Writing good music is hard, but writing good, simple music is even more difficult. To be two decades and eight albums into your career, and still be cranking out high quality, catchy tunes is almost downright unheard of. You might feel that the nagging earworms you hear on the radio and stay with you all day are a pain, but it takes a rare kind of alchemy to be able to pen such a hook.
Enter Canadian identical twin sisters Tegan and Sara. After years on the sidelines of the mainstream, the duo are now arguably best-known for ‘EVERYTHING IS AWESOME!!!’, the theme tune to The Lego Movie. While there’s nothing quite as persistent as that on ‘Love You To Death’, there’s still plenty that will rattle around your head, whether you want it to or not.
It also confirms what we already knew; despite the fact they might not be bankable unit-shifters, Tegan and Sara are a cut above their contemporaries. Here, they’re alongside Greg Kurstin, who’s also worked with Adele and Ellie Goulding, and they’re clearly more deserving of success than either of those bigger names.
The immediate standout is previous single ‘Boyfriend’ which is, to not put too fine a point on it, an absolute banger. But repeat listens reveal that there are even better cuts, particularly ‘U-Turn’, a disco-synth number that perfects the sad-lyrics-to-a-happy-song formula. If you like your pop with a bit more bite to it, then Tegan and Sara are everything you’re looking for.
8/10
Words: Joe Rivers
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