The Singles Jukebox

The Jukebox is having a night in…

[Video]
[4.11]

Vikram Joseph: When I wrote about Troye Sivan’s “Dance To This” last summer, I was struck not just by its intimacy, but by the sense of real wonder at that intimacy that Sivan conveyed; it felt quintessentially queer, that disbelief that you could be allowed so much love. I get the same energy from this; a feeling of being immeasurably comfortable around someone else, two worlds tessellating despite every pre-conditioned expectation otherwise. The two songs also share a subtext — just as Sivan hinted at more than dancing, you imagine Thomas and his lover aren’t just watching TV with the sound off — that’s somehow far sexier than most songs that try to be explicit about that sort of thing. The pizzicato flicker of the synths in the verse and the stuttering electro-pop chorus combine to produce something familiar, but achingly so. It feels redemptive and warm in its vision of domesticity; a beacon for those of us who can hardly envision getting that far.
[8]

Alfred Soto: This example of distilled queer plaintiveness has a decent title for which the three other credited scribes can come up with nothing but stuttered electronics to round out. 
[6]

Kylo Nocom: Peter Thomas’s ambiguous fantasies might be underwritten, but that’s the point: don’t say too much or else you’ll ruin the moment. This is simple pop for youthful gay teen fantasies, a nice alternative to Conan Gray’s baffling ego-trips or Troye Sivan’s A24/7 horniness. No dramatics or poetics, just shy observations that feel ripped from elsewhere but could mean a lot to anybody who wanted to hear this. Too bad, then, how abrupt the riffing juts out from the chorus. And it’s a shame that, despite not needing to say too much, Thomas surely could’ve strained to make such beautiful mundanities sound worthwhile. By the end, he becomes a murmur buried underneath blankets of Teenage Dream guitars, the message’s charm all but dissolved. If “silence isn’t awkward anymore,” why not leave some space for it?
[4]

Will Adams: I’d expected more from the co-writer and producer responsible for some of Betty Who’s most explosive, effervescent and heartwarming work, but it’s 2019, I guess, so chill we must. The distorted piano stabs have some good heft to them that distinguish “Watching TV” from its clear Troye Sivan mold. But what sticks with me is the unintentional sadness in the lyric, “I’m wondering if this is what love should be like,” as if all love is doomed to be moored by melancholy. For Peter’s sake, and mine, and everyone’s, I hope not.
[5]

Michael Hong: “Watching TV With the Sound Off” opens with moody instrumentals, but on the chorus, those punchy synthesizer stabs add something new. But they don’t really work and instead when Peter Thomas sings “even if it’s just us,” they end up being a third-party distraction and just seem counter-intuitive to the entire track’s concept.
[3]

Katherine St Asaph: Like a YouTube preroll ad for the concept of a relationship, the chorus synths are designed to thrill for 15 seconds and no more.
[3]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: I’ve enjoyed seeing everyone rag on corporations for their disingenuous, hokey support of the LGBTQIA+ community. This sounds like the musical equivalent of something those companies tweet.
[3]

Wayne Weizhen Zhang: I’m predisposed to supporting queer songwriters trying to strike it out on their own, but this is pretty dreary. The idea here — to write a song about first love focusing on quotidian, small acts of intimacy instead of the overdone trope of cinematic, over-the-top love — is admirable, but the execution is maddeningly poor. “I’m wondering if this is what love should be like/Cause that’d be fine/I’d be fine,” Peter Thomas sings, so sleepily he should probably check for vitamin C deficiency. He means to sound contemplative, but only comes across as apathetic — “fine” the way you’d respond if someone accidentally brought you Coke instead of Pepsi. The nail in the coffin is the dead-on-arrival hook, with a titular idea that doesn’t quite land (is it a metaphor?) and production lacking anything memorable. 
[2]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: God I hate to be petty about someone else’s love song but this relationship sounds incredibly boring.
[3]