despairing.we.are…
[Video][Website]
[3.62]
Katherine St Asaph: *PBF reaper*
[3]
Will Adams: will.i.am has always reveled in crassness, injecting it into every aspect of his career: lyrically, with lovely lady lumps, boobies like wow-o-wow, boners; sonically, by shamelessly chasing whatever pop trend is in vogue to the point of straight-up plagiarism; and visually, by playing a sperm, popping out of a woman’s uterus like he’s Alien spawn, and posing alongside relentless product placement. The crassness could be tolerable alone, but will marries it with an insane ego that tells him to just keep churning out the same uninspired crap. That same ego also tells will to prop up someone like Cody Wise, who’s at least three years of vocal coaching away from showing any promise. I always think that will.i.am has reached his nadir, but “It’s My Birthday” manages — from the hyperactive video to the song’s mindless repetition — to out-crass even his worst tendencies.
[0]
Alfred Soto: So moronic it must be intentional. I mean — “Que bonita/I can speak in Japanese,” followed by one word in said language? It’s will’s birthday, and he’ll make whatever damn thing he can.
[4]
Patrick St. Michel: On the one hand, will.i.am and Cody Wise at least brought A.R. Rahman aboard when recreating “Urvasi Urvasi,” and that song even gets a shout out at the very start. Unfortunately, it’s tough to find anything else really likeable about “It’s My Birthday”, with the headlining pair adding nothing but shivers to what follows (“I can speak in Japanese,” Wise sings, before revealing he only knows a word every cornball on Tumblr also knows). Honestly, just stick with the original.
[4]
Anthony Easton: The production is interesting — it seems to be riffing on new minimalism, but without any of the skeletal rawness found in the form, and Wise has a genuinely warm voice. This is also the most interested I have been in a will.i.am beat in a while. The lyrics are kind of racist, and sort of creepy, which distracts from a strong form.
[6]
Scott Mildenhall: For maybe the most multilingual number one ever (kind of) this is impressively asinine. will.i.am’s general will.i.ngness to try something unusual is laudable, and his plunder here is inspired, but he too often manages to make that unusualness sound entirely usual. Things can be worse than merely generic, at least, but “It’s My Birthday” seems unlikely to be the best remembered of his — count them — ten chart-toppers.
[5]
Megan Harrington: As a bit of forewarning, I know how vogue it is to make fun of will.i.am songs and “It’s My Birthday” is right down there in the dirt competing with his worst, but there’s a dangerous side effect to will.i.am literacy. For entire minutes after the song ended I sat in silence, a looped scratch of “in the a-air, in the a-air” floating through my head like a wicked ghost. This terrible mish-mash of generic party signifiers, lame translated come-ons, and weak brag bars is unforgettable in the worst way.
[4]
Brad Shoup: Grim and charmless, piddling yet frantic. will.i.am’s vocation is invocation: installing sonic fluff around #trending party topics, like a Bud Light Platinum commercial with an auteur attached. Cody and Will deploy so many phraselets, and nearly every one of them landed for someone else, but those folks didn’t have a five-note symphonic motif screwing itself into the ground for four minutes.
[3]