The Singles Jukebox

Before I get the wrong idea and go…

[Video][Website]
[6.71]Madeleine Lee: Unlike Jonghyun or Key, other members of SHINee who’ve had external projects, Taemin isn’t much of a stylist as a singer, and it’s hard to translate talent as a dancer into music. His first solo single, “Danger,” succeeded at making a persona out of this by weaponizing his flatness into coldness, turning an homage to the King of Pop into something a little Prince of Darkness, too. On “Press Your Number” he plays similarly cool and detached; the intimacy in the lyrics of the original demo (“press your body / on my body”) is replaced with unanswered telephone calls and fading memories of intimacy. Warmth comes from the underlying beat, which is mixed wide-open where “Danger” was dark and clubby, and the constant stream of countermelodies and harmonizing vocals in the background. It’s overwhelming at times, but it’s paced so that it only overwhelms when it needs to.
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Ramzi Awn: The silky production is the takeaway from “Press Your Number,” an otherwise lightweight dance track.
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Patrick St. Michel: Now this is how you use a big-name American recording artist. “Press Your Number” recruits Bruno Mars as producer, but isn’t a simple retread of “Treasure” or “Locked Out Of Heaven” but something more dramatic (with traces of that Unorthodox Jukebox funk sneaking in late). It feels a little too tied to the video for the song, but overall a way better use of star power.
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Brad Shoup: Taemin finds his inner Anita before Bruno brings the late-night funk. He contributes a kind of desperation, longing less for love than a fix.
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Cassy Gress: I can buy this way better than “Pillowtalk.”  This one sounds a lot more passionate! The “Girl there’s something ’bout you barep barep” sounds an awful lot like “something ’bout your body bod,” which may or may not be on purpose.  And that “Pressss youuur nuuumberrr” gives you the Bruno Mars composition part; I could easily hear Bruno singing it. This doesn’t sound like sex, it doesn’t sound like murmuring and caresses, but it sounds like he’s super into the listener.
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Alfred Soto: The warmth of his voice clashes with the intensity of his lust, with only a sequencer to mediate. But — wait? Is he really singing that chorus? Justin Timberlake, whom he mimics, wouldn’t be so bold in 2016.
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Ian Mathers: Between the dirtbag-y narrative in the video and the throwback feel of the chorus especially (something about those little post-Chic guitar licks) brings to mind, of all bands, Maroon 5. But, you know, good Maroon 5, and maybe I’m just lacking cultural context but I’d much rather listen to this guy than Adam Levine. And that is an awfully nice chorus.
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