12 FEBRUARY 2021: MIKA – Happy Ending

A big highlight from MIKA’s fantastic debut album, ‘Happy Ending’ is one of the most moving and instantly recognisable ballads of the last 20 years.

Not to get too personal here, but MIKA’s first album ‘Life In Cartoon Motion’ has real significance for me. As a music-mad child in the midst of working out who I was, I remember being obsessed with it. I ended up performing ‘Grace Kelly’ at a school talent show, and the youthful excitement of being on stage to sing that song – as well as the isolation due to the homophobic bullying which followed – comes back instantly whenever I hear any of the songs from the album. One such song which certainly deserved more credit than it ever got at the time is ‘Happy Ending’. Even though it doesn’t have the most optimistic lyrics in the world, it remains a massively uplifting composition, which MIKA’s crystal clear falsetto cuts through in a spine-tinglingly beautiful way.