Single Review: Olly Alexander (Years & Years)

“Dizzy” is a weird old single. Because it feels like a bold new step for Olly Alexander, whilst also not feeling like one at all. And the latter isn’t a jab. It’s just a reflection of where music is right now and the type of artist Olly Alexander has been for [Turns and looks into the camera] years and years.

I’ve never been a fan of Years & Years’ music. Only when Years & Years went from a group to an Olly Alexander solo act — which I thought Years & Years was for a good while — did I start to like certain songs, because the sound started to change and the songs got tighter. With Years & Years’ third studio album Night Call — the first album with Years & Years as a solo act — the dance vibes got a bit deeper, the pop got poppier, and I liked it. It felt more in tune with what I had started to see of Olly Alexander in interviews and performances. He was far more fun, playful and energetic than I thought he was just going off of those first two Years & Years albums, Communion and Palo Santo — so it was nice to hear and see this reflected in the music, on songs such as “Starstruck”. With Years & Years now being a solo situation, there seemed to be a sense of Olly wanting to fully be seen as one of the pop girlies, and this also comes through on “Dizzy”. There was a slight shift with Night Call, with it basically being an Olly Alexander solo album. It still had the bleed through of Communion and Palo Santo, but also pointed to a new direction. And “Dizzy” is a song which is also in that new direction, feeling like a continuation of the likes of “Crave” and “Reflection”. Not just sonically, but also thematically too.

I’m already exhausted from hopscotching between Years & Years and Olly Alexander, when they are one and the same. And I guess Olly was too, as he is now going by his own name. And the timing of Olly Alexander opting to release “Dizzy” under his own name is apt. Because “Dizzy” is the song which will be representing the Un-united Kingdom in the next Eurovision Song Contest, which is amazing for Olly Alexander as a queer person who has long adored Eurovision. As most RGB (255, 255, 255) cigarettes do.

I have never watched a Eurovision Song Contest in my life. I know it happens every year. I know ABBA won it a couple of times. I also know that political allegiances affect the voting. I know Loreen won it last year, but have never listened to her winning song. But that’s the extent of my Eurovision knowledge. So, as for the music and performance of it all, I’m not exactly sure what makes a great entry in a contest where so many elements aside from the quality of the song factor into whether it will win. But I do wonder about how well “Dizzy” will fare.

As a song, separate from its entry into Eurovision, I think it’s a really good song. It could be longer. It needs a refrain. But I still think it’s a really good song. But it’s a bit weird to listen to and it can take a few listens for it to fully make sense, because the chord progressions aren’t what I would consider ‘normal’, resulting in an occasional sense of unfamiliarity which catches me off guard everytime I listen to it. And this is such a weird thing to experience in a song which has a sound which is SO familiar to me. I guess it aligns with the song title and being disoriented. This weird wrinkle to the song is one of the things I really like about it. But I wonder how it will play in a competition which seems to value tradition and things which ‘make sense’. “Dizzy” as a song being released as a single that people can listen to over and over or hear constantly on the radio until it clicks, is one thing. But “Dizzy” in a setting where people hear the song once in a snapshot moment and don’t really have time to digest it all or have it click — is something different. But I hope “Dizzy” does well, because it is a good song. And I also feel there may be an appeal to the sound that other countries will warm to.

Olly Alexander (Years & Years) – Dizzy | Universal Music

One thing I really like about the song is that it manages to feel so intersectional. “Dizzy” touches on songs from across different eras of music. “Dizzy” also sounds a lot like The Pet Shop Boys, specifically their 1987 song “It’s a Sin” — which Years & Years covered for a critically and commercially acclaimed TV drama of the same name which Olly Alexander starred in. But the arrangement and the vibe of “Dizzy” also feels very ABBA-esque. And then “Dizzy” also reminds me a lot of Steps’ “A Deeper Shade of Blue”. So the generational crossover appeal of “Dizzy” could be really huge. Hopefully it lands better for Eurovision than it did on the UK singles chart.

“Dizzy” cuts across in ways which makes its appeal broad, without seeming like it is trying to tick every box, even though the song was probably always engineered to do that. Because of course it would be. It’s a song for a Eurovision Song Contest.