YouTube sensation edges out slowly into the real world…
[Fanmade video][Website]
[5.25]
Doug Robertson: Esmee kicked off her career by posting videos of herself singing various pop/R&B covers on YouTube which, as is de rigueur these days, garnered 6 billion views in a matter of seconds, hardly any of which were done by herself. Here she tries to continue her career the same way she started, by releasing what, given the glaring similarities and lack of originality, might as well be a decently done cover of “Disturbia”. While Rihanna might be dealing with a few issues right now, it’s not quite at the stage where we need someone to go to the cabinet marked “Smash glass in case of emergency” and bring out the Mark 2 version.
[5]
Chris Boeckmann: Back when people actually paid attention to Esmee Denters, she was knocking out fantastic pop covers right and left, racking up millions of Youtube hits and scoring offers from record labels. Rather than taking advantage of that 2007 buzz, Esmee — bless her cute little Dutch heart — decided to wait a decade in Internet time and perfect her Paula DeAnda impression. Now that’s what I call the American dream.
[5]
Alex Wisgard: For a Trousersnake pet project, “Outta Here” is sorely lacking in anything particularly inventive, and more importantly – especially when you realise the last thing this site covered that JT was involved in was that awesome Ciara single – anything sexy. This is the sort of song that launched the “careers” of countless anonymous girl singers in the wake of Britney and Christina, and it sounds even flatter now than it would have then.
[4]
David Raposa: Denters’ YouTube-to-Timberlake story is great and all (pending actual success), but if the ultimate goal of all this is to make some money, Polow probably should’ve given this faux-Ciara track to the lady best suited to pop & lock it into the top spot. Instead, Polow & Justin gave this subpar track to Denters, and she eagerly “rises” to the “occasion.” What her mannered reading-a-ransom-note singing doesn’t accomplish, the track’s ProToolapalooza is more than happy to fully realize.
[2]
Jordan Sargent: It’s hard to deny the rousing chorus here or Denters’ obviously powerful voice, but it’s pretty disappointing that the first single from the first artist signed to Justin Timberlake’s imprint ended up being so generic, especially considering that it was produced by Polow Da Don.
[6]
Tom Ewing: Esmee Denters sounds like a minor Roald Dahl character and there’s some Tales Of The Unexpected stuff going on here given that her sometime beau has changed his DNA to… seduce her? avoid her? I’m unclear. Meanwhile, the overdriven production is doing its darnedest to convince me there’s an exciting song under all those guitar presets, but it’s not really happening.
[4]
Martin Kavka: This is a pleasant enough pop song, and the populism of Denters’ career — girl sings on YouTube, gets discovered, signs contract with Justin Timberlake, appears on Oprah — is to be admired. One minor quibble, however: it’s only in the middle eight that the listener has any sense that she can communicate more than one emotion with her voice. And one major reason to hate: the narrator is blaming herself for having been fooled by her guy. But what can you expect from a woman whose favorite Timberlake song is the misogynistic “What Goes Around…Comes Around”??
[7]
Hazel Robinson : As Popjustice said a few weeks ago, it’s almost like someone’s noticed semi-rocky Angry Girls sell loads of records, isn’t it? This has a bit more beat and electro and less “generic guitar noise” to it, but it’s exactly the same vocal melody and song structure and she sounds about as interested as a Barbie advertisement voiceover and just WHO CARES, WHO CARES?
[5]
Additional Scores
Hillary Brown: [7]
Alex Ostroff: [5]
Jessica Popper: [8]
Martin Skidmore: [5]