Super Eurobeat 169

1.A. Gordon - Say Yeah (A-Beat C)
The grand old lady of Eurobeat is still alive and kicking. I for one wasn't expecting all these remakes and titles with Annalise to be exactly authentic, but I guess I gotta admit defeat and welcome dear old Annerley back to business. She's obviously doing better than ever with her recent tracks and the rumors say we'll be hearing even more from her soon. Say Yeah starts off yet an another Super Eurobeat album with a blast: An extremely energetic fun track to sing along. The basic A-Beat C reagents are in the mix and it all sounds very effective and memorable. Absolutely marvellous job on the vocals, we've missed you Annerley!
Rating : 9½

2.Candy Taylor - Eurobeat Kind Of Love (Delta)
The first 5 eurobeat albums I ever bought included Euromach 2, which featured the first ever Candy Taylor song I heard. Make A Move made me love the title and probably due to the extremely popular first impression I still have high expectations for every Candy song. Eurobeat Kind Of Love presents us with the newly found Delta style. Sort of medium paced and bouncy feel-good music that either strikes you or it doesn't.  The whole time I listened to this track I kept on getting this Deja Vu feeling and thought this song was on early 150's albums just slightly different. A pretty simple song that goes by rather swiftly but doesn't really leave you craving for more. A good background song, but not one of those tracks that you wanna replay over and over.
Rating : 7+

3.Gipsy Baby - Oh Honey Oh (Boom Boom Beat/Asia)
Asia has had a talent for picking weird and rather dumb artist titles in the past and I'd include this in that crowd. This song is exactly the kind of Asia I dislike the most: Totally hollow track with a basic beat that keeps it going, but other than that it just feels as if's still in a Demo stage and has no flesh around its bones at all. Totally left me feeling unsatisfied and I could only bare to listen through it a few times as I always wanted to skip to the next song.
Rating : 6-

4.Lou Grant - Maharaja Night 2006 (Time)
If you had to name one old school eurobeat male title with lots of big hits, I'd assume Lou Grant would be named right away. Almost all of the songs released under this title have been big successes and Maharaja Night is maybe one of the biggest ones. The original Maharaja Night is a true classic with good old eurobeat energy and sounds, the rework tries hard to do justice to the original but with somewhat questionable results. The old punch is still there and every once in a while the 2006 version sounds really good, but for the most part the song just sounds too light. The absense of more "strong" and striking sounds as the original had, would've been really welcome in this version as well. Either way, even though it can't reach the level of the original it's by no means a bad remake and still sounds like a good song.
Rating : 8+

5.Bombers - Mr. Frankenstein (Boom Boom Beat/Asia)
Do you ever get those songs that just annoy you right when you hear them? That's what Mr. Frankenstein did to me. The song is a rather bland Asia faire with repetitive lyrics, looping of an extremely annoying "Ho ho" in the chorus and pointless sounds. I've argued a few times already about this track with people when most other people seem to enjoy it a lot, but I just can't find a single positive thing about it. I will say that if you are a fan of Mark Farina in general, then you probably will feel home with this song, but I myself include this as one of the worst Asia songs.
Rating : 5-

6.Lolita - Hot For Your Love (A-Beat C)
Oh what are you going to do now Elena that your rival screamer is back? We've been listening to your highpitched swan songs for years but now the original Lolita is back in the business, how about some rotation on vocalists from now on.... Hot For Your Love is a very typical Lolita track you either love or hate. Simple sounds, rather pleasant chorus and uneventful song over all. Not the best from this artist, but still an okay performance, doubt too many people would rank this as a top track from the title.
Rating : 7+

7.Garcon - Super Kaiser (HI-NRG Attack)
After listening to this song for months I have to say that when I originally was writing the review for 169 I gave this track a rather lousy grade, but by time it finally revealed to me. The song will not change the well working formula HI-NRG Attack has going on, but it invents something the label rarely relies on: male & female vocals both combined. The fact is that HI-NRG Attack often adds small female back ups to their songs, but they're often rather unnoticable or just meaningless, but this time around the vocals by Baby Bazooka (?) work absolutely perfectly and the lines sung by both Ferrari  and young Greta are the clear highlight for the song. Strong sounds, great vocal work and a catchy chorus, what else can you ask for! Hot and bold, hot and cold for the human race you go!
Rating : 10

8.Norma Sheffield - Love Can Be Your Game (A-Beat C)
I feel sorry for using this old trick again, but: BORING! Sorry ol' Norma, but no... just no. Not your game.
Rating : 6-

9.Kiki & Fancy - Roly Poly Rock (SCP)
One great thing about 160s has been that it started with an album that had Kiki & Fancy and it ends with yet an another of their songs! So the decade can't be all that bad. Make Your Move was a powerful collaboration by 2 big SCP names, but this time around the highpitched girls are back and they're cheerier than ever! Roly Poly Rock kicks off with an extremely giddy melody that will drive half of the listeners away right from the start, but the ones who stay around will be mezmerised by the bouncy tune that turns out to be one of the stronger presentations they have to offer. We got ourselves a new Wake Up here in our hands. Adorable chorus with very easy to sing along lyrics is the clear highlight for the track and also what makes the song memorable. Slightly more powerful than the usual K&F track, love it or hate it. I choose the first ^n.
Rating : 10+++

