Regurgitating all his favorite alcoholic and musical brands-brands-brands-brands…
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[2.75]
Alfred Soto: For those listeners who dismissed Toby Keith’s “Red Solo Cup” as if it were warm beer, here’s Taio Cruz promising to vomit on your lap. “Vomit” is exactly how the post-Guetta backing track smells, by the way.
[1]
Zach Lyon: Oh, hey, Mad Libs. This is a song (form of expression, in other cases) performed by Taio Cruz (member of the Union of Harmless and Personality-Exempt Dullards [UHPED]) about the joy of hangovers (plural occurrence that no one involved seems to have had any direct experience with), called “Hangover” (same). It is produced by Dr. Luke (ruling-class producer who would be embarrassed to even attempt to create an actual track for Taio Cruz) and it features obnoxious acoustic guitar presets (something Max Martin would use) and synth diarrhea (something David Guetta would use). It features Flo Rida (Flo Rida). It will spend 18 weeks (enough time to ensure his next single will be relevant enough to also appear on the Top 40) on the Top 40. It makes me want to go crying (-ing verb).
[2]
Josh Langhoff: Very accurate! This song makes me wanna throw my headphones against the wall, bury my head under the pillow, and/or vomit. Taio could atone by fixing me a big plate of chorizo.
[2]
Hazel Robinson: Taio, you are older than me. Drinking until you throw up and never wanting to grow up are basically off the menu. This is a woeful tread through supposedly fun tropes that no one who’d ever actually experienced them would celebrate (the night before, sure, but has anyone ever gone “oh yes, please refill my mug of world-crushing hangover, I’m really up for having to lie down under my desk for 30 minutes”?) and deserves universal disapproval for being the annoying death knell for Cruz ever being interesting again.
[0]
Katherine St Asaph: Is there no life experience that 2011 dance-pop won’t colonize by bosh? Awaiting follow-up singles “Constipation (Rock the Flow),” “Defragmenting Drive C:” and “The Cycle Before REM Sleep (Dancing in a Dream).”
[2]
Erick Bieritz: “Dynamite” at least had a welcome to wear out; “Hangover” is as much fun as its subject matter. It’s the latest in a glut of videos composting in the wake of the “Hangover” movies, tapping into a recession-driven need to drink until the world recedes to a pulsing, dull blur, which is also what this song sounds like.
[3]
Brad Shoup: A roomful of people thought Taio detailing 50 ways to leave your liquor was a great idea. So here’s to them, as they’ve pushed the having-a-party song to a likely breaking point. Dr. Luke nods toward that Nirvana thing everyone’s been so concerned about before dropping the spooky vocal hook, the spirits of shots past dampening the day. Toss in that bizarre but admirable frankness, and you’ve got my recipe for overrating.
[7]
Jonathan Bradley: I expect the title is a sly joke whose punchline arrives only when you hear the song blaring from a neighbor’s stereo on that sick morning after a night too big. Imagine the horror; Cruz’s disco 2010 sound, here buffed even brighter thanks to Lukasz Gottwald’s riff-pop gleam, has me reaching for sunglasses and Advil even as I sit writing stone-cold sober on a Sunday evening. It’s absurd, obviously: this is pre-hangover music, created in imitation of celebratory, fist-pounding, Bacchanalian bliss and designed as accompaniment to the same. Not only is tomorrow an unreal concept at such times, it’s also an unwelcome one. Does anyone really want a preview of the aftermath when they’re in the middle of the blast — particularly a preview that not only could not be trying less hard to dissuade the listener from the path he’s headed down, but actively cheering him toward oblivion? I don’t fuck with the hair of the dog, so if “Hangover” is that kind of anthem, I’ll have to say god bless and excuse myself from further considering it, but instead I prefer to think of it as the endpoint to the concept of the club song. Pop has so painstakingly deconstructed the night out in its attempt to perfect its chronicling of the same that even its worst feature has become one more reason to celebrate. Dr. Luke presents… the death of the party.
[5]