Happy Nation
Ace of Base
Plato, The Republic — the ideal state, argued over a reggae skank instead of Socratic dialogue · 4:15
Latin / English, reggae-fused Eurobeat, utopia, invocation
Children
Robert Miles
Wilfred Owen, “Anthem for Doomed Youth” — the war elegy without rhetoric — Owen’s question answered with a piano · 6:32
instrumental, dream trance, piano, war elegy
Désenchantée
Mylène Farmer
Emil Cioran, On the Heights of Despair — Romanian-French despair performed with intolerable elegance · 5:23
French, cold synth-pop, despair, elegance
Crying in the Rain
Culture Beat
Ovid, Tristia — the poet in exile, weeping where no one can see · 4:37
English, eurodance, grief, downpour
Rhythm Is a Dancer
Snap!
Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy — the Dionysian dissolution of the self into the pulse, in four bars · 5:32
English, four-bar loop, Dionysian, hi-NRG
Dreams (Will Come Alive)
2 Brothers on the 4th Floor
Martin Luther King Jr., “I Have a Dream” — the prophetic tradition channelled through a Roland synth; the speech is the text · 4:24
English, prophetic, uplifting, Roland
Fallin’ in Love
La Bouche
Rilke, Duino Elegies — every angel is terrifying; the terror of surrender (and, after 2001, an elegy of its own) · 3:56
English, surrender, elegy, Melanie Thornton
Freedom
DJ BoBo
Rousseau, The Social Contract — born free, everywhere in chains — the chains drop at the chorus · 4:16
English, liberation, chains-off chorus, 909
It’s a Rainy Day
Ice MC
Verlaine, “Il pleure dans mon cœur” — the pathetic fallacy as Italo-house · 4:15
English, Italo-house, pathetic fallacy, rain
Life
Haddaway
Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus — rolling the boulder up the hill regardless; one must imagine Haddaway happy · 4:17
English, absurd, boulder, Sisyphus
Right in the Night (Fall in Love with Music)
Jam & Spoon
Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn” — beauty is truth; the urn singing back, flamenco guitar as Attic shape · 3:48
English, flamenco guitar, Grecian urn, beauty
Feel the Heat of the Night
Masterboy
Dostoevsky, White Nights — the nocturnal dreamer’s reckoning, relocated to a Stuttgart dancefloor · 3:41
English, nocturnal, dancefloor reckoning, White Nights
Insomnia
Faithless
Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet — the insomniac as philosopher, the self fragmenting at 4 AM into heteronyms · 3:34
English, 4 AM, heteronyms, no sleep
Purtroppo
Cassidy Diane
Leopardi, Canti — the Italian “alas” — the label’s own still point, a piano in the strobe · 2:46
Italian, unplugged soul ballad, solo piano, regret, the label’s own
Max Don’t Have Sex with Your Ex
E-Rotic
Chaucer, “The Miller’s Tale” — Frankfurtian fabliau; the low body and the high lesson, without apology · 3:31
English, fabliau, farce, moral instruction
Hyper Hyper
Scooter
Georg Büchner, Woyzeck — inarticulate rage in a reunified Germany, given a kick drum and a platform · 3:36
English / German, manic fragmentation, kick drum, void
Herz an Herz
Blümchen
Goethe, “Nähe des Geliebten” — untranslatable German diminutives; tenderness discovered as its own philosophy · 3:47
German, diminutives, tenderness, teenage Goethe
Désenchantée (2002)
Kate Ryan
Borges, “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote” — the exact same words, a decade later, meaning something entirely different · 3:39
French, the cover as new work, Borges, 2002
The Rhythm of the Night
Corona
Lorca, “Romance sonámbulo” — green, how I want you green; the night-rhythm as sleepwalking duende · 4:24
English, sleepwalking, duende, night-rhythm
Freed from Desire
Gala
the Buddha, Dhammapada — the Second Noble Truth at 138 BPM, adopted by stadiums who never read the dharma · 3:33
English, Second Noble Truth, 138 BPM, stadium chant