The Singles Jukebox

Pop, to two decimal places.

Month: May 2017

  • Travis Scott ft. Kendrick Lamar – Goosebumps

    An equally hard world to adjust to, where Kendrick scores in the [4]s and [5]s…


    [Video]
    [4.50]
    Micha Cavaseno: Travis Scott’s albums are arguably the most intriguing trip-hop compilations of the current decade. It’s a simple formula: as long as this laconic Kid Cudi impersonator is on the record somewhere, Mike Dean gets to immaculately deconstruct all the tropes of modern rap and turn redundant records into toxic stews. On “Goosebumps” there’s a lot of autotuned mush and rotting guitar loops with sea-sick synths degrading like cheap analog film until Kendrick Lamar shows up and manages to sound like the most boring part of the record.
    [4]

    Alfred Soto: The production’s the star: keyboards and sonar effects flicker, disappear, return, like a Maxwell home tape from 1988 that survived several cars and Florida sunlight. Still coming off as a Kid Cudi clone, Travis Scott doesn’t rap anything worth the trouble. As for Kendrick, he not only presses the line but presses his luck.
    [4]

    Thomas Inskeep: The beat sounds like a cross between peak-era gangsta and current-era trap; it doesn’t do much for me, but I do like the way the track occasionally seems to be slowed down like a record slipping in and out of phase. But neither Scott nor Lamar — two of the most overrated rappers of the moment — have much to say.
    [3]

    Anjy Ou: “Yeah we gon’ do some things you can’t relate / yeah cos we from a place, a place you cannot stay / Oh you can’t go, oh I don’t know”. I love this line because suggests the scary idea of placelessness and unbelonging, and at the same time, the empowering idea that you can shut people out and create your own space. A high point in a track that’s mostly dull and formulaic.
    [5]

    Hannah Jocelyn: I love the reversed, pitch-bended guitar loops so much that it’s disappointing when the trap beat makes its inevitable entrance, overcrowding the song. That said, I don’t mind Travis Scott here at all, aside from the irritatingly off-key gun adlibs at around 1:41 — interpreted as a love song as opposed to a drug song, his verse is actually kind of sweet, even when the second half goes a bit darker. Kendrick’s verse is fun as well, incorporating his flow from “LOVE.”, though his usual overdubs and voice changing further congest the track.
    [6]

    Joshua Minsoo Kim: I did a double take when I saw Travis Scott’s Jimmy Kimmel performance earlier this year. The visuals were great and all, but the added synths and ecstatic screaming transformed “Goosebumps” into the endearing confessional it wanted to be. The studio version is underwhelming in comparison; it’s the sound of a love song calculated inside one’s head without the heart to match, where one imagines a low-energy delivery of the chorus in combination with a “hypnotizing” beat will do anything but make the song feel more lethargic. Kendrick comes in and provides some lift, but it mutates the whole thing into a recycled Untitled Unmastered cut, removing any chance of “Goosebumps” feeling romantic.
    [5]

  • Calvin Harris ft. Future and Khalid – Rollin

    It’s a hard world to adjust to, where Calvin Harris is someone we actually like…


    [Video]
    [6.70]

    Thomas Inskeep: I’d like to personally thank whoever gave a crate of old records to Calvin Harris, because his 2017 releases a) sound nothing like anything he’s done before, b) are the freshest music he’s made since I Created Disco (a decade ago!), and c) keep getting better. “Rollin” sounds like his take on G-Funk via Dâm-Funk, with Khalid out-Frank Oceaning Frank Ocean and Future rapping nimbly for once, and the sum is greater than its mighty strong individual parts. I suspect this is gonna be one of my personal 2017 summer jams.
    [10]

    Claire Biddles: Snaps to Calvin for this Khalid feature: a perfect guest vocalist for his newly chill summer sound. I loved Ariana Grande and Frank Ocean on “Heatstroke” and “Slide”, but their superstar presences were (rightly) a little distracting. On “Rollin,” Khalid’s vocal and the sun-streaked sound go together perfectly — this could easily be a cut from Khalid’s debut album American Teen (one of the best albums of 2017 so far, FYI) bumped up with a Future verse for radio. I had to deduct a point for that slowed-down rave piano on principle, though.
    [7]

