Word: songe
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Swedish band, the Cardigans, it resides in the encounter of contrary instincts--the sweet, seductive purr of joyful music and the dark, cruel snarl of painful obsessions. Remember "Lovefool," the song from a couple of years ago that burst off the Romeo + Juliet soundtrack and was suddenly, like the fixated ex-lover it depicted, lurking stubbornly everywhere you looked? Few songs have snuck a more subversive view of love into the frivolous dance arena of top 40 radio. You'd scarcely realize from the jubilant disco drums and the syncopated keyboard touches that the song was actually about wretched abjection...
...underestimate the album's unusual charms, both familiar and fresh. More than any of their previous work, the album reveals the clash of personalities that enlivens the ensemble: the heavy metal/hard rock lineage of guitarists Peter Svensson and Magnus Sveningsson and the '60s girl-group pop song tradition of singer Nina Persson and producer Tore Johansson. Certainly, the group is far from a mere novelty project of classic pop archivist Johansson; as their First Band on the Moon cover photograph displays ardently, the Cardigans can rock...
...mimics, though, the Cardigans do use the razor-sharp melodies and propulsive perpulsive percussion awfully effectively. None of the stylish songs on Gran Turismo may have the impact of something truly new, but they do have the impeccable production of Tore Johansson elevating the sounds into a stratosphere of classic pop song delight. Maybe Gran Turismo is just tasty candy, but you won't be getting these sweet, sinister confections out of your teeth any time soon...
...luckily, they did not need to be. Some of Europe's most prestigious church choirs offered fame to the anatomically-intact. The Vienna Choir Boys, for instance, would train boys between the ages of 10 and 14 to sing with a sublime sweetness that was thought to rival the song of angels. Although we do not hear too much about the castrati today, boy choirs have retained their popularity. Last Friday, the Vienna Choir Boys, as witness to this popularity, came to Symphony Hall to celebrate their 500th anniversary...
...inertia. The choir boys were not in want of technical skills; only interpretive ones. Psalm No. 23 is a prayer of peace for someone who has realized that his life is in the hands of God. But an audience member might have known nothing about the meaning of the song--and the joy of love or the anticipation of heaven--if the lyrics had not been printed in the program...