Sometime around 1990, Eurodisco producers got the idea that in order to get the enormous emotions of their songs across, they would have to augment the icy (and usually thin) pipes of the resident lead singer with a gruff male vocalist/toaster. The formula proved so successful for such combos as Snap, La Bouche, and Culture Beat that, by 1997, Danish/Norwegian quartet Aqua saw fit to exaggerate it.

Where, say, the Real McCoy's O-Jay settled for a sexy-but-curt talk-rap, Aqua's René Dif made no pretense whatsoever toward sexiness or even musicality with his strident bark. Counterposed against Lene Nystrom's helium-cured coloratura, though, it put the longing in their signature tune, "Barbie Girl," into overdrive and made for a classic single in that great year for classic singles.

Not surprisingly, the album that housed "Barbie Girl," Aquarium, duplicated another Eurodisco formula: hits-plus filler.

Imagine the surprise, then, when their new disc registered a bit deeper simply by exaggerating the vocal tensions even more. "Bumble Bees" is a more brutal update of Gloria Gaynor's "Honey Bee" (Lene: " Bumble bee, take what you see/ I can't wait for your invasion;" René: "Wham Bam, Thank You Ma'am").

And "Freaky Friday" dispenses with the double entendres altogether with Lene getting hit by a car and René leaving her a note that says, "You suck!"

Aquarius surpasses even these extremes, though, with two songs that move beyond eternally recurring boy/girl schisms into a critique of pop music itself. Who would have thought they had it in them to kick off "An Apple a Day" (RealAudio excerpt) with such a hilariously self-conscious verse like "Welcome to the cliché's/ Welcome to the part/ Where we wanna finish/ What we can't start" and then go on to ridicule other clichés like "Just don't miss the water/ Until the well is dry" over an appropriately dinky house beat? And the La Bouche-on-Broadway "Cartoon Heroes" (RealAudio excerpt) is simply jaw-dropping.

On the surface, the song is a cocky metaphor for Aqua's hold over their audience: "Remember that what we do is what you just can't do." But as the chorus transforms that last phrase into a mantra, the sentiment grows so outrageous, the melody so catchy and the incongruity of it all so overwhelming that we submit to their hold on us anyway instead of getting up in arms over their pompous celebration of privilege.

If 2000 produces a more knowing song about the sad, beautiful, constantly out-of-reach power of pop music, it will be a fine year indeed.

No matter how many tall buildings they can leap in a single bound, though, they aren't heroes enough to get us to submit to the atrocious ballads that bog down about half the album. "We Belong to the Sea" (RealAudio excerpt) may be addressing their desire to thaw out their icy Scandinavian resolve somewhat, but it's such a painful listen that I wouldn't punish Phil Collins with it for winning the Oscar over "South Park." But who cares? "Cartoon Heroes" is the first masterpiece of the year, and that's more than enough to foster the illusion that I can make it to tomorrow.