The Singles Jukebox

American listeners are only allowed to listen to the 8-minute-for-some-reason version of this Alphabeat singer’s debut…

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[5.86]

Mallory O’Donnell: Well, you can’t say she doesn’t sing it with conviction. Now if someone could just come along and explain what in the ruddy Hell any of it means we might be getting somewhere.
[4]

Alfred Soto: The happy feet breakdown after the one-minute mark does Stine Bramsen’s starchy pipes no favors. She can’t keep up. At worst she sounds breathless, like a country balladeer stuck in a Brantley Gilbert song.
[5]

Katherine St Asaph: The “woman renounces independence to take up the chains of luuuuurve” theme is a surprisingly hardy little sub-bubble of pop with a lot of variation: feminist to conservative, triumphant to mournsome, successful to cautionary. (Kelly Clarkson’s “Miss Independent” is all triumph; ABBA’s “The Day Before You Came” closer to regret.) “Prototypical”‘s handclaps, rousing battle-speech of a bridge and “Tie It Up” twang would seem to slot it toward the happier side, but Stine’s pained gulps and the kicker “I used to be so cynical, now I’m just prototypical” comes off more as some dreary second phase of cynicism. I don’t think that was intentional.
[5]

Megan Harrington: I think, often, stories like the one Stine Bramsen tells here, lend themselves to glorious, swelling production. “Prototypical” is a pretty unpleasant sentiment, one that’s only subscribed to in backwards communities. It’s of a piece with “He Hit Me (It Felt Like a Kiss)” and “River Deep, Mountain High,” songs that sound shouted from cliffs and that echo from deep caves. “Prototypical” is a compelling, obsessive listen because it’s such a dangerous rhetoric to internalize. There is something seductive about turning your back on the rational world, forsaking your beliefs, accepting Jesus — that’s why it sounds so good to end every line with “whoa-oh” and repeat the best turns of phrase six times. This is testifying and it’s electric. And dark, and perverse. 
[8]

Brad Shoup: Definitely did not anticipate the Northern Soul-style hoedown interrupting what seemed like a particularly stage-y trance number. Imagine Avicii producing “This Is Love” — we’re not there, but it’s squintable. Behind an Abbaesque lyric is a sneaky Abbaesque twist: love hasn’t disrupted her cynicism, it’s confirmed it. More frantic stomp might’ve pushed this over, or it might have been less clever.
[7]

Edward Okulicz: Bramsen wasn’t sure whether she wanted a 90s dance throwback, a big gospel number, Avicii or a country song for her comeback. “Prototypical” is pretty credible at being all of those things at once, but it also takes a long time to jump-start itself, after which it sort of gets crushed underneath its own wheels.
[5]

Anthony Easton: For all the good will the ramped up beat gives, the attempt to rhyme “prototypical” with “cynical” loses most of it. The trap-kick drums and her spitting of the word “love” are worth something though. 
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