A rather uninspiring thing…
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[3.80]
Alfred Soto: Inspirational, epic, grand — the qualities that people ascribe to Beyoncé in the abstract.
[4]
John Seroff: Am I reading too much into the decision to make the blandest, most disposable track on the mostly excellent The Gift: a) the last song on the album and the easiest to skip; b) the only cut that crosses over to the official Lion King soundtrack; c) the lead single? Obviously, I understand that both the tune and the film are explicitly crafted as radio-friendly unit-shifters and that leading with, say, the far superior summer jam “Find Your Way Back” (or, better yet, the 50-megaton “My Power”) would be pearls before Pumbaa, but I had kinda hoped that post-Lemonade B would be past tent-poling roll-credits anthems for spins. Competently crafted but decidedly inessential.
[3]
Josh Buck: I have listened to “Spirit” at least 5 times at this point and I still cannot remember what it sounds like. Obviously, this is just the latest in a long line of placid new songs added to existing musicals in order to snag a Best Original Song Oscar nomination, but the difference here is that there’s an entire album full of better original songs to choose from. Someone greenlit *this* as the lead single from The Lion King: The Gift instead of the phenomenal “Brown Skinned Girl” and that person is the real Disney villain.
[3]
Will Adams: I can think of no better synchronicity for Disney’s uncanny valley 2019 remake of The Lion King than having its flagship song spotlight one of our generation’s most important artists only to churn out something that is as technically competent and dramatically sweeping as it is empty, lacking a human pulse and ultimately pointless.
[2]
Wayne Weizhen Zhang: I’m sure that amidst the drama and spectacle of The Lion King “Spirit” will be goosebump-inducing cinematic gold, but divorced from its movie soundtrack context, this is just another pretty, plodding ballad barely better than Katy Perry’s “Rise.”
[5]
Will Rivitz: Katy Perry’s “Rise” is only marginally better when sung by Bey, especially if she spends the whole time doing a Leona Lewis impression.
[2]
Nortey Dowuona: Massive, throbbing veins of synthesizers and bass, surrounded by a soaring, shimmering chorus as Beyoncé reminds us that we are all still very much her creations. (The song is aight.)
[6]
Joshua Lu: Presented as something grand and imposing, but ending up rather insipid, “Spirit” is filled with a chronic swelling that one would want to get checked out by a doctor. Of course there’s a key change; of course it’s superfluous. If anything, I pity the generations of kids who’ll have to compete with Beyoncé when they try to sing along to this film’s soundtrack.
[4]
Katie Gill: This has exactly the same problems that I had with “Speechless.” The remake of a 1990s film gets a new song, either to flesh out the character arc of an underdeveloped character or because Beyoncé wrote you one. However, the new song does not fit at ALL with the rest of the soundtrack of the film. It makes strides at trying to fit in, but there’s still something way too 2010s pop (as in “Speechless”) or way too reminiscent of the artist’s personal discography (that’s this one) for the song to fit in perfectly. If this was just an end credits song (which Wikipedia says it isn’t), then I’d be more forgiving. But as it is, you’ve got a mid-tier Beyoncé song trying to fit into a soundtrack written over twenty years ago and it just doesn’t fit. And besides, “Shadowland” is RIGHT THERE.
[5]
Jonathan Bradley: This is a song from the blockbuster Disney® animated feature The Lion King™ that is performed by the multi-million-selling, award-winning artist Beyoncé Knowles.
[4]