The Singles Jukebox

Ugly hurts…

[Video][Website]
[5.30]

David Sheffieck: If “Want to Want Me” was everything going right in Derulo’s Michael Jackson impression, this is everything wrong with it: a whole bunch of signifiers in the vocals married to a grating Crazy Frog hook and a lyric that manages to be even worse. The gulf in quality that separates one Derulo single from another is both impressive and dumbfounding.
[2]

Cassy Gress: Michael Jackson might have done this song, except I don’t think he would have done a song with this lyrical content. And that makes me sound like an old biddy, but I’m pointing it out solely because my brain so strongly wants to hear this as an MJ song that the lyrics seem incongruous — it’s got the harmonies, the woo!s, and a bass riff that reminds me of “Bad.” The “bruuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh” was cute, but only because of how it sounds like a zipper as it connects directly to “I can’t” — if it was just an interjection I’d hate it. Speaking of ugh, “oh my oh my oh my god/this girl straight and this girl not.” I was going to give this a [6] but after I sat on it a few days… nah: [4]. It’s well-sung, just garbage content.
[4]

Scott Mildenhall: Jason Derulo is far more fun when he’s taking things absolutely seriously than when he’s actually trying to be fun. Fortunately, for as much as he’s trying to fill or even fall in the void that LMFAO left — “this girl straight and this girl not”? You’re better than that JD — “Get Ugly” isn’t without its genuinely gawky charms. The last-minute Cybotronnish breakdown, in particular, is entertaining, but the song needs more of that, and less of the one-note humour, both lyrically and sonically.
[5]

Anthony Easton: This is the stupidest thing I’ve heard in months, and it is genius for it. Completely inappropriate to hear at 4am over headphones, insanely inappropriate to hear in the middle of February, but how he sings “ugly” is an aesthetic choice I am all in for. 
[9]

Alfred Soto: That stuttered hook and taunting “na na naaaah” bespeak Jason Derulo’s new commitment to found sounds, but except for “Want to Want Me” none of Everything is 4‘s singles have caught on with the public. I hope this does for the bridge alone.
[7]

Will Adams: The opening “Oh my gawww” unfortunately recalls Karmin at their worst, while the rest drills your ear with unfunny gags like a Family Guy episode.
[3]

Katherine St Asaph: Evokes Slim Shady with a hook singer and someone ripping off Timbaland, possibly Timbaland himself — i.e. all the worst parts of the mid-’00s.
[3]

Brad Shoup: Somehow, Ricky Reed searched his databank for “cartoonish menace” and ended up with Ned Flanders. That bassline is vintage Timbo, but everything else is late-period Timbo. If only Derulo had demanded more territory — the pre-chorus is the kind of pop grandeur that his collaborators needed to draw on.
[4]

Jonathan Bogart: In which the kid embraces the corniness that has dogged him since the beginning and out-Mackles Macklemore at appropriating-slash-appreciating the Day-Glo era of hip-hop culture. Of course, he can actually sing, actually dance, and actually make work the song stopping short for an extended groaned “bruuuuuuuuuhhhhhhhh,” which is why the other reference point I keep coming back to is K-Pop, where immaculately-drilled charisma synthesizes cultural reference points which otherwise have nothing to say to each other. But mainly, as a fan of bone-dumb pop music, I love a song in which the chorus is mostly the nonce word “diddly.”
[9]

Micha Cavaseno: Derulo is definitely such a weird sort of dude, and the more time goes on that really comes forward. The pre-chorus for this track has Timberlake-tinged hints of sweep, and that beatbox-filled bridge certainly makes it feel like a missing experiment for the Justified era. But there’s this other part of Derulo that has to fill his song with the kind of corny jokes reminiscent of people bored on Snapchat and making those goofy images of them puking rainbows (y’all know who you are), while cheesily lurching along to a rubbery bassline and a surprisingly effective tempo change. This is the thing about Derulo that drives me nuts: too serious, and it’s the most inane drivel ever. Too goofy, and people love it but I’m still left rolling my eyes. Right smack dab in the middle, showing confidence and charisma? Not enough people are into it, but damn, it’s actually super solid.
[7]