Annie
Don’t Stop
Smalltown Supersound; 2009
If there’s anything that Don’t Stop, the sophomore record from Norwegian songstress Annie proves, is that the music of Madonna has enduring cultural cachet. Better yet, the style of dance-pop that Madonna has championed for nearly thirty years now – strong women being upfront with their sexuality and their lives in general – has only increased in relevance over the past few years. When you place the over-the-top personalities of ladies like Lily Allen, Karen O, and Lady Gaga alongside the music being created by Robyn, Lykke Li, and Sally Shapiro, it’s more than evident that we’re experiencing a grand revival in ‘80s-influenced electro-pop made by women who won’t let you ignore them.
Annie’s music is powered by banks of bouncy, bubbly synths interacting over straight-up, four-on-the-floor drum machine tracks that beg you to alternately stomp and slink across the dance floor. And it doesn’t hurt that this woman has a beautiful soprano voice, one that manages to walk a razor-thin tightrope between breathy and clear with deft aplomb. This twelve-song project is comprised of equal parts finger-pointing tracks and come-hither cuts that are either sultry or sweetly sensitive. “My Love Is Better,” “Bad Times,” and “I Don’t Like Your Band” are aggressive, cheeky selections that evince a bold woman unafraid to say exactly what she’s thinking and feeling, some guy’s feelings be damned.
Unfortunately, the record as a whole suffers from poor set list construction. Specifically, the second half is markedly weaker than the first, mostly because all of the silly and sappy ballads are lumped together and not interspersed amongst the brash material. As a result, the record feels quite wonky and somewhat manic – the first six songs speak of an independent woman who can stand up for herself, while the last six give the impression that Annie enjoys being a dippy sap, pining for some guy and hoping he will pay more attention to her.
What makes the latter portion of Don’t Stop most annoying is that the perky, sharp-edged pop arrangements of the former are dulled and stretched to their most hackneyed and derivative extremes. “Loco” and “Heaven & Hell” are boring, tepid tracks that advance some rather childish, overly cutesy ideas of romance over some bland music. When she sings, “You’re so loco. Baby, take me down before I go-go. Yeah, give me what I need,” I want to hurl.
I worry that the persona she’s concocted here is too muddled, as it causes her songs to suffer greatly when her ADD kicks into high gear. This record has some really high peaks from which she belts out her thoughts, but it then tumbles into a deep ravine from which she struggles to emerge. Ultimately, Annie really does have a great deal in her favor, mostly because she recognizes the powerful musical history upon which she stands. Truly, the first six songs of Don’t Stop alone are worth the purchase price – she definitely knows how to cook up a great hook and killer beats when necessary.