Today, the Jukebox goes bunburying….
[Video][Website]
[6.38]
Brad Shoup: Ah, the funkiness of being earnest. This one’s a stormer, dropping digital stank all over. Shinichi Osawa keeps the landscape shifting, but groove is the grounding, and there’s texture aplenty. It’s kinda like “1 Thing,” but on steroids and trying to warn you about the Matrix.
[9]
Anthony Easton: 4 points for the video’s choreography, 3 points for that orange dress, and 2 points for the robots fucking in heavenly metallic sheen.
[9]
Iain Mew: I really like the way that the instrumental intermissions in this each take it off in completely different and enjoyable directions, but it’s otherwise too dominated by that obnoxiously jerky riff and sledgehammer chorus to do that much for me.
[5]
Michaela Drapes: Though there’s no question that Namie Amuro’s still got that je ne sais quoi (er, marketing department?) that made her a star, I can’t help but be a little disappointed here. Where she should be bigger and bolder, this track’s endless mealy-mouthed chorus drags her down. It’s like she’s trying to fly, but is tethered to the ground with an endless supply of sandbags; whenever the song starts to show signs of life, that cumbersome chorus comes and ruins everything all over again.
[3]
Jonathan Bogart: It could stand to be tightened up — there are a few too many bars of aimless downtime, and the producers don’t need to show off every last filtered synth sound they’ve come up with in one song — but this is a hard-cutting blast of dance-pop that gets its hooks well in and then shakes you like a rag doll. The chirrupping hook sounds almost like an old 70s analog synth figure, but the beat and especially Amuro’s voice are so modern that any reverence is pummelled out of it with maximum efficiency.
[7]
Edward Okulicz: If, in Japan, when you want something big and attention grabbing, you stick white noise like breaking keytars everywhere a US producer might stick a guitar solo, then I want this influence to spread far and wide. For a Namie Amuro song, could do with a bit more Namie Amuro on it, addictive though the synth fuckery is the first few plays.
[7]
Katherine St Asaph: “Scandalous” didn’t vanish at all! It just pupated for years, and now it’s got all these twinkly, thorny appendages that go on for miles.
[8]
Mallory O’Donnell: Really awesome for about 17 seconds. Really annoying for the remainder, which clocks in somewhere around the end of time.
[3]