Like Milla Jovovich
2025 Mix 11: Oops! All Golden Beats
I am just about discoursed out for the time being — I finally started an A-pop series that was linked in a recent Pitchfork review, set the record straight on “Since U Been Gone” in a way that I’m hoping will eventually make its way to Wikipedia (and then…the world!), and even generated a bit of interest in my 2007 Bluffer’s Guide to Post-2000 Teenpop for Stylus after Todd in the Shadows wondered if there were ever any Avril-alikes. …If there were ever any Avril-alikes!! My work is not yet done on this earth.
So enough yapping. Instead, this week I’ve focused on Golden Beatology. As a reminder, a “golden beat” is a term used in the People’s Pop Polls for songs that you love that you’ve never heard before. “Golden Beatology” is my term for finding songs that I think many voters will particularly enjoy as golden beats. These are not necessarily my favorite songs, because my personal taste isn’t often well aligned with the tastes of the electorate.
If you like the songs on this mix more than usual, I would suggest (1) you should participate in the People’s Pop Polls on Bluesky (nominations for the next tournament, Poppelgangers—identical title songs—are on March 30), and (2) you should check out my ongoing Golden Beatology playlist. If you don’t like this mix, you should still participate in the People’s Pop Polls, because everyone should.
1. Kazinama f. Musarrat Nazir: Ahista Ahista
India/Pakistan
An Indian producer’s breezy rework of an ‘80s song by Pakistani singer Musarrat Nazir (subject for future research). This was released sometime in 2024 but has now gotten a rerelease on Universal Music India. Kazinama also put together a fun mash-up over on Instagram of Britney Spears’s “…Baby One More Time” and A.R. Rahman’s “Genda Phool.”
2. Kit Sebastian: Göç/Me
Turkey/France
A French/Turkish duo based in London, on Flying Lotus’s Brainfeeder label. Slinky Anatolian psych/funk that sounds classy but not too fussy. Whole album’s good.
3. Suzane: Mouvement
France
French pop that gets in a fighting position (from Tekken—good morning!) but never really throws many punches. Has the distinction of being the only music video of the whole bunch this week, so gets a screencap by default. There’s a line in this song about Suzane’s lyrics “cutting like a sword, à la Milla Jovovich.” This inspired me to once again look up Jovovich’s 1994 alt-pop album The Divine Comedy (still good!), which Mike Barthel wrote about for the Awl many years ago.
4. Duke Boara: DoubleDouble
UK
Effortless indie disco, with the faintest glimmers of some millennial baile funk and Miami bass around the edges, but a bit too square for those to feel like more than set dressing. It’s a cool set, though.
5. Art d’Ecco: Tree of Life
Canada
Vancouver artist on Paper Bag Records identifies as glam and goes all in on this descriptor on the title track centerpiece of his new album Serene Demon, which made me think fondly of The Ark as I’m wont to do. But for this mix I went with the more straightforward cowbell clatter dance-pop of “Tree of Life.”
6. Marina Zispin: Penthouse Samba
UK
UK duo from Newcastle and London, Bianca Scout and Martyn Reid, with washed out synth-pop that just skirts drab despite staying resolutely gray.
7. PPJ: Que Isso
France/Brazil
Dark, driving electro with a genuine freestyle undercurrent, but not much to go on top, the vocals subsumed into the instrumental, not the strongest choice but not a bad one, either.
8. Opek: The Table
Germany
One-man band from Cologne made the jump from bedroom looping to bedroom loping, setting a slow boom-bap under a spare funk jam, lots of space for the guitar and bass to crawl around without bumping into each other.
9. Ibex Band: Yezemed Yebada [1976]
Ethiopia
Ethiopian funk band that rocked through the 70s and occasionally backed Mulatu Astatke before decamping to Sudan amidst intensifying civil war in 1979 and becoming the Roha Band. This is a salvage of a 1976 album created in a fortuitous moment when a four-track and other equipment for a studio recording was briefly available. More info at Bandcamp.
