In which our writers like this guy all of a sudden.:.
[Video][Website]
[7.00]
Will Adams: “I Know There’s Gonna Be (Good Times)” is In Colour‘s lighthouse, offering refuge from the stormy seas of the preceding tracks and signaling its closing chapter. In isolation, it’s less effective. But the way Young Thug and Popcaan provide unfailing positivity in the face of Jamie xx’s bent steel drums creates a compelling early evening jam.
[7]
Jonathan Bogart: I thought Street Corner Symphony would be a good sample source when I bought it a decade ago too. But I didn’t do anything with it, and that’s why Jamie xx is Jamie xx and I’m not.
[10]
Brad Shoup: Even as someone who doesn’t club, I know Jamie xx is some garbage, someone who’s happy to create narratives around nights out like DJ sets haven’t had that as the goal since day one. If you think of this as a Thugger/Popcaan radio rip, it’s easier. Otherwise it’s a headcold of a mix whose blitheness was already in each feature’s M.O.
[6]
Micha Cavaseno: If only we could get Jeff and Poppy together for a more organic collaboration, as I can’t think of two artists who have made better songs embodying blissout euphoria like these dorks. For the most part I find Jamie xx’s steel pan aesthetic and twisted-up chimes, complete with some REAL-STIRRING GOSPEL, a bit cloying; one can only take so much of someone brandishing their Soul Jazz compilations with so much dignity. But here it strikes a good balance, putting the hedonism of these two youngers into the realm of the sacred. The turnup is real, and you need a pair of souls as foolhardy and willing to let go as these two in the face of the self-conscious neediness of Jamie’s strident nerd shit.
[7]
Alfred Soto: Thug’s sliced and diced syllables prevent this track from embalming itself as a a Moby reprise.
[6]
Anthony Easton: The last vocalizations do that old trick of sound overwhelming language, but the coda is so small that it becomes symbolic of the lack of commitment in the process.
[2]
Thomas Inskeep: You could be forgiven for thinking this is a Young Thug single, by the way he grabs the reins and runs with it like he’s Lil Wayne circa 2007. But it’s still Jamie xx’s record thanks to the production he provides: drunken steel drums, Popcaan on the hook, an old soul sample. That said, this wouldn’t be nearly as great as an instrumental, or even as a Popcaan joint; all of the ingredients here are necessary, and the fact that Young Thug sounds like such a star is key, too.
[7]
Josh Winters: The thing I enjoy most about In Colour is how the front-to-back listening experience feels like jumping through different radio wavelengths that act as portals into Jamie’s private metropolis of a world. “I Know There’s Gonna Be (Good Times)” represents the “summer jam” station on the dial. Jamie checks many boxes for making a proper beach banger — bountiful bumping bass, charmingly goofy rap/dancehall verses, a Persuasions sample designed for waxing nostalgic on memories of collective revelry — and the sound design feels not just flashy but wealthy, like someone dipped the “cha-ching” sound effect in liquid gold and melted it down into a diamond ring. There’s nothing I love more than blasting great songs while driving, especially while breezing along past sunlit waters shouting “ima ride in the pussy like a stroller” like it was the first day of vacation.
[8]
Megan Harrington: There is so much happening here that it seems almost improbable that “I Know There’s Gonna Be (Good Times)” is a masterpiece. Maybe it’s not a masterpiece. Maybe it’s awful.
[10]