Galaxia Tropicalia

Blasfemea’s Galaxia Tropicalia is a psychedelic electro-pop album that, while not made by women, is decidedly about and possibly for them. This Lisbon-based quartet of adorable, dark-haired boys makes music that, at least in theory, pays homage to women. This sort of sweeping statement is problematic, because really, when has “woman” ever been a universal label? You can easily argue that what’s between your legs doesn’t mean much anymore.

Nevertheless, all of the songs on Galaxia Tropicalia have stereotypically female names: Catherine, Lindsay, and Kami, for example. On opening track and single “Maria,” the fellas sing about hot chocolate and doodling a crush’s name. “Ida” showcases the band’s afropop influences and features British tropical music rock band Dead Kids.

Blasfemea—BLSFM for short—isn’t afraid of experimenting with various Latin sounds. That said, their sound moves from fairly straightforward pop to manic, slightly confusing afrobeat and hard rock. On one short album, it’s more confusing than interesting. Even though the band relies on Latin influences and hails from Portugal, the entire album is in English.

Their cover of Michael Jackson’s “Dirty Diana”—simply called “Diana” this time—is a tough sell. I love a cover song, but this remake doesn’t work for two reasons. It’s not only too soon to be sampling a King of Pop track; this cover is remarkably bad. The original is a gem and thus difficult to reproduce. I couldn’t even finish this version. Stick with BLSFM originals.

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