    Alfred Soto: It sports an attractive brightness, but you can’t dance to it even with the house piano and the Bowie-esque synth. Besides, who’d dance while Future mumbles and Khalid fumbles?
    [4]

    Ryo Miyauchi: Future becomes a parody of himself while he sits way too comfortable against this soft-rock back drop. He reaches for luxury brands to fill space, and the so-called “monster” blaming his codeine intake for his lack of inspiration just sounds tacky.
    [4]

    Crystal Leww: 18 Months practically defined the EDM era, but Calvin Harris has had a hard time dealing with the era’s downfall. “How Deep Is Your Love” put a temporary pop-house bandaid on his faltering sound, and “This Is What You Came For” was just a way to keep his name around with a magical collaboration. Both songs are great, but it’s clear that Funk Wav Bounces Vol. 1 is going to be singular in its sound. Even if it’s just sourced from Black dance music, Calvin Harris has always been able to put together a banger.
    [7]

    Micha Cavaseno: Do millennials have an alternative to the yacht? Because that’s the vehicle Calvin Harris is crafting these gems for. Over a groove that sounds like a modern day version of Kool & The Gang’s “You Don’t Have To Change,” Future gets to sound relatively inspired and Khalid gets to actually sound soulful. How infuriating is it that Calvin Harris gets to be the guy who did what Daft Punk couldn’t get right?
    [6]

    Katherine St Asaph: Calvin Harris is nothing but market-savvy, and a blatant niche he found: “Lose Yourself to Dance” with stronger guests than Pharrell. Even better: Khalid’s last verse provides the bitterness at the bottom of the cup.
    [7]

    Hannah Jocelyn: Like “Slide” and “Heatstroke”, this is effortless and smooth, but by nature of being a kiss-off, “Rollin” is a little bit more aggressive. The beefed-up beat energizes Future, whose whole thing is that he never sounds energized, as he experiments with different flows. The pitched click track is the kind of little detail I’ve enjoyed in Calvin’s recent singles, and where “Slide” had the “I might!” hook, this has an ethereal, even affecting vocal line in the background, courtesy of Khalid. “Rollin” sometimes gets a bit too petty for my tastes, especially in the outro that might as well interpolate “Gives You Hell,” but it’s still the best single he’s released from this era.
    [7]

    Anjy Ou: Harris’ move to this funk and soul sound is super unexpected to me, but also seems like a necessary refresh. While something inside me still screams “appropriation!!!” you can’t deny the guy is good, and he’s bringing black artists along for the ride so I’m not too mad. I love the juxtaposition of Future and Khalid here — Future provides his typical heartless hedonism, and Khalid reveals the emotions that all that hedonism is trying to cover up. Harris’s production toes that line effortlessly, providing both an emotional throughline and a nostalgic balm for the soul.
    [8]

    Will Adams: I’d be disappointed in this being the third consecutive offering of randomly accessed Memories were “Rollin” not the best one so far. Unlike the good time churn of “Slide” and “Heatstroke,” this is actually evocative. Khalid’s late night drive sets the scene: pushing 85 on the freeway, six empty lanes splayed out into the horizon, streetlights and exit ramps blurring into one monotonous stretch as the piano cycles its chords again, as the ceaseless kick anticipates your oncoming headache. Future’s verses replay the events, coding them into memory. Somewhere along the road, the coda coalesces, and the blur vanishes to reveal the end of the night, the end of a relationship.
    [7]

  • Psy – New Face

    “Gangnam Style” is five years old this summer. Chew on THAT.


    [Video][Website]
    [4.00]

    Will Adams: New face, same schtick.
    [5]

    Thomas Inskeep: If “Weird Al” was Korean, only did original songs, and was really, really horny, he’d basically be Psy. Only “Weird Al” is a lot more original, even when doing parodies, than Psy. A lot more talented too, than this dance-pop-by-numbers with lyrics to match.
    [2]

    Leonel Manzanares de la Rosa: Psy’s commitment to his formula is so consistent that, even when the beat in “New Face” has nothing to do with the blaring EDM of previous singles, it still manages to sound like more of the same. But the 2 Live Crew reference, however silly, is enough to give this one points. 
    [4]

    David Sheffieck: I’ll admit: I laughed at the 2 Live Crew interpolation (I’m sorry). If only the rest of the song had half that charm or a quarter the stickiness of that ancient hook. And honestly, this saxophone should’ve been taken out behind the barn and shot after Flo Rida perfected it a few years back.
    [4]

