Saturday, November 28th, 2015

The Chainsmokers ft. Rozes – Roses

A generous kind of dance music.


[Video][Website]
[5.43]

Jessica Doyle: This feels already dated, maybe deliberately so, as if to pass first judgment: 2015 was The Year We Listened to Female Singers Discuss Weed-Smoking with an Affected Casualness While Men Yelped “What?” in The Background. Which made me wonder: what is 2015 going to feel like for those a couple decades’ removed from it? Will my daughters’ daughters want to know what it was like the day Obergefell v. Hodges was announced? (I cried; I got on Twitter; I promised my best friend I’d never bug her about marrying her partner.) Or if we went to a rally after the Michael Brown grand jury refused to indict? (In Decatur; it was perfectly peaceful; we couldn’t hear the speakers.) Will they think that 2015 must have been a time of excitement and intensity — marvel that the simple act of using a hashtag on Twitter, or posting a selfie, could be political and brave? Dear future, 2015 was like any other year: sometimes disappointing and often a little tedious, and all of us in it unsure if the worst is coming quickly or receding under a tide of unpredictable individual decisions. “Roses” is safe, a little sad, yearning for human connection. This sounds about right.
[5]

Madeleine Lee: A beautiful VSCO Cam photo of an orange and pink sunset peeking through clouds, uploaded on a night when everyone else is posting the exact same thing.
[6]

Will Adams: In which The Chainsmokers drain the excess from their past productions, leaving behind a gorgeous mid-tempo that bursts and contracts at every beat. Unlike most vocal dance music, “Roses” is neither situated on festival grounds nor in the present; it’s not about love’s possibility, it’s about love past. It takes until the chorus to realize this, as Rozes’ smitten letter crumples into a wad, leaving the ink to bleed through repeatedly with the aching plea, “Say you’ll never let me go.”
[9]

Alfred Soto: The usual electrofuzz and distortions apply, or: Simon Says for the Skrillex Age.
[4]

Thomas Inskeep: Gently pulsating electronic f/x snake their way through and around half a song, sung by Rozes. At least there’s no drop. I think the “Say you’ll never let me go” refrain means this is emo for Gen-EDM.
[5]

Katherine St Asaph: Uncommon generosity from the Chainsmokers, two people who’ve since shown little evidence they’re capable of the emotion. The otherwise non-sequitur title is an ad for the singer — “you know, that song, Rozes?” (Counterpoint: Given her scant/scrubbed Internet presence it’s possible she named herself after a Chainsmokers instrumental.) And there’s very little Chainsmoking crassness; the song sounds essentially like Rozes’ solo music, down to the echoing synth peals and tangled-headphones vocal snarl. Is “generosity” what this is? I can’t tell anymore, or what this is aimed at, or who it is for. The music business is weird.
[6]

Andy Hutchins: If someone prone to doing bad Adele karaoke found a discarded MGMT instrumental, it would sound like this but would also possibly be better music. The “WHAT?” used for effect is self-aware existential angst, right?
[3]

Reader average: [8.25] (4 votes)

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3 Responses to “The Chainsmokers ft. Rozes – Roses”

  1. wow maddie’s review here is so good

  2. good drag maddie

  3. thanks guys