Midnight Red
As top contenders Mindless Behaviour have sadly so far failed to set the charts alight, the search for this generation’s American boyband continues. Midnight Red are the latest contenders, and they’re attempting to align themselves with boyband legends of the past to get their foot in the door as they’re the support act for the NKOTBSB tour I was rambling on about the other day. They have respect for boyband history, and they’re the latest protegées of pop genius RedOne, but I’m still not convinced by Midnight Red. Their single One Club At A Time is enjoyable but extremely generic, and the EPK video on their website makes them seem hilariously weird. The random combination of different looks and personalities worked for The Wanted (similarly Midnight Red have an Asian one, a curly haired one etc) but their music was fresh and forward-thinking, a very 2010s boyband sound. This song is stuck in the 2000s and not even a great example of that! Huge improvement will be needed for Midnight Red to claim the title of American Boyband 2011.
Poptasticness: 71% Hit potential: 20%
Alex Saidac
A new Swedish female electro-pop singer/DJ signed to Alexander Bard’s record label. That sounds exciting! Unfortunately, despite fitting that criteria, Alex Saidac is still pretty dull. I really wanted to like her new single We Shine for the aforementioned reasons, but it doesn’t capture my interest in the slightest. Nonetheless, it’s actually doing quite well in Sweden (in the iTunes top 10 at the moment) and is getting a UK release through the AATW label. Watching her EPK she seems like a cool and interesting girl, but her single sounds so dated to me and the lyrics are completely pointless. I don’t need my pop music to be like poetry, but I can never sing along enthusiastically to something as meaningless as “we all shiiiiine, we all shiiiiine”. The ballad at the end of her EPK has a lot more promise, however. If she can move away from the terrible imitation of dance music and become a proper popstar, then I’ll be interested.
Poptasticness: 65% Hit potential: 70%