Next time, maybe Diana might be better off sending us flowers or candy instead of a song.
[Video]
[4.12]
Vikram Joseph: I’m sorry but this sounds like something you’d sing at Sunday School — saccharine, slightly reedy and full of the sort of milquetoast declarations of devotion that they pack hymns with to prevent them from sounding accidentally sexy. It’s basically a key change away from “Shine Jesus Shine.” There are better ways to thank your fans than this, Diana.
[3]
Edward Okulicz: If someone decides to ever reboot The Golden Girls (which would be a terrible idea, please don’t do this), then this would be a perfect theme song. It doesn’t seem to have any particular other use to my ears.
[4]
Dorian Sinclair: If anyone has earned the right to a four-minute paean on their fans’ support, Diana Ross is surely near the top of the list. And it’s always a pleasure to hear new material — new originals! — from her. But the lyrics for “Thank You” are sentimental right up to the point of being cloying, and while her vocal performance is as charismatic as ever, I can’t help but wish the material was a little bit fresher. It’s clearly evoking her ’70s heights, which I’m entirely in favour of, but instead of the triumphant revival, it’s a muted echo.
[6]
Thomas Inskeep: I wanna get behind this, I really do. But the music is so generic, just not-even-average untrendy pop (seemingly designed for Adult Contemporary radio), and these lyrics are the epitome of anodyne. I get that this sounds like a love letter from Miss Ross to her fans, but come on. “Thank You” is hooky, I’ll give you that. Hooky, but utterly bland, like a bowl of plain oatmeal.
[3]
Alfred Soto: She approaches “Thank You” like a housekeeper cleaning a shelf of crap china beloved by their owner and no one else: approach the edges, touch the top, avoid serious wiping. In other words, Diana Ross is inhumanely Pro Tooled, which wouldn’t matter if “Thank You” were a song.
[3]
Austin Nguyen: Optimized as an encore for a performance on Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve — replete with hand-warming breathy affect, crowd-pleasing platitudes, awkward spoken asides — and perhaps best enjoyed under similar conditions. Which includes, but is not limited to, post-midnight delirium, stranger-kissing desperation, firework-rattled ears, Time Square-bleary eyes, weak buzzed smiles, glittered-cardstock flair. I am currently 1/6 of these (take your pick), hence,
[2]
Andrew Karpan: Even in an pristinely laid out set-up and ballpark-surpassing performance, it’s interesting that Ross’ message is aimed so directly at the listener, a spirit that Ross both channels and thanks profusely for the opportunity to do so, the showman touch of anonymity that would feel crudely anachronistic coming from anyone else.
[7]
Claire Biddles: My favourite moment comes at 2:37, when after singing and speaking the titular phrase two dozen times, Ms Ross grows impatient with bestowing gratitude on her fans, and hollers “thaaank youuu” like she’s addressing a corner shop salesperson while running outside to light one of the fags she’s just bought.
[5]