Wait, who did this song again?
[Video]
[4.20]
Micha Cavaseno: Cabello’s inherent need in her former group to be the one who always stood out made a certain sense to the need for separation and individualism, especially when you think about how people always want to define a group by ‘break-outs’; you either live to see yourself become a Beyonce or a Justin, or become damned to be a Backstreet Boy until the end of your days. The thing about Camila though that can be exhaustive, is that rather than demonstrate any patience, she is always demanding you take her seriously at this. very. moment. Ironically, pairing her with Sia, someone who can’t quite write songs that allow for people to not sound like her and overwhelms their own characteristics, is an er, inspired choice. Nothing about the song ends up being exceptional or particularly awful, and it’s on brand for the sense of seriousness that Cabello takes herself with (which no doubt will be a sticking point for detractors in the future). Good on her for somehow doing the unthinkable however, and doing something that manages to not be the extra we’ve come to expect and perhaps even dread from her.
[4]
Scott Mildenhall: The interpolated Aguilera is an exceptional excerpt from the history of recorded sound, an expression of everything pent up about to be released in a song literally about the possibility of that happening. Better yet, it develops across the three times it appears, coursing through the song until it stops it briefly dead — and then it releases again! It’s exciting just thinking about it. By comparison, “Crying in the Club” is dullness presenting as strength and stability, with no such joyful release. Perhaps if you take the reservation of emotion to be what that’s mirroring it makes sense, but it doesn’t make for a very exciting song.
[6]
Katie Gill: Ohhhhh poor Camila Cabello. She is trying her HARDEST and trying to give it her all and just pouring her heart and soul and voice into this uneven mess. You can instantly tell where the radio edit’s going to cut in as Cabello goes from a full tilt diva wail to a wannabe club banger that weirdly samples Christina Aguilera. This really isn’t doing anything to remove Cabello’s designation as “the extra one” of Fifth Harmony.
[4]
Joshua Minsoo Kim: That “Genie in a Bottle” interpolation is a rapturous vortex that transports you into the hazy guilt-free euphoria that the rest of the song is pining for. The rest of the song is Camila nagging you to get to that point as she reads off the living motivational poster that is Sia.
[3]
Ryo Miyauchi: For her solo debut, the most showy ex-singer of Fifth Harmony turns to Sia for inspiration because of course she did. The dramatic vocal affect is overbearing already in whatever context, and it does her no favors here as it wipes out any amount of sympathy from her attempts to mend.
[4]
Alfred Soto: After a Billboard Music Awards performance fit for a holiday part around Disney’s Polynesian Village pool, Cabello shops “Crying in the Club” to a radio audience that made Sia’s “Cheap Thrills” a hit. It might work: the last couple times I turned on the radio I thought I was listening to “Cheap Thrills.”
[2]
Stephen Eisermann: Sia Camila sounds great on this run-of-the-mill dance track. Sia Camila even makes the Aguilera sample work in a whole new atmosphere. Too bad, then, that Sia Camila’s track isn’t interesting enough for me to give it a second listen, because I loved “”Cheap Thrills”” “”Work from Home.”
[4]
Thomas Inskeep: It’s Benny Blanco on the case for Camila Cabello’s first solo single, so of course this is lowest common denominator sub-Bieber radio pop. Cabello does herself no favors by slurring her way through these awful lyrics, either.
[2]
Mo Kim: “Crying in the Club” isn’t quite a cheeky misdirect; Camila Cabello delivers her hook as an imperative because the threat of refusing it looms in the air like heat on a packed dance floor. I’ve critiqued Cabello in the past for…overembellishing, but here her voice is a well in scorched desert, each broken note and slurred phrase letting water seep between the cracks of the sledgehammer instrumental. This is heavy (and heavy-handed) but elemental, somehow, enough that even a line as clunky on paper as “the heat of a thousand fires” tastes like smolder in my mouth.
[7]
Katherine St Asaph: For someone so consistently the worst part of every Fifth Harmony single, whose post-group collaborations have ranged from bad to hellish, Camila Cabello’s solo debut is not only tolerable, but pretty decent! Admittedly most of the decency comes from ripping off the more-than-decent “Work,” right down to actually displaying the lack of enunciation Rihanna was accused of. For once Sia’s involvement works in Camila’s favor; singing in Sia’s range keeps her out of the dread upper register, for a low, low cost of a couple lines like “heat of a thousand fires.” The “Genie in a Bottle” interpolation exists for no reason but to make bloggers talk about the “Genie in a Bottle” interpolation, but it was an awfully good prechorus, and I can’t be mad at something that gets David Frank and Pam Sheyne on the credits. Overall, definitely no Robyn, not even Platinum Weird, but solid radio filler.
[6]