    Micha Cavaseno: I mean, comedy pop rap that at least goes out of the way to sample “Clear” and “Baby Got Back” deep in the track is in its own way the Psy version of any other rapper citing their respective ancestors. so I have to give a few novelty points. That said, saxobeat in 2017 is going to stifle the chance of that novelty fostering any sort of genuine fondness so…
    [4]

    Tim de Reuse: Psy sticks very close to his brand here in a way that would make this tune unremarkably decent were it not for the fact that the phrase “New Face” just doesn’t work as a crowd-chantable anthem.
    [5]

  • Brett Young – In Case You Didn’t Know

    No relation to Satellite, ostensibly…


    [Video][Website]
    [4.17]

    Katie Gill: When I clicked the link in the blurber, I thought “who the hell is Brett Young? That sounds like the name of a generic middle of the road country guy.” Glad to see I was proven right.
    [5]

    Thomas Inskeep: An extremely thin voice and synthetic-sounding drums don’t, generally, lend themselves to good country songs, and this is a case in point. 
    [3]

    Alfred Soto: Sincere, blue-eyed, and with a voice as thick as oatmeal on the counter, Brett Young worms his way into the heart of a woman who apparently can’t gauge this sincerity. Since it’s worked on country radio and has crossed over, I won’t quibble with its success, but it’s lugubrious for an early summer hit.
    [4]

    Will Adams: Young’s nasal, gravelly timbre is interesting, and it deserves better than that awful drum machine that’s plopped in front of you in the opening. While the arrangement improves quickly enough, the song is too drab to provide him any additional support.
    [4]

    Anthony Easton: I like a good, soft ballad. Brett’s burred voice and the slow the guitar tell a story that is so sentimental, so seductive that you ignore how much her voice is sublimated to his passive aggressive game playing and ego.
    [5]

    Juana Giaimo: For being a song about madly falling in love with someone, this doesn’t sound passionate at all.
    [4]

  • Satellite Young – Don’t Graduate, Senpai!

    We Love The 80s


    [Video][Website]
    [6.83]

    Thomas Inskeep: Satellite Young’s theme to an ’80s-retro anime is absolutely on brand with their relentlessly retro new wave J-pop sound, very 1982. If you like that kind of thing, you’re likely to love this, but if not, you can skip it. Me, I’m fairly agnostic.
    [5]

    Alfred Soto: The opening synth fanfare and syndrums evoke Flashdance, and it’s easy to imagine a montage in which sensei and student smile as they solve trig problems. It twinkles too incessantly.
    [6]

    Ryo Miyauchi: Satellite Young’s music grabs hearts precisely because they celebrate the bubbly kitsch of their beloved source of the ’80s, to be specific Japanese pop music during that decade. From the classic senpai/kouhai romance to a series of lovely onomatopoeia, many details make “Don’t Graduate, Senpai!” so distinctly a product of Japan. But out of all, Emi Kusano’s use of English to emphasize her feelings defines this love letter as a righteous homage.
    [8]

    Katie Gill: 1980s synthwave aesthetics that also simultaneously evokes my love of mahou shoujo anime? Is it Christmas for Katie already? This sounds exactly like the sort of song that would play in an opening sequence or a big heartfelt conversation between two characters in said mahou shoujo anime. It’s a fun pastiche and a loving homage, a reproduction of that sort of sound with slightly anachronistic synths giving it a modern edge. 
    [8]

    Will Adams: Compared to Magalie’s “Love Criminal,” which took hyper-pulse 80s electropop and updated it with modern flourishes, “Don’t Graduate, Senpai!” tends to get mired in the past — the opening comes off as a local news station’s theme, and the vocal mixing can be uneven. Still, the candy heart sweetness of it all is enough to make me revisit it, and the fact that my Facebook feed has been flooded with graduation posts for the past two weeks has primed me to give in to misty-eyed nostalgia.
    [7]

    Micha Cavaseno: There have been lots of attempts at music that cribs from, emulates or even outwardly tries to be city pop over the last few years, and a lot of it ultimately came up short. But how ironic that what’s basically a parody of the genre ends up being the most ideal tribute.
    [7]

  • LCD Soundsystem – call the police

    Man, we didn’t particularly like anything today, did we?


