The Singles Jukebox

More like “Fight Against You.”

[Video][Website]
[4.12]

Katherine St Asaph: Teenage dystopian feels that sound equally at home in teenage dystopias as on the highway at 11 p.m. after the theater lets out. For a movie that’s basically just the biggest-budget rendition of SAT anxiety since the test-prep industry, the lineup is surprisingly non-obvious — singer who splits her time singing lead soprano of her high school choir and singing Drake covers on YouTube; Chance the Rapper, the most interesting “rapper featured on every major-label whatever” in some time; and Clams Casino, who’ll probably find his way onto a lot more major-label whatevers (his next credit: Foster the Damn People) — and the sound is undeniable. A generation of kids is gonna stream this on future YouTube, like the current generation’s doing with, say, Legally Blonde, and realize the music they grew up with was kinda great.
[7]

Will Adams: Pia Mia’s thin voice plays well against the fantastic production, which sounds like a standard moody synthpop template run through a paper shredder. Structurally, though, “Fight For You” is a mess, adding unjustified phrase extensions and inconsistent sections. And that’s before Chance the Rapper enters to aimlessly fumble all over the song.
[5]

Alfred Soto: I can accept Rihanna’s imitating greater singers, but I’ll be damned if I have to accept Pia Mia imitating Rihanna. This leaves Chance dropping his odd stresses over the staid proceedings. The contrast between him and Mia gave me the bends.
[3]

David Sheffieck: This is less of a trainwreck than the Kendrick/Tame Impala collaboration that’s the only other track I’ve heard from the Divergent soundtrack, but that’s largely because it’s incredibly dull – to the extent that even on my second listen, I had forgotten the hook halfway through Chance’s ill-fitting verse.
[3]

Patrick St. Michel: Did Divergent not have the budget for someone to listen to this song before putting it on the soundtrack, because geez, what an absolute mess that finds a few talented artists tripping over one another.
[2]

Andy Hutchins: The only bit of “fight” I derived from this song was my own struggle to stay awake. Not really sure why Chance felt that a K’Naan impression was a good idea — or why Clams Casino was tabbed for production duties on a song destined for a soundtrack to the 55th movie about a dystopic future war involving teenagers since 2009 — but his verse is the best thing here, because it at least occasionally rises above the heart murmur of a beat.
[4]

Brad Shoup: So Divergent is basically about how you want to have sex with your teacher, and Thatz Okay. They used the Tame Impala part of the remix for the first cafeteria scene, which is just silly. I know I didn’t hear Chance One at any point. But I’m 70% sure he delivers a Tobias Eaton pun, so again: silly. Pia’s section is riddled with malfunctioning machinery and impishly treated voices; I imagine a solo molly jaunt in a shuttered textile plant. 
[4]

Mallory O’Donnell: The lack of resolution in the beat, which plods, pauses and plods again, fits the subject matter and holds Mia’s vague trills ably. She’ll fight for you, but… tonight. Tomorrow? Another story. Chance the Rapper adds little, still needs a new name.
[5]