Erik Hassle - Pieces

With hair large enough that it would most likely sink the Titanic, this week finally marks the release of Pieces the debut album from Swedish pop star Erik Hassle. Having recently been awarded the Grammi Award for Best Newcomer (the Swedish equivalent of the Brit Awards) in January, the buzz in the pop community concerning this new talent has been immense with demos and artwork being the staple of blogs for the last twelve months.

In his attempt to acclimatise himself to the British market, Pieces is in fact a reworked version of his Swedish debut Hassle with four tracks being removed and the replacement of one with another in order to maintain a standard length of 12 songs. The remixes of these songs are remarkably subtle meaning that if you are not well acquainted with his previous work there is no need to scour the internet for the originals.

The focus of this debut concerns a recent break-up of Hassle’s and the aftermath which appears to provide so much inspiration for this generation of male pop singers. When listening to this material, many would be excused for hearing a remarkable similarity to last year’s debut album Complete Me by Frankmusik (especially since if you put both album titles together they sound like an advertisement for some musical jigsaw puzzle). In fact these two singers share so much that they could have baked in the same potter’s kiln; both of these men are heavily influenced by the eighties, have ridiculous haircuts, sing about break-ups and can stitch together very good pop tunes.

So what is the problem with Pieces? The songs are heavy on the hooks and addictive beats, making heavy use of synthesisers, the latter of which is extremely in vogue at the moment. Album opener ‘Bump in the Road’ is synth-pop in all its enveloping glory as Hassle takes on the guise of a man pleading with his lover to keep working with the relationship with images such as birds singing with broken wings and trees still standing as they lose their leaves. Granted these may sound rather clichéd but with the conviction of Hassle’s vocal delivery and the smooth natured of the backing, this actually turns out to be one of the strongest pop album openings so far this year. The songs that immediately follow it all aid to keep up the fantastic momentum with ‘Hurtful’, ‘Standing Where You Left Me’ and ‘Don’t Bring Flowers’ all acting as fantastic pop numbers that showcase Hassle’s talent.

However, when you reach the second half the album you realise that he has already fully played his hand and there really isn’t much left for him to say on this debut. Break-up albums are nothing if not numerous but those that are able to keep up the interest are those that could be some of the rarest discs in existence. Sadly Pieces does not live up to the great pop-break up albums of the recent 80’s revival, something that VV Brown’s Travelling Like The Light is probably glad to hear.

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