10. The Lewis Express, Chip Wickham: Run Tell That
UK
You know a mix like this will need to have a flute block, the flute provided in this case by Chip Wickham for this lively instrumental soul number from a British jazz group on ATA Records.
11. Riz Ortolani: Colsì Dolce…Cosi Perverssa - Shake N. 1 [1969]
Italy
That said, you can probably tell which flute jam is actually from the late ‘60s. It’s this one, from the score to Italian giallo flick Colsì Dolce…Cosi Perversa (So Sweet…So Perverse).
12. Okonski: Dahlia
US
Chill jazz theme to study to from a North Carolina trio, a bit slight but in the pocket, am lucky I stumbled on it while making this particular mix.
13. Michi f. Gabriel da Rosa: Memmy (Recuerdo)
US
Something about this samba’s immaculate production and off-kilter vocal mixing grabbed me, and I was at first surprised to see it’s out on Stones Throw but it sort of made sense, especially when I heard the very different (but no less immaculately-produced) lead single “Snoobie.”
14. The Lumiñanas f. Jon Spencer, Pascal Comelade: Space Baby
France/US
Married French couple have mined a slick neo-garage sound for many years, and on their new album they bring in lots of guests to lend some grit to their vocals, which tend to be a little, well, French. This one’s got Jon Spencer, and elsewhere you’ll find occasional collaborators Bobby Gillespie of Primal Scream and French singer-songwriter Bertrand Belin.
15. Maribou State f. Holly Walker: Peace Talk
UK
The occasional sleepy Britrock that I am still capable of falling for, especially when there’s a guest vocalist and a string section involved. I regret to inform you my eyes fell upon the phrase “packed with sublime anthemia” in the press materials. (I don’t envy the people who have to write these things; I can barely half-ass some of these blurbs.)
16. Marshall Allen f. Neneh Cherry: New Dawn
US/UK
I swear I pulled this one, a duet with Neneh Cherry on the new album by Sun Ra centenarian(!!) saxophonist Marshall Allen, before Christgau gave it a full A this month. The version on the Spotify playlist is the lesser radio edit, needed for my arbitrarily strict mix CD time limit, but the superior full version is linked in the YouTube playlist (and above).
17. Skye Wanda f. Drega: Kila Kitu
South Africa
18. Thakzin, Divine Keys: Stick Around
South Africa
Wouldn’t be Golden Beatology without some South African music on the dreamier side of the house music spectrum. The first is a delicate Afro house build-up that warms up the whole room in seven minutes, the second a requisite check-in on 3-step pioneer Thakzin, who is back to all four steps and gets a lot of mileage out of a languorous piano section.
19. Salami Rose Joe Louis: Inside
US
I remember Salami Rose Joe Louis being more disjointed avant-funk but I don’t hate this breathy swirl of arpeggios and loops and bloops and meandering melodies to nowhere. Wouldn’t sequence it any further up in a mix than the penultimate cool-down slot, though.
20. Laurie Torres: Reflets
Canada
Montreal pianist gradually develops what sounds like a simple improvisation in a way that holds my interest throughout, with thoughtful introduction of splashes of synth that break through like the first glimmers of a sunrise. I like that it ends before dawn has quite broken, though.
***
That’s it! Until next time, I hope you’ll keep a song in your golden-beating heart.
—Dave Moore (the other one)
Title from Suzane: Mouvement (“à la Milla Jovovich”).
Todd didn't say "Avril clones," he said "Avril-alikes." To me, "clones" is a lot more offensive, implying not just similarity or affinity but something manufactured to be like an original with no distinguishing characteristics. Maybe for other people, though, "Avril-alikes" is the same thing (so for them, "Avril-alike" is an "Avril clone" clone).
Was heartened by the thread, with so many people having good ideas about who led to Avril and so many of them knowing as successors not just the Ashlees but the Katy Roses and Skye Sweetnams. Assume these people were young and listening while the music was being released in the '00s. I don't think anything like that depth of knowledge of the era has ever been part of the general musical or critical discourse.
Woof! What a great playlist. Loved the uptempo pop stuff, the gauzy, hazy slow stuff, the South African stuff. Thank you!