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“Music Sounds Better With You” – Stardust
(Words/music: Thomas Bangalter, Ben “Diamond” Cohen, Alan “Braxe” Quême, available on Music Sounds Better With You EP, Virgin 1999)

A lot of pop music walks a fine line between being delightful and being annoying. A lot of this is left to personal taste – what is one person’s pop anthem is another person’s signal to leave the room. That being said, some know how to write songs that play to their strengths and others take the strong point and run it into the ground. Finding repetitive music either as an opportunity for revelry or a source of repulsion tends to vary from person to person. Perhaps this is what made Stardust, a one-off collaboration between Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter, producer Alan Braxe, and vocalist Ben Diamond, a one-time collaboration. “Music Sounds Better With You,” depending on your taste, either sounds like a perfectly danceable pop gem or a musical thought dragged on too long.

Essentially, “Music Sounds Better With You” loops the same keyboard riff, sound effect, and pulsing beat for the entire song. Ben Diamond sings the same few lines like a lounge singer squeezing as much charisma out of his limited script. The vocals aren’t as droll as that last sentence suggests, but the riff is the make or break portion of the song. Bangalter and company pull out a couple tricks – they fade in, drop the beat, etc – but essentially ride this riff for the entire song. Personally, I see how someone might find the song annoying, particularly the high pitched sound at the end of each bar. However, I end up getting lost in the repetition, occasionally keying in on Diamond’s vocals but generally just nodding my head along to the beat. Even if it’s not the most dynamic song, it gets firmly lodged into my brain, in part because the song threads that keyboard line together at least a hundred times before the track ends. It’s simple enough to withstand the repetitive usage and slips into the subconscious to that place where melodies go only to return at the most random times. It’s also melodic enough to become a welcome guest; while some melodies annoy me, getting part of “Music Sounds Better With You” only sends me clamoring for my iPod.

More on Stardust: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm