Scaling Love’s Great Heights

Alphabeat “What Is Happening?” – There was a perfect moment for this song in this week’s season finale of Gossip Girl. Spoiler alert — if you’re the kind of person who can’t see super-obvious plot points coming from miles away, this is definitely a big spoiler — but after a full season of dealing with her incessant lying, Dan Humphrey dumped Serena van der Woodsen, and in a better world, “What Is Happening?” would’ve been the soundtrack to the scene when it all falls apart, and the actors have to go about looking sad yet stoic. This song was built for such a moment, whether it’s in fiction, in life, or somewhere in between.

Alphabeat draw on the same potent well of digested post-modern narrative as Josh Schwartz, yielding a glossy, super-stylized, hyper-pop version of emotional reality. The lyrical details of “What Is Happening?” are fairly mundane — a couple has a huge fight, but at least one of them is still in love with the other, and they make a gesture to hold it all together — but the effect of the song is something far more magical. From the very first moment, it pulls the listener into a state of heightened drama and romance, and boils a complicated set of thoughts and feelings into one intense super-concentrated shot of emotion. It gives you the feeling that everything has become more complex and meaningful, though in reality, it’s all about streamlining and idealizing a difficult situation into something so easy to understand and manage that it becomes a desirable fantasy.

Oh, also: In my mind, I have this half-formed notion that Alphabeat’s debut album is like the inverse version of the Arcade Fire’s Funeral. The two bands have a very similar approach to executing their songs, but radically different tones. In this analogy, “What Is Happening?” is their equivalent to “Wake Up,” right on down to the way both songs start out anthemic, but eventually shift into a boppy vamp for its finale. (Click here to buy it from Amazon.)

Music Go Music “Light Of Love” – Whether we’re jaded by bad experiences, bitter from chronic lovelessness, or have simply heard too many bad pop songs, it’s very easy to be put off by tunes that express a sentiment that roughly translates to “love has come into my life, and now EVERYTHING IS BETTER.” That said, Music Go Music’s elegantly composed, ABBA-esque “Light Of Love” manages to convey a subtle tinge of lingering sorrow and doubt, even at the pinnacle of its jubilation. Crucially, the song really hits home the sense that the singer was truly depressed and hopeless before her love came along. This isn’t about landing a new boyfriend; this is about salvation, and finding a reason to stay alive. (Click here to buy it from Secretly Canadian.)