10.Yellowfin - Welcome To The Beach (A-Beat C)
Nuage is back under a new title. After listening to this song repeatedly I couldn't really point out whether it had other vocalists in it, but to my ears it at least sounds like it's not just the good old Denise singing in it. A very sunny song that fits the current season due to it's perky mood and slightly summer influenced lyrics. Nice song for a while but will definitely be forgotten after a while I predict.
Rating : 7½

11.Rose - Magic Rainbow (Time)
Must... resist... Deep breaths... Okay, let's do this fast and painless: I don't like this song. It's lame and smells of doo. And what exactly is a Magic Rainbow a metaphor for?
Rating : 5

12.Cy-Ro - Get The Dark Side Into My Brain (HI-NRG Attack)
Super Kaiser brought HI-NRG Attack back to the path I've been hoping to hear from them for quite a while. Cy-Ro tries to keep the level up with another powerful energy-packed track. If we take the previous Rose airy-feeling and compare it with this "heavy" Cy-Ro mood I don't even have to think twice about which I'd pick. Yet Get The Dark Side Into My Brain can't really compete with the Garcon song in production values. This song strikes out as a very well done song from the label, but it doesn't have the similar novelty hit value as Super Kaiser. Either way, nicely done HI-NRG Attack.
Rating : 8½

13.Christine & Van T.K. - Now Celebrate (SCP)
I have to admit that even sometimes the biggest favorites end up screwing big time, even SCP. What I love about SCP is how they do lots of duets between their big titles and very often they end up being catchy and memorable performances (just look at where Go 2 is at). Now Celebrate was a song that sounded slightly like a christmas track on crack when I heard it the first time. The 2nd time around it just started to remind me of a gay disco anthem, what the 3rd thought it brought to me can be left untold. One thing I am certain though of, is that I really don't stand this song at all. Really boring and meaningless track that does no justice to either of the great vocalists.
Rating : 5

14.Neo - Disco Fire (A-Beat C)
The strong A-Beat C male front just keeps getting stronger and stronget by time due to songs like Disco Fire. Eurobeat at it's finest form: Fast, energetic, catchy and nicely produced. I can already imagine this being one of the hits for the best of this year, or at least the next JGTC. Neo is doing the exact same thing as Manuel was doing at the start: Well produced songs that make the title big and eventually they'll do some sort of a curve and change the style a bit. When that will happen is of course still a mystery but if my predictions are correct we'll soon hear a Neo ballad.
Rating : 9-

15.Sophie - Drive In The Night (Time)
A song that even earnt its own Thread on the Eurobeat Prime forum, what's with all the fuss? As the experts in the thread explained, this is a remake of an old 80's song by Havana. With all the small "hype" around the song I have probably listened to this song the most from this album due to trying to understand what's so special about it. And I still can't see it. I do feel that when compared with most of the Time tracks around these days, Drive In The Night stands out as a variable and fun song to listen to, but it by no means seems like a very outstanding song to me. Fun to listen to and even after countless repeats I can say that I like it, but not a favorite for me.
Rating : 8

16.SCP All Stars - Big Heart (SCP)
Oh it's been quite a while since we had proper All Stars tracks so it's Big Heart is very warmly welcome. All of the big SCP vocalists make their appereances in this feel good song that is an another song that could be a future hit for a Super Euro X'Mas album. For some reason SCP has this talent of putting christmassy chimes and sounds in their duets and this song has a fairly strong feeling of the christmas spirit in it, even the vocals could very well be adjusted a bit to have a christmas meaning in them. The song is a very nicely produced song, just as you could expect from an All Starts track to be. Surely will be re-appearing on a few albums in the nearby future.
Rating : 9+

17.Alvin - Dream Of You (Boom Boom Beat/Asia)
The previous Alvin song was a hit and even made it rather high on SEB170, so fans were eagarly waiting for this track I assume. Dream Of You is a similar energic Asia song that won't surely leave fans cold. Fast beat accompanied by nice sounds and a good, yet slightly annoying chorus. Not as big of a hit for me as Domino was, but still clearly the best song out of the 3 BBB songs on this album.
Rating : 7½

18.Ale - If You Ever Leave Me (Delta)
An album has reached its end by a new title, I for some reason was expecting this to be a male title when I originally saw the tracklisting so I was somewhat surprised to hear a female vocalist blasting away. Fast melody that works surprisingly well due to the vocals, can't really pinpoint if the vocalist is some new one to the business or an old one. One thing is for sure though is that the vocals are the key thing in this song as they really create a huge edge to the song. A nice way to end the album, and maybe a new title for Delta to keep the strong beats kicking.
Rating : 9-

Final Words :
I originally wrote the review for this album a few months ago when it was released but while I was writing the last bits my computer crashed and I got so ticked off at it, that I decided to postpone it a bit and here I am, waaaay late, but better late than never I guess. 169 ends an era with the very similar level the whole decade has been: somewhat unsatisfactory. If the 150s felt as a rather boring and slow decade, 160s have done even worse and maybe one of the biggest things that has affected this has been Vibration's departure and Asia being present. Either way 169 is an okay album that has its highlights but lots of mediocore stuff and a few bad tracks, not the best one this decade can offer, but not the worst either. Listen to the previews on the Avex site and decide for yourself.
Final Score : 7½

The Best 3 Songs

- Kiki & Fancy - Roly Poly Rock
- Garcon - Super Kaiser
- A. Gordon - Say Yeah

The Worst 3 songs

- Bombers - Mr. Frankenstein
- Rose - Magic Rainbow
- Christine & Van T.K. - Now Celebrate

Honorable Mention

- SCP All Stars - Big Heart

Reviewed by Bore