The new sounds of hits

Just found myself a few wonderful surprises among today’s big-selling albums. In The Lonely Hour by Sam Smith, 1000 Forms Of Fear by Sia and Don’t Kill the Magic by the band Magic! are easily the standouts. Interestingly, they share some common qualities that hint of what is now happening to popular music.

First, the featured artists are not Americans. I guess this means that the door to the hit charts is open to anybody. Second is their music styles are definitely old-school. This means that instead of using studio gimmickry, they rely on the old-fashioned requirements, great voices accompanied by good music. Their success today just goes to show that you can seldom go wrong with that.

1000 Forms Of Fear by Sia: Technically, Sia is not really new. The Australian pop jazz artist has been around for years recording albums, doing shows and writing and collaborating with other artists. Among her famous compositions of late are Pretty Hurts by Beyoncé, Double Rainbow by Katy Perry and Diamonds by Rihanna. She can be heard in David Guetta’s Titanium, Flo Rida’s Wild Ones and Eminem’s Beautiful Pain, among others. But I say new because her music is so different from others nowadays, that it feels like hearing something new.

It is the mystery in her voice. It is strong and otherworldly, yet hints of vulnerability. This coupled with her flair for writing commercial, very catchy choruses is what makes Sia’s music so amazing. This is very much in evidence in her album where potential big-sellers drop in with every cut.

Foremost among these is Chandelier which everybody now loves to sing and I must say also watch and dance to, entranced as everybody is by that cute dancing girl on the video. My next choice is the dark and anthemic Elastic Heart (feat. Diplo) which was used in The Hunger Games soundtrack. And for the third, I would say Fire Meet Gasoline with that refrain that burns into your ear and stays there.

Also included in are Big Girls Cry, Burn The Pages, Eye Of The Needle, Hostage, Straight For The Knife, Fair Game, Free The Animal, Cellophane and Dressed In Black.

Don’t Kill The Magic by Magic! is new reggae music processed the Canadian way. The story how this came about has begun to go around. The members of Magic! are Nasri Atweh, Mark Pellizer, Alex Tanas and Ben Spivak. They are all Canadians. They are seasoned, well-awarded studio musicians who one day decided to record their own album. Given the fact that they work regularly with big names in the business, there was no question that their music would be good.

What came as a surprise was that the album Magic! turned out to be not only excellent but also a very big seller. It is so commercial, in fact that Rude, the first single out, is now No. 1 and a strong contender for song of 2014. And Rude is not all there is Don’t Kill The Magic. This is an album of well-written songs, very good vocals, top-notch production and a happy, over-all vibe that gets listeners grooving again to the reggae beat.

There are no bad cuts here so I am sure you will also love No Evil, Let Your Hair Down, Stupid Me, No Way No, Paradise, Don Kill The Magic, One Woman One Man, Little Girl Big World, Mama Didn’t Raise No Fool and How Do You Want To Be Remembered.

In The Lonely Hour by Sam Smith: It seems too soon for comfort but true talent will manifest itself whenever and wherever, so I say now that it looks like somebody who can walk on Ed Sheeran’s footsteps has arrived. The guy is attractive and also young. He is only 22 years old. He is also British. He has incredible vocals, including his own kind of falsetto. And best of all, he writes killer songs. We heard him first in Latch by Disclosure and La La La by Naughty Boys. His name is the oh-so-simple Sam Smith.

Smith is the kind of singer who can sing anything. Listen to how he treats the acrobatic notes of the upbeat opener Money On My Mind, now he goes into the acoustic ballad mode of Good Thing and then soars high in the gospel ballad Stay With Me. He is also up there in the expressions department. His singing is so sad and soulful at times that I am tempted to call his style emo for emotional. You would be emotional, too, as you hear how he sings about unrequited love in the broken-hearted trio of Leave Your Lover, I’m Not The Only One and I’ve Told You Now.

Also included are Like I Can, Life Support, Not In That Way, Lay Me Down, Restart, Latch an acoustic version of the song with Disclosure, La La La without Naughty Boys and Make It To Me

Here is a unique kind of hit chart. This is a list of the 100 Most Pirated Music Releases that I found from the Digital Music News. It surely gives truth to the saying that artist should be glad if their works get pirated. That means they are selling. Remember pirates cannot be bothered by flops. Here are the Top 20 songs most downloaded by pirates in the list:

 X by Ed Sheeran; True by Avicii; Ultraviolence by Lana Del Rey; The New Classic by Iggy Azalea; All Of Me by John Legend; XSCAPE by Michael Jackson; G I R L by Pharrell Williams; Night Visions by Imagine Dragons; Trigga by Trey Songz; the Billboard Magazine Top 40 by various artists; AM by Artic Monkeys; PRISM by Katy Perry; Love In The Future by John Legend; Wake Me Up by Avicii; Fancy by Iggy Azalea; Beyonce by Beyoncé; Problem by Ariana Grande; Dark Horse by Katy Perry; Chandelier by Sia; and Bangerz by Miley Cyrus.