The Singles Jukebox

Not a Bananarama cover, but about as many naked men in the video as if it were.

[Video][Website]
[5.22]

Alfred Soto: They haven’t topped 2011’s “Whirring,” even if 2013’s “Cholla” and “Bats” came close. Here they waste time with banter caught on studio mics and let the power of the riff get diffused.
[5]

Iain Mew: Their first album mixed sweet melody and bursts of riffage; the second built on its successes for some awesome rock bombast. Now they’ve stripped away the extremes at either end of their sound, and rather than barer rock adding focus, they just sound a bit lacking in identity.
[4]

Cassy Gress: What I’m hearing in the first 20 seconds of this song is the “Welcome Freshmen” theme song. No clue why! There are much more obvious connections to make!  I like that fast-strummed A that goes through some of the choruses, and the riff is all right, but I’m not a fan of the voice doubled an octave higher – it works in the verses, but it sounds a little shrill and squeaky in the chorus – and I don’t like at all the rhyme of tryin’/mind.  It might have been better if she’d sort of slurred “tryin'” into one syllable (though that’d be out of place too), or even changed the lyrics to “even when I think I tried”, but as it is, it doesn’t sound like it rhymes, and it sticks out.  As rock songs go though, it’s got a pretty low bar to clear right now.
[6]

Micha Cavaseno: You “wouldn’t say that this is the end”, but it definitely feels like the end of the rope. Scandal songs thrice recycled, a dispassionate come hither vocal, and equally shrugged off guitar riffs. The last thing on someone’s mind would be putting this record on.
[2]

Leonel Manzanares de la Rosa: As with most of The Joy Formidable’s songs, the strength of this track lies in the relentless, almost Keith Moon-ish drum beat (this must sound gargantuan live), but the guitar/bass work –especially the muted strumming in the verses– combines with Ritzy Bryan’s gritty vocals splendidly. It’s a little bit stuck between the abrasiveness of noise-rock and the accessibility of pop (being both and neither at the same time), and while that’s not necessarily a bad thing, the main riff promised us a much heavier song; we needed the pop thing to be taken down a notch. 
[6]

Cédric Le Merrer: There’s a “your mom in leather pants” embarassing quality to a band trying to be badass with the kind of sound that would have felt slightly retro on the Daria soundtrack. But your mom should not worry about your embarassment if she’s having fun doing it.
[7]

Thomas Inskeep: If Blondie rocked harder they might’ve sounded like this, and I mean that as a compliment.
[7]

Brad Shoup: It’s like a seastorm: lots going on underneath, with tumult up top. And the riff is fantastic, a buzzy singsong that gets passed from guitar to singer with ease.
[7]

Patrick St. Michel: I think it’s great The Joy Formidable are using their position to try to shake things up via the video for this song, along with uh the articles they get to write for The Guardian. Too bad the last thing on their mind is the actual music, the end result here being a stuck-in-the-same-gear chug with no pay off. Maybe just get a Medium account?
[3]