Heavenly Devil’s Music

The Teddybears is a Swedish band that mixes a number of genres to come up with astoundingly catchy pop music that spans generations and styles. From the lead-off “Rocket Scientist,” the stage for their sophomore album, Devil’s Music, is set. Rapper Eve takes the helm for guest vocals and the band backs her up with twitchy keys, thumping drumlines, and a fair share of tambourine to raise the fun mood. Reggae singer Desmond Foster comes up next on the infectious “Get Mama a House,” about going through whatever means you have to in order to buy a house for your mother—the true sign of success. The Teddybears deserve to reach that success, too.

Other interesting guests include Cee-Lo and the B-52’s together on the restro-feeling “Cho Cha” and the Flaming Lips on “Chrystal Meth Christian.” What The Teddybears do best is take the performances from these artists and expand on them. The Flaming Lips still have the earthy, sonic feel of their newer albums, but with deeper reaches into the club/dance scene. The album’s title track wraps everything up into one package fast-paced blues rap from ADL (the downside to the guests of a Swedish band is their lack of name recognition in the States) mixed with music that hits a variety of instrumentation, but is sealed together with a tight, non-stop beat.