This Post May Contain Blurbs…
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Tim de Reuse: A concept and an instrumental so bafflingly out of step with one another that I can only imagine they were constructed in different rooms, in different cities, by people who weren’t talking to one another. I’ve got to imagine that’s how it happened — Zimmer phoned it in, or delegated it to whatever intern was closest by, and no amount of enthusiasm on the part of Raye could fully redeem it. I simply can’t buy that someone said, yeah, this tune about how much you love hanging out with your friends in high heels does need to sound like it’s drowning in syrup and also be five minutes long. C’mon, Hans, don’t be shy, add some harp arpeggios. We know you’re just dying to add some harp arpeggios.
[3]
Claire Davidson: There’s a certain irony to the fact that Raye recruited Hans Zimmer — whose most famous film scores generally accompany the kind of sleek, erudite vision only afforded to male auteurs — to add grandeur to an anthem about going to the club with her girlfriends, an ode to the kind of female camaraderie that Raye implicitly likens to an army. Whether or not that contrast was deliberately subversive on Raye’s part is anyone’s guess, but the real issue with “Click Clack Symphony” is that, despite the pomp and circumstance suggested by the song’s title, describing this track as any kind of sweeping opus would be a misnomer. Raye speed-runs through her delivery using the same hurried gait she employed in “Where Is My Husband!”, preventing the soaring instrumentation around her from accruing the bombast this song is predicated on developing. That lack of greater pay-off is all the more conspicuous in a song that runs this long — at five minutes, there’s little in the way of the greater dynamic range that would justify paying sustained attention to a track this chaotic. Really, if not for the signature trombone blare that appears within the song’s first fifteen seconds, one would be hard-pressed to know Hans Zimmer worked on this track at all.
[5]
Julian Axelrod: I know Raye is pissed that she wasn’t asked to do the Wuthering Heights soundtrack. Her music is always self-consciously grand and bombastic, but “ft. Hans Zimmer” is extra even for her.
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Nortey Dowuona: There is a curious thing in the song is that where there is meant to be heavy drum programming, or at least it registers in my mind there is meant to be some heavy handed smashing drum patter here, but instead there is simply a mid tier kick/snare keeping time but removed once the orchestra begins to rise. There is even a rising siren that would register for a bass heavy drop but instead trails into Raye’s earnest, forthright poetry. Instead of buoying the song, the strings slowly cocoon it, tightening and restricting it from rising, yet somehow it does, merely off the ground, then splatters all over the place. The click clicking of the heels as percussion is the anchor, pushing it forward until they are finally removed as well. For all the grand menace of this arrangement by HNDRC and Russell Emmanuel, they seem to be held back by the far superior construction of Raye and Mike Sabath, who seem to actually understand this song is meant to be cocooned then billow into a beautiful butterfly, but at the last moment, when the song is meant to butterfly, HNDRC and Russell gives her a weak, poorly assembled arrangement protected by Roman Soto’s percussion. Raye sounds amazing, as she always does.
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Alex Clifton: “Click Clack Symphony” is kind of a lot, but in (mostly) a good way. It’s a cinematic mental breakdown and an ode to female friendship complete with a theatrical monologue. It’s packed to the gills but somehow doesn’t feel like it outstays its welcome. I will admit that I don’t always want a large spoken-word portion when I just want a sweet tune to soundtrack my depressive episodes, but I think Raye mostly pulls it off. I did have to dock a point though because “the way I fake this smile could pay the mortgage and the rent” is a bit redundant. If you have a mortgage, you likely aren’t paying rent at the same time. (I suppose one could do both, but that’s a distinctly different tax bracket I will never know.)
[7]
Ian Mathers: I feel a little bit sad that it’s becoming increasingly clear that “Escapism.” was an outlier, one where Raye’s sensibilities and mine happened to overlap. I still love her voice, still think she can sing the hell out of a hook (including here), and am very happy she currently has the money/clout to clearly do whatever the fuck she wants… I’ll just be over here respecting that despite not actually enjoying it that much. Especially with Hans Zimmer Hans Zimmering around the place.
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Scott Mildenhall: The double-edged sword of Raye’s sincerity is fully sharp here: at one moment piercingly candid, awkwardly on-the-nose the next. Hans Zimmer is a natural companion for that lack of subtlety, providing the apt and inevitable swell. Raye could have realised this idea without him to less grandiose effect, but as an all-caps STATEMENT, “Click Clack Symphony” hits its target.
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