101-ᗅᗺᗷᗅ
I Still Have Faith On You
(Polar)
After our Top 50 albums of 2021, it is time to recap our favourite songs of the year. Beginning, as our tradition demands, with the symbolic 101 position, usually dedicated to a guilty pleasure or a track/artist of great relevance during the last twelve months, left bubbling under our selected list. In this case, it is both, as after four decades of their separation Swedish pop behemoth ᗅᗺᗷᗅ announced their return, which automatically was hailed as the comeback of the century. Their new album, ‘Voyage’ unsurprisingly found them at their most mellifluous, but in times of a pandemic recovery that is still uncertain, ‘I Still Have Faith In You,’ at least for anyone whose childhood was left mildly traumatised by the sheer melodrama of Chiquita or for those that treasure some joyful memories soundtracked by ‘Dancing Queen’ or ‘Gimme Gimme Gimme’, had the warmth and feel-good embrace of an encounter with a long time absent friend.
The Swedish fab four may have felt slightly dated and their new offerings weren’t even the best ᗅᗺᗷᗅ-like songs around, that honor could go to Pearl Charles‘ glorious pastiche ‘Only for tonight’. However, like theirs, most songs outside the tyranny of the mainstream fusion between EDM, pop and modern R&B formerly called urban music were positively revivalistic. In 2022, whatever your favourite jam from the past may have been, there was a strong chance a current song was influenced by it. This has not been a year for great innovation then, but rather for music which, suitably for the times we are living in, brought comfort and reassurance.