    [Video]
    [3.71]

    Tim de Reuse: Sixteen years ago, James Murphy’s first single as LCD Soundsystem was about poking fun at the stylistic pretensions of people younger than him; over his next three albums, he gradually perfected the persona of the slightly schlubby, tired, middle-aged dude who’s supposed to be too old for this “dance music” shit but sticks around nevertheless. He wrote vague songs about age and disillusionment and partying and New York and got on the in-store soundtrack of every Blockbuster from coast to coast. Between the releases of Sound of Silver and This is Happening, ten trillion articles were written on how supposedly uncool his beard was. I was curious how this so-unhip-it’s-actually-hip-’cause-he-knows-he’s-unhip image would adapt to the latter half of the twenty-tens; unfortunately, it didn’t. “call the police” addresses the current state of things with a noncommittal cry of “Whoa, this is all pretty crazy, isn’t it?,” culminating in a climax that confuses reference with commentary and comes off as more confused than incisive as a result. These rambling, indulgent rants worked when they were self-obsessed and self-deprecating, but attacking 2017 with the exact same technique just doesn’t make any goddamn sense; in the space where previous tunes were achingly nostalgic or monstrously clever all I’m getting off of this one is a feathery, sarcastic message of half-worry. All that said, this isn’t a bad song; It sounds as gorgeous and punchy as Murphy’s arrangements have ever sounded, and an energetic enough I – IV – I Bowie worship session will do it for me any day of the week. It’s just that every time I hear Murphy proclaim that it “gives him the blues” when people “argue the history of the Jews” I feel like listening to the numerous songs off of Murphy’s last album that did this kind of thing better but weren’t so ill-conceived. Or, better, I could just listen to Bowie.
    [6]

    Alfred Soto: The guitars pull James Murphy backward where (when?) he wants to be: the teen listening to The Cure’s “Push,” conscious of history, unaware that fifteen years hence he’d write a song commemorating that history — a history as biography. I suppose Murphy gets credit for picking up where he left off. Nothing on “call the police” sounds like felonious, much less like a misdemeanor, despite those guitars.
    [4]

    Thomas Inskeep: Like U2 if they actually had rhythm, with a bassline so epic it could be peak-era JD/NO Peter Hook. The guitar line sounds equally of Pulp and Blondie. And I love that they can pull this off live, flawlessly. Perhaps this is just the comeback we need in 2017. 
    [8]

    Claire Biddles: Like an mp3 of “All My Friends” that has been copied over and over again until all of its defining features have washed away into the ether, “call the police” is so old and dull and long that it makes me want to start using proper capitalisation in my tweets again purely as an act of defiance.
    [1]

    Edward Okulicz: This song’s harmless, anodyne chug suggests no criminal intent, danger, or even edginess at all. I give two points because part of it reminds me of “Dakota” by Stereophonics, in a good way. The rest of it also reminds me of landfill mainstream indie rock from the mid-2000s, and not in a good way.
    [2]

    Rachel Bowles: Sounds like the Strokes. Not what I want from an LCD Soundsystem song, especially one referencing Berlin and Death From Above (1979). It all sounds very indie 2007, but not LCD Soundsystem 2007 sadly. Gimme Get Innocuous and Losing My Edge. Maybe I’m too auld.
    [4]

    Micha Cavaseno: Call the police, more like call the coroner, ’cause I thought we finally put James Murphy down once and for all!?!? Like the one ugly awful band of my adolescence that was adjacent to bands I wanted to listen to and not the people who made my childhood neighborhoods to expensive to live in (Refused, for the record) LCD Soundsystem did some documentary/concert putting a pin on their supposed legacy, despite the fact that people generally thought they had one ‘good’ (mmm… dubious) single. LCD Soundsystem are a band comprised of taste… Not of their fans, of Murphy, constantly showing the right moves, the right things to sound like. Here he’s doing a ghastly fake Bowie voice invoking viruses and Berlin (at least he did the grace of letting the cancer take him, hearing this would’ve been all the more painful) while the bass thwacks obnoxiously and the guitar twangs in a way to scream “POST-PUNK BRAAAAAAAJJjjjjddddoooYOUUUUULIIIIKEEEEEANCUHHHRRRTZZZMEEEETOOOOOBRUUUUUUUUUUUH” at us while we do our best to feign politeness in the hopes this selfish asshole will go away. Seriously, why are all of his songs badly done Neu! grooves with fake Springsteenian lyrical blather that NEVER GO ANYWHERE AND NEVER STOP. In fact, don’t call the cops, call someone to fumigate the rotten buzz of this record.
    [1]

