Popdar #8: LIGHTS never stop shining.

Canadian lovely LIGHTS, real name Valerie Anne Poxleitner (sometimes a stage name is undeniably necessary), has only made a whisper over on these shores, supporting arguably inferior worldwide success Owl City (even I'm beginning to lose interest these days, I admit), but once you are ensnared by one of her irresistible butterfly-wing ditties, it's for the long term.

Debut record "The Listening" was a delight of happy-go-lucky geek-synth-love-pop that shone as brightly as LIGHTS' alias suggests. She sang about World of Warcraft and teenage crushes and celebrated all that was young and uncool. New single "My Boots" knocks up the dance quotient a coupla notches, with nonsensical lyrics that could either be about a lesbian crush, an ode to footwear or maybe another computer game song. Brilliant. Another album please?

Popdar #7: Uffie brings my beat back.

When you're laptop breaks and is sent away to be repaired, it's quite sad how much of your life is unrepairable until it returns. Without my iTunes I have been a mere shadow of a man. So I have a lot of catching up to do, and TWO months worth of listing to catch up on.

One step at a time, so I'll kick off with my new favourite video. Uffie's debut album, finally released in May, turned out to be a rather limp affair, less fierce Robyn attitude and more "whip my hair back and forth" with less whipping and more, um, hair (obligatory pop culture reference out of the way). BUT. New single "Difficult", released this Monday just gone, has the same casual shit-talking twee urban feel (if ever such a thing were possible) of Uffie's quirky masterpiece "Pop the Glock", with the kind of line that Robyn throws off the cuff as its hook, namely "don't worry if I write rhymes, I write checks".

But what sets Uffie apart from the Swedish synthpop superstar (alliteration!) is quite simply her Frenchness. Whilst Robyn is sexy in a Madonna/Dita/Erotica/Scare-you-to-death kind of way, Uffie is just sexy in an Amelie-innocence kind of way, and the track couldn't be more French if it tried. Lolloping Justice beats and a squelch-funk bass that sharpens up Uffie's lazy flow and speak-singing in a way that turns a potentially simmering track into a bubbling one. Not overflowing mind, just bubbling, but that's the way Uffie likes it.

And I'm no film critic, but that video is so blissfully avant-garde it deserves an Oscar.