Tonight was the final episode in this season’s Så Mycket Bättre (aside from next week’s bonus ‘duets’ episode), and they saved the best until last – Darin’s night.
Or at least it was supposed to turn out that way.
Perhaps it’s because we love the originals so much, or perhaps it’s because most of the artists there weren’t all that familiar with his music, and so couldn’t be bothered putting that much effort into their versions of his songs – but either way, all the performances, productions, and versions tonight (with one exception – the title of this post) were absolutely dire. Lazy bastardisations of great pop songs. Even Miss Li singing ‘Lovekiller’ was terrible – she totally left out the chorus. Magnus Uggla’s ‘You’re Out Of My Life’ was at least a fresh take on the song, but his performance style still managed to somewhat curdle it.
Anyway, out of all that tripe there was one shining beacon of flavour – Maja Ivarsson’s ‘Want Ya’. She turned the song into a punk pop piece, and gave the already fantastic melody a new, vigorous, perhaps chemical fueled, lease of life. In X Factor terms – she smashed it.
Phew! Thank you Maja Ivarsson for renewing the sanctity of Darin’s back catalogue in a difficult evening.
Here’s the audio of her live performance of the song;
