Pitchfork

Jens collaborates with everyone, so it was only a matter of time before he got around to Vapnet, the Swedish-language pop outfit whose Jag vet hur man vantar was one of the more inventive pop albums of 2006. Taken from the forthcoming mini-album Nagot nytt daligt har hant (which translates as Something new bad has happened), "Håll ihop" (Stay together) doesn't stray too far from the band's effervescent pop compositions, although it does sound like they've tidied up the arrangement for their guest. Bells, flute, melodica, guitar, and that show-stealing sax blow kisses to one another over a percolating beat, goosing the stop/start melody to that exuberant filigree that leads so joyously into the chorus.

Despite the exuberance of the music, an undercurrent of melancholy runs through "Håll ihop", mostly courtesy of Jens himself. Singing in Swedish, he sounds more like his in-love-with-love "You Are the Light" self than his mopey "Black Cab" self. Vapnet make great use of his textured tenor, revealing how much more expressive it's grown since his earliest EPs.

Stream: > Vapnet [ft. Jens Lekman]: "Håll ihop" [MySpace]
[from the forthcoming Nagot nytt daligt har hant]