Over the past decade or so, Gothenburg, Sweden’s music scene has development a reputation for a particular brand of pop that has received international attention across both Scandinavia and elsewhere — and interestingly enough, a number of the city’s up-and-coming artists have been attempting to redefine the city’s renowned sound as they’ve begun to see the Gothenburg sound as a smothering restriction. Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past few years, you may be familiar with Gothenburg-based quartet School 94 — formerly known as School — has built a reputation across the blogosphere for a sound consisting of shimmering guitars, swirling synths, sinuous bass lines and propulsive drumming with ethereal vocals as you would have heard on “So Long,” a single, which I wrote about back in December 2014.
“Common Sense,” the Swedish quartet’s latest single and first single off their forthcoming EP Bound is an urgent and swooning track that has the band pairing four-on-the-floor drumming with layers of jangling guitars, shimmering and chiming synths, propulsive bass lines with frontwoman Alice Boteus’ clear and plaintive pop belter vocals. Sonically, the song sounds as though it draws from both The Smiths, New Order and Haerts simultaneously — in other words while possessing a gorgeous melody, the song manages to evoke the urgency, passion and awkwardness of young love.
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