Despite a general distaste for any song that directly is addressing the DJ (sorry Pink), I have to admit that Niki and the Dove pulls it off more than most — perhaps because this is a song far more complex than your typical “just trying to dance” affair. Not that it doesn’t make you want to dance, because it does; it just does so in less of a “dance for the hell of it” and more of a “dance so that you can forget” kind of way. It’s primal. The pulsing beat is one that is easy to get lost in, the lines “DJ, ease my mind will you / play that song again / because we were in love” quickly become unforgettable.
Keeping up with the apparently Scandinavian tradition of an artful grasp on the electro pop genre, Niki and the Dove members Gustaf Karlöf and Malin Dahlström use intricate layers of synth, keyboard, and percussive vocals to create a sound that is both light and heavy at the same time. There is a certain necessary desperation in their lyrics, which are abstract enough that they keep the listener guessing but not so much as to completely leave us in the dust. The music is entirely self-involved, which is not necessarily a bad thing, for as you make your way through “DJ, Ease My Mind” or “The Fox” there is no doubt that you are being invited into Karlöf and Dahlström’s most intimate trains of thought. Everything about Niki and the Dove is unapologetically their own, and that seems unlikely to change any time soon. As they say on their Facebook page, “…we just make the music that we want to, and never compromise, so no pressure. It’s not like we can change anything anyway.”