Andrew Reviews: I Love It

"Artist:" Icona Pop
Chart Position at Time of Writing: 9 (Peak: 7)
Link that will cause hearing damage: I'm so sorry.

Review: I will be the first to admit that I don't "get" dance music. I'm of Scottish stock; we don't dance unless we've had 3 beers too many, and when we dance it looks like we're having poorly coordinated seizures with musical accompaniment. I don't enjoy this genre of music even a tiny amount, so I'm going into totally uncharted territory with this one. You can't criticize me for mocking something I don't like, though, because I haven't picked some random dance number. I have picked a song that has achieved more chart success in the US than anything Jimi Hendrix ever performed. I sincerely hope that last sentence offended you.

So I have a question for people who actually like this type of music: are the lyrics always this stupid? 15 seconds on the web tells me that Icona Pop are a Swedish duo. Any reason this song couldn't have been in Swedish? There is empirical evidence (La Bamba comes to mind) that Americans will listen to and enjoy music that isn't in English, no matter how dumb the "real" lyrics are. This song right here is an insult to English, Swedish, and several other languages. Here we go...

I got this feeling on this* summer day when you were gone.

Not a terrible starting line, but I have to let you know that it comes after 9 seconds of the most godawful noise ever. Have you ever had a video game start stuttering and then crash? Because that is what the backing track of this song sounds like. You'd think that the lyrics drowning the noise out would be a good thing, right? You'd be wrong. The two girls aren't hitting any impressive notes, they're barely singing, and it sounds like their voices have been processed by the same factory that makes the "cheese" you can get on a McDonald's burger. The scariest part of it all? This is the best part of the song. It's all downhill from here...

I crashed my car into the bridge. I watched, I let it burn.

Ladies, it's really dang hard to make a car explode/catch fire. The Mythbusters proved that back in 2009. So unless you drove a Ford Pinto into the bridge, it probably didn't burn. Also, the theme of the song is breaking free of the guy(?) who's trying to keep you down. How does destroying your own car do that? If I wanted to get back at an ex, I wouldn't make "destroy my own vehicle" step one. Wait! Maybe she's showing us how little she cares?

I threw your shit into a bag and pushed it down the stairs.

That's more like it, girls!

I crashed my car into the bridge.

You idiot.

I don't care,
I love it.
I don't care.

There's a pretty interesting debate over what the opposite of love is. Is the opposite of love hate? Or is apathy the opposite of love? Because if apathy is the opposite of love then this verse makes no dang sense at all. But, hey, I think I know what the songwriters (all 3 of 'em) were going for here. She loves the fact that she doesn't care. Alright...(Heavy rant warning! The following is not so much humor as it is a commentary on the pathetic state of humanity!)

Because if there's one thing our generation needs it's more apathy! We clearly care too much! It's not like we 20-somethings have ignored the repeated slaughter of hundreds of thousands of our fellow human beings in Africa. Or the protracted civil war in Syria. Or the waves of violence sweeping across the country we invaded under sketchy pretenses a decade ago. Nope, we all need to lay back and care even less than we already do! Thank goodness we can unironically shout how great it is to not care!

Look, I'm not saying we have to concentrate on the negative all the time. If we did, we'd collectively go nuts. But I look around and see the a huge proportion of my generation wrapped up entirely in themselves, willfully ignorant of the world around them--the last thing we need is a song telling us to care less. Then again, maybe it isn't saying that, just reinforcing it. Maybe "I don't care" is really the motto of our generation, no matter what Drake would have us believe. (Rant over. Attempts at humor & mockery of terrible lyrics resume here.)

You're on a different road, I'm in the Milky Way.

Unless this dude's "different road" is on a planet in another galaxy, he's in the Milky Way, too. Do they not have astronomy in Sweden?

You want me down on earth, but I am up in space.

Hope you cared enough to bring a space suit. I also hope you don't crash your rocket into a bridge. OK, I'll stop.

You're so damn hard to please, we gotta kill this switch

You don't kill a switch! I assume this is a reference to a kill switch, an emergency stop button included on most pieces of heavy equipment. I'm fine with "push the kill switch" or something like it to make that fit into the rhyme, but you can't kill a f***ing switch! Good Lord, it's like these people don't speak Engl--my bad. However, to cover for my casual racism, I ask again: why the eff couldn't this song have been in Swedish? I think we've established by now no one's listening to the thing for the words.

You're from the 70's, but I'm a 90's bitch.
I love it!

And now we have possibly the most nonsensical line in the whole song. Is the guy stuck in the past? Is he an older man?  Does the dude wear a whole lot of tacky polyester? More importantly, why is this woman calling herself a b****? That's...usually not a compliment. And while the 90s were an awesome decade to grow up in, they weren't exactly the 60s or the 80s in terms of generational identity. Truth be told, the decade was a bit apathetic about everything, sort of like the song purports to be. Maybe that's where they get it from?

Blessedly, that's it.The song actually gets repeated word-for-word after this, but since it isn't any more intelligent the second time through, I see no need to waste your time any more than I already have. I do need to reinforce, however, that if you don't care, you probably shouldn't smash up your car...

*--They might actually say "the summer day" or "a summer day." Either way, this is the least stupid line of the song. Which is saying something, since "the summer day" implies that the guy was gone for one day and got his stuff smashed up while his ex crashed her own car to show him what's what. 

Recommended Alternative Listening: Well, if you're into this sort of thing, I'm gonna recommend good ol' Daft Punk. Many of their songs don't have words, and the music, while not my style, sucks about 100% less than the piece of Swedish whale vomit that is "I Love It." If you want a song about vengeance on a boyfriend, try Hit 'Em Up Style by Blue Cantrell (or the nifty folk version by the Carolina Chocolate Drops, if you're feeling a bit risky). If you want a song in a foreign language that you can dance to, consider the 80s hit 99 Luftbalons by Nena. If you want a genuine Swedish experience, buy a Volvo, go to an Ikea, or eat some meatballs. I hear they have less horse in them now.