The Singles Jukebox

But not at our response…

[Video]
[6.40]

Julian Axelrod: I tend to find Kindness infinitely less interesting than his collaborators, so a song that hitches Robyn’s superstar charisma to Adam Bainbridge’s paper-thin croon shouldn’t click. But there’s so much more going on here: the bass wanders around the mix, a shaker echoes in the distance, choral swells phase in and out like the evening tide. And the final 30 seconds are astounding, with strings and pans and what feels like a million voices melting together into a gorgeous celestial sunset. Sometimes prioritizing production over personality pays off.
[7]

Alfred Soto: Continuing in the murmuring, understated disco of Robyn’s Honey, “Cry Everything” benefits from the low wail of a Todd Rundgren sample and Robyn’s own refusal to yield to the title’s cathartic possibilities. Also: you can dance to it.
[7]

Leah Isobel: The drums have a soft, pleasing physicality that provides a comfortable bed for the walls of vocal texture. That abundance of texture isn’t necessarily positive; it suggests orgasm and sorrow in equal measure, appropriate for the song’s liminal emotional state but mixed too low to overwhelm appropriately. I guess the chorus turns on wanting to cry it out, but the string coda, while gorgeous, is too short to properly resolve the tension. For a disco-informed song about crying, the thrill and the hurting both feel unnecessarily blunted. For god’s sake, just let go!
[6]

Will Adams: So… where’s the crying, then? The vocal and string arrangements both hint at it, but the titular melody sounds ambivalent at best. Even stranger that the failure to convey this particular sentiment is coming from Robyn, of all people.
[5]

Katherine St Asaph: Something is dreadfully wrong — surely a track called “Cry Everything” with Robyn on it shouldn’t sound this emotionally blunted?
[5]

Natasha Genet Avery: “Cry Everything” is surprisingly contained, teasing a moment of pure, unbridled emotion without ever providing that release. You can almost hear the song straining at the edges as Kindness unravels a chorus of anticipatory wails behind Robyn’s clear-headed vocals. In a nod to “Honey” closer “Ever Again,” where Robyn vows to never be broken-hearted again, “Cry Everything” suggests a new method of processing a break up, where tears are a sign of progress rather than despair, and where optimism suggests openness rather than positivity.
[8]

Jonathan Bradley: Kindness’s crumpled-up deep house disintegrates into low harmonies and brisk pulsations before Robyn can properly latch her pop hooks into it. She sounds only half present, like she were dissolving away before she can bend the track to her will. As someone who is so often placed in the spotlight of her songs, the recession is entrancing.
[8]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: “Cry Everything” is at once intimately familiar and alien-sounding, like a standard piece of disco revival as seen through a smudged mirror. The strangeness of the track pervades its every aspect, from the double vocal-approach that Robyn and Kindness take on to the way the beat behaves, synths falling in and out seemingly at random. It’s most evident, though, in the lyrics, which are the sort of beautiful dancefloor gibberish that takes on a certain profound quality in their lack of coherence.
[8]

Vikram Joseph: A murky, hookless track which feels like a disco in a padded cell, with both vocalists sounding like they’re trying to move through a thick, suffocating smog. When the beat fizzles out and gets replaced by strings and multi-tracked vocals, it’s like the clouds clearing after an evening rainstorm to allow weak rays of sun through patches of blue, which is kinda nice but insufficient to make up for a song which seems confused in its intent — neither layered enough to be interesting or direct enough to bang.
[4]

Iris Xie: Sad and moody house music always amuses me, because they’re really good for trauma recovery naps on sunny blue days. Specifically, they’re great for the moments where you know you’re having a good day and there’s nothing wrong and you’re safe, but you just need to rest your mucky, sad, addled brain because woops, repressed memories coming back that need to be worked through, and okay, time for a nap now, in order to combat the exhaustion and flushing out and rewiring. But come on, the day is so freaking beautiful! But you just roll with it, for it’s the best thing to do for your healing. Sigh. “Cry Everything” bridges those moods, with the back vocals sounding solemn even in their elation, and the instrumental seeming pared down and muffled to provide a low, soft glow to their vocals, which sound filtered through glass water bottles. Overall, this results in the sonic equivalent of burying your face in a soft fleece blanket, while nodding your head along to the beat.
[6]