The Singles Jukebox

Eventually we’ll meet the next generation of pop artist, who can do it with their eyes closed and a broken heart…

[Video]
[4.90]

Mark Sinker: issuing a correction to my previous experience and instinct regarding the terror group imagine dragons, this gothic-neurotic slab of game-soundtrack piffle continues to stick in my stupid head in a pleasing way — as i hand it to them are there professionals I can see about this? 
[6]

Tim de Reuse: I can’t make cheap shots about their ghastly production choices this time, because it sounds mostly fine — a little dry, a little sand. Even the dubstep wubs, bizarre as they are, feel too blended into the mix to really offend. Justin Timberlake did that better. I mean, funnier. Which is to say: much worse. The weird stuff is a little harder to get to. What kind of killer fish-based cultural undercurrent is he trying to harness with that line about piranhas? Why are you driving your car with your eyes closed — and are we to take the end of the video as a cautionary tale or a triumph? Why are you rhyming “turn out the lights” with “turn out the lights?” The strange formant-shifting effect on his voice makes him sound like a cartoon elephant, in such a pointed way that I cannot imagine what he could have been going for except for “cartoon elephant.” This is advanced Imagine Dragons, practically avant-garde. I wouldn’t recommend this song to beginners in disliking Imagine Dragons. You need years of experience in disliking Imagine Dragons before you can start working on disliking this one.
[4]

Taylor Alatorre: Twelve years after “Radioactive,” they finally figured out the basic mechanics of how dubstep works. And also that their name, while still a debuff, does at least grant them the license to be loudly and unrepentantly silly, which they should use more often. Alt Nation needs better court jesters than the AJR brothers, after all.
[6]

Alfred Soto: Their songs shiver with portent, which explains their appeal — did their mid ’10s fans go on to stream Disintegration and Violator? Even the hints of hip-hop distinguish them. If these hints and allegations don’t cohere, they don’t keep me from switching from radio to phone either.
[6]

Nortey Dowuona: Mattman and Robin have somehow managed to pulled the rap nerd spirit out of Dan Reynolds, and I admire that, but sometimes you lay down a better piano track than the limp one you slip in the intro and chorus and don’t add weak brostep bass wobbles under echoed lines. Try, for the love of gorsh.
[3]

Will Adams: Strange to feel nostalgic for dubstep wubs, but here we are. Between that and the rapped bits, there’s a bizarro approach to “Eyes Closed” that keeps me from fully hating it. As I said earlier this week, “weird” is an increasingly rare but welcome quality in pop music.
[5]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: I was really feeling this but thought it was maybe a little subtle and understated. Fortunately, the boys down at Imagine Dragons HQ agreed, and put J. Balvin on the remix! Pop excellence.
[3]

Katherine St. Asaph: Imagine Dragons no longer sound like mainstream pop. I am completely serious. I’m not doing a bit. Forget your prior associations, kill the cringe cop in your head, and ask yourself: what artists in pop in 2024 (I’d say in the Top 40, but considering the Top 40 is mostly Taylor Swift at the moment that would be cheating) sound like the sounds this group is emitting? I’m not saying this is good, but it is distinctly them, the product of their uncool, bombastic, stubbornly held musical fixations. It sounds like visiting a parallel musical universe and checking out its jock jams.
[7]

Oliver Maier: Look, you can say a lot about Imagine Dragons’ catalogue of ridiculous hits, but at least they all felt like they sounded the way they were supposed to. What really bugs me about “Eyes Closed” is how inept the drop is: the wubs are too timid, the drums are too reverby. Most galling is the way the “TURN OUT THE LIGHTS” line is drawn out for two extra beats. It’s spacious! I want to feel the oxygen being sucked out of the room!
[3]

Isabel Cole: Dan Reynolds has debunked the rumor that Imagine Dragons got their start writing cast-offs for the musical Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark, but this song sounds like he used that concept as a writing prompt. It feels deliberately designed for use in Bucky Barnes fanvids, or tailor-made to close Act I on Marvel’s next attempt to gain ground on the Great White Way. I almost feel wrong listening to it in the middle of a Spotify playlist, like I’m taking an animal out of its natural environment (the season finale of one of those CW superhero shows, where it would make sense the way “Believer” instantly earned my forgiveness once it became the Riverdale horny teen sex anthem). Obviously, I would not say these things about a song that was not deeply, deeply stupid, not to mention loud and annoying and humorlessly committed to a bit it doesn’t seem to realize is a bit, but to my own surprise, it’s kind of grown on me. It’s so silly, so earnest in its own goofy bravado, that a few listens took it from “this is awful” to “this is… camp???” My head says this is a generous [4]; my heart says there’s a fifty-fifty chance I put this on a cardio mix by summer’s end.
[6]