If you saxy, then flaunt it…
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[7.43]
Alfred Soto: Maybe Bruno Mars will help this cross over, but a British artist doing a “Rapture” variant over cowbell may need a stronger promotional pull in the land of Meghan Trainor. The air of variety show enthusiasm isn’t easily dispelled either.
[7]
Edward Okulicz: This song is more sketch-comedy parody of “Uptown Funk” than successor, in other words, rather less funny. It hides its other sources rather more cleverly too. The opening verse puts me more in the mind of “Rapper’s Delight,” and the middle section is “Buffalo Stance.” Mark Ronson is kicking himself twice for losing first dibs on stealing those and having two more global smashes. The sax bit had to be good to carry this cheesy melange without it falling apart, but Fleur East has got very lucky with that too.
[8]
Josh Winters: Audacious, overblown, and explosive, Fleur East is totally out of control as she spits and sings for her goddamn life in this runway redux of “Rapper’s Delight” that’s as exhausting as a life-giving lip sync. Who would’ve thought the horn section from “Club Tropicana” needed to be plugged into a dozen electrical sockets.
[7]
Jonathan Bogart: “Buffalo Stance” flow on top of a Prince-a-few-years-earlier pastiche was going to get a high score from me no matter what, but the fifty-years-out-of-date goofiness of a saxophone player being the epitome of sexy cool seals the deal.
[9]
Scott Mildenhall: Step by step, Syco are sealing up the “sounds like Christmas” market. Little Mix have the bells, but better yet “Sax” is its own extended, explosive metaphor. Overstuffed, gaudy, and applied to make money for ASDA, it’s a tour de fleurce. The brass hook is big enough to carry you, your friends and all your family’s winter coats at once, and Fleur herself is exactly the performer she showed she could be on The X Factor, even without visuals. It was always sure that one of the Addictiv Ladies would come good.
[8]
Thomas Inskeep: Most people seem to be hearing “Uptown Funk” in “Sax,” especially considering Fleur East’s star-making performance of said smash in last year’s X Factor semifinals. But I hear a lot of the DNA from Javine’s 2003 cover of Diana Ross’s “Surrender” — which should’ve been a massive worldwide hit, but wasn’t — too. This has tons of energy, and East is clearly a star, but I wish the lyrics of “Sax” weren’t so nonsensical (“hey boy/play that back/you can talk that talk, but can you play that sax” — is she only interested in dating woodwind players?!). I want to love this song, because it has a lot going for it, but can only like it.
[6]
Will Adams: Fleur East does her best with the barely-there metaphor, vamping and hollering before stepping aside for the massive instrumental hook. This is the kind of single Jessie J wishes she could release — good ol’ professional fun — if she could only remember the importance of letting the music speak for itself.
[7]