mini album as in download only then, I presume?

okay, there's nothing special about this song at all but it's nowhere near being one of the worst songs ever recorded

also I've now found two different versions of this on Youtube pitched a half-step apart and the higher key makes into a better song

it is kind of flagrantly cheap sounding, tbf

All this rage blackout/WORST SONG EVAH nonsense is fucking ridiculous. This album is fantastic and Dancing on My Own is the song of the year. That is all.

forks and i did end up sparring @ the singles jukebox over this! i called her the diplo of scandopop. really, smh at this woman and her exceedingly smug, boring quirks. and i am so over people recycling old-ass "crying at the discotheque" tropes for cheap emotional affect.

http://www.thesinglesjukebox.com/?p=2259 - fembot
http://www.thesinglesjukebox.com/?p=2261 - dancing on my own

I'm loving this album a lot. But I can get with some of the hate, it's not quite as jaw-dropping as her previous stuff like Be Mine and Girl and The Robot etc. But it's still probably my favourite pop album I've heard all year after Janelle Monae.

I don't understand "cheap emotional effect" here. "Crying at the discotheque" isn't a tired old trope, it's one of the basic planks of pop. You might as well call any classic pop theme a tired old trope. Dancing on My Own does it so well - the monstrous, chugging synth line, the melancholy PSB-style glock melody, the a cappella breakdown, the detail in the lyrics. Your Robyn hate seems to come from a place that I don't understand - there's nothing in the music to justify it. You seem to be on a mission to defend black music from her when it doesn't need defending.

Re: Fembot, I'm very amused by the way Vigilant Citizen reads every predictable robot reference as code for the "transhumanist agenda" and mind control. I take the point that the imagery's pretty played out but I still love the tune.

I'm tired of all these LOVE songs, I tells ya!

Weirdly the Lex actually likes Robyn when she's doing sincerity (Who's That Girl, Be Mine, With Every Heartbeat), it seems to be the other side of her persona that enrages him. Not surprisingly really because her Konichiwa Bitches/dressing up as a bumblebee thing is lame and annoying.

Yeah, grudging cosign

Sonically I thought the revamp of "Bum Like You" from acoustic ballad (on the Swedish CD) to electro ballad (on the UK CD) was a bad sign; i hoped that it was somehow a sop to the UK market rather than a decision that it actually sounded better that way. however on the basis of the new joint it appears she really does think it sounds better that way, which saddens me

I guess that's the problem with any distinctive sense of humour in music - if you're charmed/amused by it, great, but if not then it's just aggravating. I find Don't Fucking Tell Me What to Do pretty funny.

I would support any brutal dictator who promised to outlaw pop stars dressing up in animal suits.

is OK if they also wear something over their head so you can't be sure it's them

I think Lex might be the brutal dictator you're looking for. He's recently been talking about beheading Frankie Boyle so I think he's got the chops for the job.

i really enjoy most of the tracks on this new record but i do think that it is being received slightly better than it deserves simply because it is robyn.

I was turned off by "Fembot" because it seemed wholly unnecessary, like she redid "Bum Like You" with all of the fun sucked out of it or something; still willing to check out the album, though.

need to listen to this album before i discuss further methinks

Listening to her cover of "Try Sleeping With a Broken Heart" right now. It's obvious it was just thrown together for an in-studio performance on Radio 1, but if she fleshed this out in the studio it could probably work really well.

SFJ in the New Yorker:

Robyn’s lyrics are a mash of language from everywhere and nowhere, and sound decidedly un-Swedish: “I press trigga, I don’t press people button / Nobody tjaffs come face me with something / like how I have twenty-two inna me something / Ten is for you so who gon’ get the next dozen, fool.” That kind of borrowing could be off-putting coming from someone who was trying to pass herself off as Sweden’s dancehall queen.

Mad Cobra's lyrics, one presumes?

I think Lex might be the brutal dictator you're looking for. He's recently been talking about beheading Frankie Boyle so I think he's got the chops for the job.

He may end up being a bit too busy beheading pop stars who are over 35, are fat, with a beard, and have been around since the 80s or earlier....

ok i like 'don't fucking tell me what to do'

i think this is the closest i've come to a guilty pleasure, like, ever

I wholeheartedly love this record. Was super-disappointed by Fembot as a leak, but without the "pointless sequel to Girl & The Robot" factor it fits well after Don't Fucking, and the autotuning for effect not only works thematically but sounds great too. The tail-off of the two downbeat/acousticy twaddle songs at the end works SO MUCH better than on the 2005 Robyn; partly because they're not outweighed by so many bangers and Bum Like You beforehand, partly because they're both dope. I feared a song called "dancehall Queen" written & produced by Diplo before hearing it, but it's a great fakeout, with cultural magpieism present only in absentia, as a touchstone for 'Robyn' to long for. And the more emotions, items and people she has to long for, the more amazing songs we get from her (even though she didn't write it).

Can't WAIT for Dancing On My Own when she tours. That's going to be immense.

http://pitchfork.com/news/39451-new-robyn-album-gets-a-release-date/

Robyn promised us three new albums this year, and it looks like she really might come through. After last month's brilliant Body Talk Pt. 1, her next release-- appropriately titled Body Talk Pt. 2-- is due September 6 in the UK on Konichiwa/Island.

Keeping things moving, the Swedish singer is also set to release a new, danced-up version of Pt. 1's killer ballad "Hang With Me" as a single on September 5. Robyn also recently recorded a track with Snoop Dogg, but it's still unclear whether the duet will end up on Pt. 2 or Pt. 3.

ok wtf i am a big fan of robyn's work but how can one objectively think that this last record was "brilliant" or that hang with me is "killer" (esp when compared to some of her previous ballads which actually ARE borderline-"killer," whatever that means)? it is a very good ep-esque thing but that's about it. maybe if pitchfork didn't hype her up so much they wouldn't feel obligated to praise the shit out of her work when it doesn't really deserve it that much

"Don't Tell Me What To Fucking Do" kind of shames the rest of this