  • Bibi H – How It Is (Wap Bap…)

    Not our most disliked song ever, but awfully close…


    [Video]
    [1.43]

    Alfred Soto: My skin started unpeeling from its bones the moment the opening acoustic guitar and piano announced their fealty to false cheer. No one’s going to sing “Wap Bap” because even three-year-olds know “it’s” not how it is.
    [0]

    Thomas Inskeep: I know I can sound like a cranky old man when I dis internet “fame,” but this reinforces all of those thoughts and prejudices. This German vlogger has inexplicably received over 37M views for this look-at-me-I’m-pretty barely-stringing-together-phrases video/barely-a-song, and it really does make the likes of Paris Hilton sound like, I dunno, Radiohead. I bet Bibi H went to the Fyre Festival.
    [0]

    Will Adams: With all the hate being directed at “How It Is,” you’d think Bibi was using her obscenely inoffensive song as a platform to sell you shitty iced tea. Sure, it’s a bad song — it’s an uphill battle when all you’ve got is a ukulele and cloying optimism — but its knee-jerk designation by many as being the “WORST SONG EVER” speaks volumes more about the detractors than it does Bibi. It sucks and it’s unfair: this gets pages and pages of YouTube reaction videos with all-caps titles and mouth-agape thumbnails, while the Mrazes and Marses of the world go multi-platinum for the same bullshit. “How It Is” won’t matter in a few weeks when the Internet finds something new to point and laugh at; my cynical hope is that when the cycle repeats, it’s for something far more deserving of this level of scorn.
    [2]

    Cassy Gress: This is a thoroughly confused concept: lyrics apparently written by a 12-year-old pretending to be an adult, orchestration courtesy of library music (that’s not the actual song but may as well be), video of sexy girl in sexy dresses rolling around in bed. One point for effort, I guess, no matter how incoherent it ended up. But this doesn’t deserve to be the 6th most hated Youtube of all time, not when there’s like, actual Nazis.
    [1]

    Iain Mew: I don’t know if I want to understand the forces that elevated this so quickly to the sixth most disliked video in YouTube history. Sure, it’s twee in a way that sounds like it might be on a weather forecast ident and its mundane lyrics take a puzzling turn at the end, but while I wouldn’t go out of my way to listen to it more, it’s harmless and I’ll take afectless vocals over plenty of the common alternatives for this stuff.
    [3]

    Micha Cavaseno: Europe needs to get every which way to the hell out with this nonsensical, Betty Boop-oop-e-doop ass bullshit right now. Hell to the Tom Green nauh buddy. I already struggle enough with the occasional returns to blithe twee Hallmark Card commercial soft-pop, now you’re doing this with some “Lemme just hit two notes for a whole song” type from the fjords blathering about things just being what they are, and who cares lol? NO. NO I CARE, OK?!? And I’ll take any sort of hyper-alarmed feeling of energy than this slow asphyxiation of sunlight and cotton candy and dullness. C’mon man…
    [1]

    Hannah Jocelyn: Look, there’s so much backstory to this song, involving Warner Music, colossally overpriced singles, and a German YouTuber whose entire existence apparently revolves around manipulating young children, so I’m just gonna hope other Jukebox writers cover that part. To my ears, this is not bad enough on it’s own merit to warrant the amount of dislikes, but it’s certainly bad. The backing track sounds like the production music in those 30-second Facebook news videos, Bibi’s voice is not just robotic in pitch but in delivery, and the lyrics remind me of the old Internet game of translating a song through Babelfish and seeing the results. In this case, the source must have been “The Way It Is” by Bruce Hornsby, and the attempts at making Bibi seem like a human being (I lost my job! My credit card was denied!) are somehow even shallower and clumsier next to Hornsby’s poignance. Maybe it’s not Bibi’s fault, considering she didn’t write it – she just doesn’t have the Range.
    [3]

  • Linkin Park ft. Pusha T & Stormzy – Good Goodbye

    Not that good, and not even a goodbye! I demand a refund.


