Pitchfork Forkcast: Premiere: The Radio Dept.: "Freddie and the Trojan Horse" [MP3/Stream]

Premiere: The Radio Dept.: "Freddie and the Trojan Horse" [MP3/Stream]

Sweden's the Radio Dept. reached a whole new set of listeners with their appearance on the Marie Antoinette OST in 2006. The Malmö/Stockholm three-piece's melody-oriented dream-pop bridged the soundtrack's divide between bristling, anti-establishment post-punk and unapologetically commercial New Pop, as Stephen M. Deusner observed. New song "Freddie and the Trojan Horse" reopens the political debate, with crisply gated electronic beats, wistful guitar, a few keyboard chords, and lyrics the band says refer to Sweden's right-wing government (which, as I understand, probably wouldn't pass for right-wing in the U.S.-- i.e. they still believe in social spending... and that rich people should have to pay taxes). "Just let us go," Johan Duncanson sings, his voice coated in trebly distortion, as he describes how Freddie-- aka Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt-- allegedly led the workers astray by pretending he was on their side. Man, aren't the Radio Dept. worried about sounding condescending? The punchy horns that join in on the lush outro should go a little way toward soothing any commentators' vicarious anti-"elitist" outrage. They also help those of us who have no idea what Duncanson's talking about.