Now taking suggestions for ways to prove Jonathan wrong…
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[3.86]
Crystal Leww: RedOne’s international profile has fallen since the heyday of EDM-pop, and while it speaks to how quickly that style has gone out of style, I can’t help but wonder if it’s also because American record labels didn’t want to give the non-Anglo foreigner a chance to adapt. I am sadly assured that it’s not by “Kayna Wla Makaynach.” While RedOne’s other collaborations with Chawki were absolute thrills, they were also still very much in the vein of his early-aughts output. An attempt here with a more measured midtempo croon is thoroughly unremarkable if not outright boring. It’s lovely, but it doesn’t move or try for anything new. RedOne’s tricks end with the build up and thrill it seems.
[4]
Scott Mildenhall: “Kayna Wla Makaynach” sounds as pretty as it has been translated ugly. Chawki could be playing censorious, he could be playing devil’s advocate; with the linguistic and cultural barriers in the way, it’s impossible to tell. Less uncertain is the feeling that this has far less to latch on to than a stereotypical English-language RedOne production. As far as Chawki goes, it doesn’t hold a candle to the audible delight of the time he went gallivanting with Pitbull.
[5]
Micha Cavaseno: Both the lyrical and musical equivalent of some real neckbeard style #ACTUALLY being passed off as pop.
[1]
Patrick St. Michel: This one’s saved by the Auto-tune vapor trail behind the vocals and the beat. It adds some intriguing touches to an otherwise boringly straight-ahead song.
[5]
Jonathan Bogart: The problem with tokenism in a nutshell: this is likely to be the only Arabic-language song we cover all year, and it’s a mediocre croony bore. The mistake would be to take it as representative. All pop tends toward mediocre croony boredom; the outliers in every field take more tracking down.
[4]
Katherine St Asaph: I always have to double-interrogate my taste with Arabic-language music: the comparative sliver Westerners might curate or appropriate, versus what I remember of the music I’d hear in my father’s car, which often sounded like this. The ballad-orchestral instrumentations and the Auto-Tune — popularized in Morocco — mark this as mostly pop, albeit with more of a gentle sweep than some. RedOne stays out of his way, not normally his forte. And yet… it’s a midtempo ballad. You know?
[4]
Ramzi Awn: Perfectly pretty, and perfectly boring.
[4]