    [Video]
    [3.00]

    Crystal Leww: Linkin Park’s core structure with a singer, rapper, guitar & drums, and a turntablist have enabled them to adapt much more deftly to the changing tastes in production in pop music. That single with Kiiara worked well, pulling in more elements with EDM and a duet partner for Chester Bennington. “Good Goodbye” works less well because it doesn’t capitalize on Linkin Park’s adaptability, settling for Fort Minor circa 2005 production to showcase Pusha T and Stormzy, which theoretically could have been very interesting but instead just sounds tired. I understand the desire to imbue meaning, but if the last half decade has taught us anything, isn’t it that we can do that with dance production, too?
    [4]

    Thomas Inskeep: Chester Bennington whines, Mike Shinoda rap-whines, and Pusha T and Stormzy give it a go but can’t help this weak sauce rise above the mire. 
    [2]

    Rachel Bowles: Those Stranger Things opening synths give false hope. They soon give way to the painfully slow tempo of Good Goodbye’s chorus which is the aural equivalent of watching paint dry. Stormzy is not well versed enough yet in the art of phoning in a half decent verse to elevate a shit song (Nicki Minaj’s specialty.) “Tell ’em I’ve got a tune with Linkin Park.” Why?
    [1]

    Katie Gill: Honestly, I like Linkin Park providing a backbeat for rappers more than Linkin Park doing their own thing: “Numb/Encore” is literally one of the most underrated songs of the 2000s. However, in “Numb/Encore”, both Jay-Z and Linkin Park actually put in effort. Here, the only person who seems to be giving at least half effort is Stormzy. “Good Goodbye” had such potential and, if everybody gave a little bit more and turned it up a few notches, we’d have something amazing. As it is, we just have something okay.
    [5]

    Micha Cavaseno: Man, don’t force me to sit through a Fort Minor single and tell me its’ Linkin Park just because you managed to keep Chester around. This might be one of the most boring attempts at ‘motivational rap’ (best exemplified by the banality that was Drake’s “Forever” which you KNOW Mike Shinoda still can’t get sick of). Pusha is particularly terrible and Stormzy is adequately uplifted, but in general this is a song meant to soundtrack ESPN segments, not be listened to.
    [2]

    Will Rivitz: In which Linkin Park listens to Monstercat/Alan Walker/G-Eazy/any other mediocre and milquetoast producers or artists half-bridging electronic, pop, and rap with none of the benefits of any of those genres and says “Yeah, that’ll do.”
    [2]

    Hannah Jocelyn: One thing I’ve realized about “Heavy” in the weeks since I reviewed it is how close it is to not being terrible – the chorus melody is anthemic, the lyrics have some good ideas, and even the generic arrangement has moments where it registers. It’s just that somewhere along the line, all the energy was sucked out. On that note, I’m going to paraphrase an often-quoted line from Roger Ebert; if it’s not what a song is about, it’s how the song is about it,”Good Goodbye” more or less hits exactly what it’s going for. By the logic of Ebert’s quote, this is a solid [8], as not even hypothetically would I give a [10] to “I’ve been here killing it/longer than you’ve been alive, you idiot” or an awkward interpolation of “Hit The Road Jack”, of all songs. But unlike “Heavy”, or the rest of One More Light, “Good Goodbye” manages to do everything its creators intended. Also, it contains the line “Mandem we’re linking tings in parks/Now I got a tune with Linkin Park”, and that’s kind of amazing.
    [5]

  • IU ft. G-Dragon – Palette

    Continuing the tradition of making Jukebox editors feel completely ancient…


    [Video][Website]
    [7.71]

    Ryo Miyauchi: Self-aware and self-referential yet not too self-critical, there’s a chill in “Palette” that this soon-to-be 25-year-old wishes to adopt. This being IU, it isn’t without the twee: the meaningful relationship that fades in this easy-going world is her preferred hair style. But as much as she chops off her hair for a modest bob to welcome a new age, she proudly looks back at her long-haired past — a phase Twenty-Three IU would’ve locked away for good through a much more dramatic makeover. While 23 was a year of still being “happy, free, confused and lonely at the same time,” 25 seems to be a time one finally can embrace their multitudes not as a clash of contradictions but simply a part of a whole. And to face such a year head-on, no pair of lyrics can be a better gift than “I got this: I’m truly fine.”
    [10]

