Title: Life in Cartoon Motion
It’s no secret that my music choices are influenced by the doyen of Hollywood gossip, the self-proclaimed Gossip Gangsta Perez Hilton. For months now Hilton has been wheezing the praises of Mika, a dashing young British singer with a voice eerily reminiscent of Freddie Mercury and Erasure. I had to download him. With the release of his debut album Life in Cartoon Motion in the United States this March, Mika joins Amy Winehouse, Lily Allen, and Paolo Nutini in the British bamboozling of the American music scene. Robbie couldn’t do it, and the Spice Girls were good for only a laugh, but Mika not only topped the charts in UK, Canada and now the US, but his album sold 100,000 copies in its first week of release. At last month’s South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas, where the audience is as celebrity-packed as the stage itself, Mika’s operatic dance pop had everyone on their feet and bopping.
All of this, of course, means absolutely nothing to you, so let me try and put it in context. His smash hit “Grace Kelly”, fast and furiously energetic, is perfect for navigating through Mumbai’s manic traffic—I listened to it about seven times yesterday, while grinding my teeth from Colaba to Juhu. And “Lollipop” is so marvelously corny you will enjoy it whether you’re inhaling the dust off the city’s streets or dancing on table tops at Zenzi.