Not about Kitty, like I first assumed…
[Video][Website]
[5.46]
Katherine St Asaph: I’m never going to be able to react to cat pictures again.
[3]
Alfred Soto: The danger of Charli XCX hooks is when employers rely on the myth of their indelibility. This one sits there, content in its incoherence. No one bothers to get engaged, Ty least of all.
[4]
Micha Cavaseno: WHAT. WENT. WRONG. “Free TC” is supposed to be the gesture that fully establishes Ty as the soul auteur he truly is. Because don’t be fooled, behind the misogynist king of ratchet’s song-based format is a former backpacker neo-soul nerd. First single “Stand For” was a noteworthy gesture in that direction, but I imagine that we’ve got the label wondering why he hasn’t given them another “Paranoid” or “Loyal” to secure an easy transition into further hits and success. But honestly, Stargate and Cashmere Cat are not doing it here. Tinashe is barely present and Charli was literally sent here just to shapeshift. So we’ve got a problem here, folks. Ty needs to blossom and become the artist he’s meant to be, but this sub-standard version of records his progeny are already skating far past is undoubtedly going to be promoted and hold him back. Ty Dolla Sign’s image is in jeopardy, and I don’t know if he can claim it back in time.
[3]
David Moore: Charli XCX gets her Igloo on in this alternate-universe second consecutive summer smash (why did they dump it on us in February?), and somehow an excess of good faith makes it OK for her in a way that her Trojan Horse to the mainstream — or was it vice versa? — never managed outside of Robert Christgau and Questlove. Meanwhile Tinashe, slumming it, capably plays the role of Charli’s Charli, while Ty Dolla $ign, predictably, appears as himself. For some genuine DJ Mustard summer sunshine pop (accept no substitutes) wait a few months, unless you live outside of an igloo, i.e. in Australia, and blast Maliibu N Helene with the windows down.
[7]
Cédric Le Merrer: It’s a great testament to DJ Mustard’s talent how this sucks on almost every level. Tinashe’s couple of lines are okay though, I guess.
[2]
Josh Love: Charli, bless her heart, doesn’t seem to care what absolute nonsense she’s asked to sing, and she still brattily sells the everloving fuck out of it. Unfortunately she’s the only one who gives this song a pulse, as Tinashe is sadly little more than a hostage here. Meanwhile, Ty’s highlight is biting Anthony Kiedis’s flow for two seconds.
[5]
Ian Mathers: I mean, I’m not sure I needed more proof that Charli and Tinashe could make just about any old bullshit enjoyable by sheer force of presence, but both of them normally have way more interesting production. Ty kinda feels like a placeholder here in comparison.
[5]
Luisa Lopez: Despite its ridiculousness, this somehow manages to be genuinely sexy — not consistently, but the repeated meetings of Ty Dolla $ign’s indifference and everyone else’s mania builds a wave of weird desire that only breaks once, in the sly and mechanized dial tuning after “come a little closer / come be my boy,” and it’s a surprise but a good one, like a joke made to turn someone’s head away from your pulse.
[6]
Scott Mildenhall: Charli XCX is worth far more than just being a cartoonish mascot, a dystopian Minnie The Minx enlisted to imbue some notion of “attitude” wherever required. Perhaps when it is required she is the one to call, but when not she’s an irritant; far and away the worst thing about “Drop That Kitty”. For the most part it has a delicate poise; not the forcefulness of “Fancy”, and not calling for a facsimile. Weirder still is that all this flimsy posturing appears to have turned Tinashe into Avril Lavigne.
[5]
David Sheffieck: Needs more Tinashe, but this sounds massive; if she gets some of the solo success she deserves as a result of another credit for a minimal feature, I won’t complain. The real star here is Charli, finally delivering the hook on a rap song that won’t make you sick and kill you, and demolishing it. I mean, I know there were verses here — and I generally enjoy Ty — but he’s just filling space. Luckily everything around him is big enough to make up for it.
[8]
Brad Shoup: Just when you think that bassline’s gonna zig, you know? This is dusted with enough night magic to reward second-level listening. Charli was clearly recruited because she’d Ryan O’Neal the shit out of the hook; Tinashe’s issuing a call to arms, which is just about as off. And right now, the moon’s in the house of me remembering that strip club anthems aren’t supposed to be Cilvia Demo.
[6]
Josh Winters: If you luh to get 2 on, then what’s one more?
[8]
Crystal Leww: Shhh shhhhhh shhhhhhhh: I know you think this song is heinous, puffing out your chest and getting red in the face with accusations of gross guys and their gross gaze and guess what? You’re probably right. (Ty Dolla $ign makes me think of the original promise of The Worstnd fulfilled in the best possible ways.) But I do respect myself, and I definitely do respect Charli and Tinashe, and I think we’re just gonna find our way to the club, pulling up in our cutest lil neon-colored crop-tops and weather-inappropriate old school convertible with the top down and we are gonna DROP THAT KITTY DOWN LOW! POP THAT KITTY DOWN LOW! TAKE THAT VIDEO PHONE!
[9]