The Singles Jukebox

“Charlemagne” is what Aziz Ansari calls his penis in Master of None. There, I’ve ruined Blossoms for you, no charge.

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[5.22]

Megan Harrington: Do you bring a picture of Jimmy Page circa 1974 to the hair salon or does this style just appear on your head if you write a song that compares your girlfriend to the King of the Franks?
[5]

Patrick St. Michel: Sometimes a song is so unremarkable, so boring, you will settle for any tidbit, regardless of how unexciting, as a basis to say something at all about it. So… Googling around tells me “Charlemagne” has ‘The Coral’s approval,’ which confirms this was a waste of about three minutes. 
[3]

Micha Cavaseno: I wish this song was just sung by Joey Lawrence now. Would be funny, thereby making it a little more interesting.
[4]

Katherine St Asaph: New Wave is just going to last forever, isn’t it? Extra point because the singer and guitarist so clearly want to pull the song in any other direction.
[6]

Iain Mew: The gestures towards dance and the singer’s Brett Anderson stylings take this in different directions, but the chorus’s loping lines and big chunky exclamation marks of guitar override them. They suggest at heart a Kaiser Chiefs with self-conscious wackiness dialled down and a small resultant a hit to hookiness. To quote Tom Ewing from a Sound of 2011 entry, yes, THAT GOOD!!
[6]

Thomas Inskeep: I find it awfully amusing that the BBC’s Sound of 2016 site refers to Blossoms as “psych-pop” because this is about glossy as sophisti-pop gets, folks. The spirit of ’86 is alive and well on “Charlemagne,” which would’ve sent Go West into the UK top 20 back in the day (and not much higher). Only their singer is much more enjoyable than that git from Go West.
[7]

Josh Winters: Crate-digging, dad-worshipping dudes lay down some funky grooves with a touch as limp and lazy as their once-agile forefathers.
[2]

Brad Shoup: It’s big, by which I mean the bass gallops and that synth hook creeps to the ceiling. That’s two dimensions. Can’t get the third when your boy’s singing stuff like “science came, a kingdom reigned.” Them’s the breaks!
[6]

Edward Okulicz: “Charlemagne” bosts an air-headed chorus with a nagging melody, and a singer who needs a bit of a lozenge lest he wind up emoting too much, which is a potentially horrific combination. But I actually think Brett Anderson joining Bastille would be a good idea, so:
[8]