Hazy

I like how we Americans are so quick to categorize entire countries within a certain musical genre. That is, we'll say something like, "oh yeah, France ... everyone's like Daft Punk over there," or, "right -- Sweden ... everyone does guitar pop in Sweden." And for the most part, those categorizations are correct ... and when they're not, it's not necessarily the critics' fault, but the fault of the people promoting the foreign music ... they're the ones who have the final say as to what stuff hits the American market, and they tend to shoot for stuff that's more straightforward in terms of defined genres. So Sweden'll probably be the place to go for guitar pop for a while, but things are looking ... different recently.

Piccollo & Nopposan are such a French band. They're trip hop, I suppose, but they've got lots of little poppy quirks in there as well. Regardless, they're something different than like, Uffie and the Ed Banger crew and the DJ scene over there. Check them out (and sign them as well!) ...

Australian artists, on the other hand, have less of a focused style. But they still often confirm to a specific aesthetic ... there are plenty of twee-/indie-pop groups out there, tons of more organic dance music, and enough psychedelica for the whole world to share. However, you categorize Mountains In the Sky, though, they certainly don't fit into any of those stereotypical groupings. They've certainly got tracings of psychedelica there, but there's something dancier about them. Imagine like, the Avalanches doing a darker album ... that's sort of what these guys come off sounding like.

And just for fun ... Lucky Lucky Pigeons, a Swedish girl band. Okay, so they're sort of what you'd expect from a Swedish girl group, but those accents, and those goofy lyrics ... too much. And no one will turn down a nice pop song ... ?

Mountains In the Sky - Noah's Arkestra
Lucky Lucky Pigeons - Who Smells Marshmallows?
Lucky Lucky Pigeons - N to the ICE