The Singles Jukebox

We’re generally okay with this sort of rock-ism…

[Video]
[6.44]

Kat Stevens: Like when there was a wasp trapped behind the radiator in the office and my colleague threw her shoe at it (complimentary).
[8]

Leah Isobel: Equal parts delightful and boring, “Rockstar” distinguishes itself from LISA’s previous solo material by having ideas, or at least the semblance of them: the switches between celestial melody and skittering momentum, the blunt sexuality of the post-chorus, and the critique embedded in the chorus’ “teach me Japanese” bit all point to a real personality. But its blockbuster soundscape and paucity of structural interest — that chorus is worn out by the third repetition — squeeze out the more interesting parts. It’s a La Croix song, with just a hint of flavor beneath all the empty fizz.
[5]

Jonathan Bradley: “‘Lisa, can you teach me Japanese?’/I said ‘hai, hai’” is such an ostentatiously silly lyric, especially for one that recurs that many times, but it helps lighten a song that could otherwise be too self-serious in its stunting. LISA’s got a likeable charisma, but she doesn’t fit imperious well, which is perhaps why her royal fanfare comes in the form of a mere Tame Impala sample. Likewise, that sample drops in just before the harsh pinging production threatens to become alienating. A pose of indomitability that is fortunate not to be as uncompromising as it imagines itself to be.
[7]

Taylor Alatorre: The self-orientalizing doesn’t land as hard as it should because it aims a bit too broadly — after two decades of hallyu, it’s more plausible that an oblivious fan would mistake Lisa for being Korean than Japanese. Hip hop is built on hyperbole, but the low-hanging “all look same” punchline represents a missed opportunity to foreground her status as the only Thai member of a flagship K-pop group. CL, while lacking such status, seemed to have more fun with her version of this trick on “Hello Bitches,” zipping from Macau to Kakao to sake with breathless irreverence. But “Rockstar” is more stylishly produced than “Hello Bitches” was, with a refurbished griminess built of interlocking machine parts. If the end result is to evoke the kind of amalgamated cyber-Asia that forms the backbone of Bullet Train and Elon’s Twitter feed, that isn’t the worst possible thing; at least it gives the joke a proper setting.
[6]

Will Adams: Much like a lesser known Rihanna single of a similar title, “Rockstar” is an endearing game of play-pretend that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Do I believe LISA is actually a rock star? No. Do I believe she’s having fun? Oh yeah.
[7]

Ian Mathers: It didn’t fuck me up when I saw people roughly my age noting that kids these days will sometimes refer to “taping” shows without understanding why we call it that, or that they don’t recognize what the save icon is a picture of. But I did get a bit of a jolt listening to this and realizing that “rockstar” as a term is probably as referent-less these days as “dialing” a phone number is (and that’s without getting into the precipitous and not wholly unwelcome decline of calling people). That doesn’t mean the use of “rockstar” feels inappropriate here at all; for the length of “Rockstar” LISA certainly feels like one in the modern sense, even as the song doesn’t even vaguely gesture towards the music genre that used to inform the term. But who cares? It kinda bangs.
[7]

Nortey Dowuona: James Essien, a Ghanaian songwriter who cowrote “Hurt People” for Belizeian-Trinidadian pop singer Kamal., is one of the three co-writers (along with Delacey of “Drama Queen” and Lucy Healey of “imtyn”  by Grace Enger), alongside producers Ryan Tedder and Sam Homaee. These have nothing to do with the light faux Tame Impala drums that play for two bars, but I’d rather mention all of that than anything that happens in this song.
[3]

Katherine St. Asaph: I don’t know how I feel about Ryan Tedder being brat.
[6]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: Perhaps the most obnoxious piece of music I’ve heard this year.
[9]