The Singles Jukebox

…and Daniel wins the prize for knowing a non-Leto name.

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[3.62]

Patrick St. Michel: Not nearly as overblown as I expected, but that doesn’t excuse the lack of anything catchy either.
[3]

Tara Hillegeist: This may be the oddest and least appropriate tribute to a movie starring George Clooney I’ve ever heard, and I’m in just the right demographic to remember my friends making audio recordings of their Ocean’s Eleven fan-porn, so I’d know, okay.
[1]

Alfred Soto: Listening to Jared Leto plead for sympathy from a “portrait of a tortured you” would have warmed my cockles in 1994 when I wondered why the hell Angela wasted time mooning over Jordan Catalano. 
[3]

Jer Fairall: The stately piano refrain deserves a good home, but the rest of this track is a slurry of post-grunge, glam metal and shrill overproduction reminiscent of something from one of those late period Smashing Pumpkins records that not even the die hards will defend anymore. Jared Leto’s vocals strain for dramatic effect, but sound even more self-parodic than when he was serenading Angela Chase with love songs about his car.
[3]

Anthony Easton: I would ask Jared Leto to keep his day job, but his acting is as self-aggrandizing as this attempt at gravitas.   
[3]

Brad Shoup: What is with these people and windpipes? Whatever happened to the therapeutic car ride? And that point at which returns vanish, surely 3STM have hit it, vis-à-vis dudes yelling “WHOA” in a rather hollow manner? These are not particularly provocative questions, but it’s all I can muster in response to Leto’s Game of a Thousand Necks.
[4]

Will Adams: I appreciate the effort to make it as big as possible, but it’s hard to sift for content when all I hear is a violent lyric and excessive treble.
[5]

Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: The bigger a rock band gets these days, the more likely it is for the guitars recede into the background and replaced by every other instrument in the world. “Up in the Sky” is a example of rock ostentatiousness, with Tomo Miličević pulling back to accommodate skittering samples, blockbuster strings and Very Serious Piano. Then there’s Jared Leto, whose considerable enthusiasm has yet to meet his lyrics halfway — but enthusiasm is enough. Lo and behold, this $$$-happy are-we-rock rock is pretty satisfying. It’s huge sounding in the way a blimp is — silly and full of hot air — but it’s entertaining to witness while it’s in your vicinity.
[7]