FFWD Weekly
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Music by Mike Bell Eiffel 65 with Patria March 26 and 28 The Palace Chances are you’re familiar with Eiffel 65’s hit single "Blue (Da Ba Dee)" under another name: "That fucking ‘Scooby Dooby Doo’ song," or "Whatever that bloody song is called that’s always on Power 107 – you know, that ‘Boop Beep Bop Boop’ song." In fact, when it appeared on several of Fast Forward’s music critics’ end-of-the-year lists, everyone had a different name for it. But everyone knew it. And hated it. Whether it’s the frequency with which the dance pop hit has been spun in this country or how it gratingly niggles its way into your subconscious, there’s a tremendous amount of ill-will directed at the little ditty. "I can tell you that there’s been a time in Italy when we heard it so much it became a nightmare for us," agrees Eiffel 65’s vocalist Jeffrey Jey, from his home in Italy. But I guess it’s a nightmare worth enduring when the song has surprisingly – in Jey’s eyes anyway – gone to Number 1 in such countries as Germany, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Mexico and, of course, Canada. "It dropped out of the clouds for us," he says, explaining that the single had all but stalled before a Northern Italian radio DJ began championing "Blue." "In no time at all, it was on every radio and in every chart.... We were really, really shocked." Comprised of a quartet of like-minded Italian producers and musicians from a collective called The Bliss Corporation, the band’s debut, Europop, is pretty much what the title suggests – a speed reader’s version of the history of European pop music. From Kraftwerk to ABBA to Duran Duran to Depeche Mode to Aqua, it’s music that has, over the years, attracted a great deal of derision from critics and traditionalists. Then again, which bands are history more likely to remember: Teardrop Explodes or Men Without Hats? Bongwater or A-Ha? "A long time ago people thought (those bands) were cheesy – I never thought something like that," says Jey. "I thought they had really great melodies and they were really good musicians and I admired them a lot." So there. And a Da Ba Dee to you too.

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