    Iain Mew: “Palette” is quietly remarkable; it conveys such a sense of calm mid-20s self-acceptance that its mood even survives an inspirational lecture from a 30-year-old.
    [8]

    Alfred Soto: A lap pool disturbed by faint ripple of disquiet. G-Dragon is the equivalent of a teen cannon balling into it.
    [7]

    Thomas Inskeep: This is the sound of a twentysomething finding and figuring out her place in the world — and accepting who she’s become/ing. IU’s had to grow up in public, so that makes this all the more poignant, especially paired with a soft, gently bumping melody (a little less major-key and it could almost be trip hop) and an encouraging rap from G-Dragon. “I got this/I’m truly fine,” she sings, “I think now I know who I am a little.” And now, we know her a little more. There’s a real universality to “Palette,” as well, whether you’re in your 20s or 40s; this is a truly lovely single.
    [8]

    Micha Cavaseno: I appreciate that it’s a follow up to “23” in many ways (which I loved) but whereas the soft-disco and mild-temple-rubbing sensation of the previous installment worked wonders of being so dizzy, here on “Palette” IU is kind of trying to give herself a lot of breathing room. To the point that the record is so low-key and drifty, it can feel boring as hell (I blame the invocation of Corinne Bailey Rae). Regardless, the call for serenity has unmistakable charm speaking to IU’s insistent need to find the spaces nobody else in her field tries to claim.
    [6]

    Will Adams: Maybe it won’t click until I reach that age in September, but IU’s calm contentment at being 25 seems unreachable for someone who feels like they’re at threat level orange at all times. What might be blocking it is the song itself, a pile of buttered electric piano noodles, breathy (though admittedly lovely) vocals, and unsolicited advice from G-Dragon, the latter being far less helpful than what Verbal Jint provided Taeyeon.
    [5]

    Mo Kim: “Twenty-Three,” IU’s sharp left away from the doe-eyed image of her adolescence, resonated with the college sophomore busy swallowing their trauma and alienation in snarling, expansive anger hungry enough to eat entire days away. I’m turning 22 today, though, and one of the nice things about being older is being increasingly at peace with who you were then and are now. “Palette,” like its predecessor, brims with clever (and well-earned) meta-commentary about young womanhood and the strange experience of growing up under a spotlight, but its lips drip with a newfound honeyed compassion. It’s hard to explain. It’s seeing yourself on the screen when you’re fifteen, sighing but remembering you sure were pretty. It’s not just letting go of the young girl who became Korea’s little sister a little too soon, not just circling back around: somehow it’s both. It’s liking the “simple things” these days but still being able to jam to “Corinne’s music” (Corinne Bailey Rae, whom IU presumes we’ll know is still one of her favorite artists, after all, we’ve known each other for years, haven’t we?). It’s “I know you hate me” and “I’m truly fine” learning, finally, to sit in the same room. The uncertainty is still there (it’s still “I think I finally know something” because that’s the closest to knowing anything you can get), but it’s not a pair of glitter-studded gloves shielding your face anymore, not rejection of your past but reckoning fully with your present. It’s not “a picture” you need to curate but a “palette,” a range of possibilities as colorful as a rainbow. All of which is to say that I love this, and I’m so glad it exists and so proud of the person behind it.
    [10]

  • Miley Cyrus – Malibu

    All the stars explode tonight…


    [Video][Website]
    [4.89]

    Alfred Soto: Supposedly written in a half-hour card ride, and I hear it. Courtney Love already wrote the finest song about Malibu, but the world needs more from someone old and smart enough to understand the scene, its behavior, its language: what would it sound like to use the Malibu ethos to write a valentine to Thor? Miley Cyrus is that person. I like her unsteady warble too. But this “Malibu” has too many received gestures. 
    [6]

    Claire Biddles: Every time the chorus hits, I start daydreaming about Hole’s “Malibu”: Recognisable as an ode to the same place as Miley’s, but with the bland, washed-out Instagram filter removed. The drive to escape is there, but so is the rotted desperation that came before.
    [3]

    Olivia Rafferty: Miley really hits something special with “Malibu.” There’s an earnestness to the way the chords progress in each verse, flitting between hopeful and somehow wistful with each change. The ease translates to her vocals, which are breathy and contain a jewel of authenticity. For all the beautiful build-up, the teasing and coaxing of those verses, something gets lost as the refrain turns into some kind of Mumford-cum-vlogger music. Still, I’ll listen again and again for those verses.
    [7]

    Katie Gill: Take a shot because Miley Cyrus is reinventing her image yet again, going to a more laid back, sort of folky and breezy sound. There’s been plenty of articles written about how Cyrus just so casually cast off her appropriation of black culture with this new single, so I won’t tread ground that’s already been covered, but as pretty much the only person who liked the weirdness and unconventionality of Miley Cyrus & Her Dead Petz, her following that album up with something sweet and gentle yet not all that exciting is… kind of disappointing?
    [6]

    Micha Cavaseno: Enough has been said about the supposed “she return to whiteness” narrative from plenty of people who resent the garishness of Miley’s “rebel period,” starting with the ratchet-kin vibes of Bangerz before briefly sliding into the trash/psych/brat vibes of Dead Petz. More creepily, “Malibu” feels in many ways like a millennial version of the classic boomer-rehab angle. After falling head over heels in gaudy pursuits of rebellion, now we get a calmer, more relaxed Miley who gets to provide some sort of wisdom after surviving… what, exactly? Doesn’t matter. After years of making music that admittedly was sonically oversaturated with flash and bang, we get Cyrus with her voice and guitars to both cast aside the supposed plasticity of her early Disney beginnings (like “The Climb” ain’t a great MOR ballad), or the shamefulness of her “wilderness years” to settle down and be a real person. Its dullness is supposed to endear her to the parents who just want their kid to settle down and get themselves together and the adolescent who no longer feels the old rushes like they used to. It’s a deliberate drain and squeeze in such a predictable fashion.
    [4]

    Katherine St Asaph: At this point there is probably literally nothing Miley Cyrus could release that people would like. In her Hannah Montana days she was a metonym for the Disneyfication of pop, in her Bangerz days she was a metonym for the faux-twerkification of pop, in that Dead Petz minute-and-a-half she was a metonym for the excess of celebrities. This is the curse of the metonym: you’re a household name, but you can record Disney Channel pop-punk, watery inspiro, stompy electro, straight-up pop fizz, party sulking, weird-ass piss-takes or conspicuous country authenticity, and it’ll all be written off as Pop All Sounds The Same And Is Awful. So sure, “Malibu” is as calculated an image move as “Can’t Be Tamed” was: the prodigal pop star, returning to happy-hippie guitars and milquetoast morality and Liam Hemsworth. That’s not the problem; pop is the construction of feelings via calculation. The problem is that “Malibu” wants to be a Katy Rose record, but is too contrite.
    [5]

    Thomas Inskeep: No, this doesn’t have the excitement of Bangerz, but I really like (what I assume is) the natural twang that Cyrus lets dictate her singing here; this amenable, lightly countrified pop-rock suits her (as, apparently, does domesticity). The only glitch comes in the choruses, where the beats threaten to encroach on the proceedings, but fortunately they settle down before that would happen.
    [6]

    Will Adams: What does it say about Cyrus’s career that the best case scenario for her post-VMA shenanigans era would be skewing as inoffensive as possible (I won’t speak too loudly; Katy Perry might be taking notes)? It’s a quagmire: Bangerz is one of the decade’s worst pop records and I’m happy to never return to it, but “Malibu” comes at the cost of Cyrus roundabout shitting on any hip-hop that isn’t Kendrick and providing yet another mixup between authenticity and plainness for a year already chock full of them. The sun-streaked guitars and Mumford stomp are rote, the lyric mushy, and the end result pat.
    [4]

    William John: What’s worse — Miley Cyrus continuing to maraud and profit as a cultural minstrel, or Miley Cyrus denouncing that same appropriated culture altogether and then gravitating towards an authenticity as dictated by the white establishment? It’s hard to divorce “Malibu” from this context, and to view it through any lens other than one heavily clouded by cynicism. Cyrus’ melancholy twang has always been her biggest strength, and it’s nice to see it highlighted here (one would hope it is further exploited by Nashville songwriters either on this album or the next) on a pleasant enough guitar stomper. It’s all vacuously fine, but in the way she’s released this single Cyrus has positioned herself as a condescending cultural tourist. That in turn weakens not only the song’s likability, but its credibility too.
    [3]