We’re up all night to get loose…
[Video][Website]
[5.17]
Alfred Soto: Returning to the moniker with which he scored his early success, Puff Daddy returns to leading an R&B and hip-hop family/Family through a terrain that looks much like the one he created in the late nineties and reunited with new members and greater finesse on 2010’s Last Night in Paris. On this track he waves his baton and they fall in step on a track as jittery as Pharrell’s early Jay Z productions. It’s not great because Puff isn’t great when he’s leading, but he’s got urgency. Maybe his great, wracked performance on Meek Mill’s “Cold Hearted” was a one-off after all.
[6]
Anthony Easton: That Bad Boy tag at the end is a kind of desperate attempt to remind the world that Puff Daddy is relevant, and considering how rough shod he rides over Pharell’s featuring, a stunting one.
[5]
Micha Cavaseno: Sean “Puffy” Combs has been one of the most fascinating men in rap for a long time. As far as actual talents that muso-types respect, the only thing he can do truly is dance. But abstractly, he is a master visionary who paved the way for Kanye West’s struggles to turn hip-hop into pop art, who to this day haunts Andre Young’s yardsticks despite the both of them having long since been discarded as figures of expectation. In an interesting twist, the only person I can compare this song to definitively is the one man who’s incredibly close to Puffy in role and presence on records: Kirk Franklin. And make no mistake, Puffy is a religious man, so much so he took a bat to Steve “Culture Vulture” Stoute for disrespecting Jesus. The Dirty Money project, his last true album, was centered around his thoughts on martyrdom that’ve radiated through the stars he served and his own musings. That’s why he casually insists “this god’s work”, and that “he wants you to be happy, he wants you to be free!” over shivers of nega-funk gospel crafted by Pharrell while the duo play Chuck & Flav (AKA Bobby & James). Its a subdued sequel to the rambling hysterics of last decade’s Dark Magus-sampling “Get Off” that feels so slight, and surprisingly devoid of fleshed out work, but is all the more noted for the gaudiness ornamenting the bits of exoskeleton he’s still put on display. We’re promised the last musical chapter in the career of a rare breed of artist… A man not defined by his talent and skills, but the visions that have seized him.
[6]
Thomas Inskeep: Maybe an ersatz “Hot In Herre” beat isn’t quite the way to make a comeback in 2015, Puff. Just maybe. Also, you should be slapped for referencing Public Enemy again.
[1]
Will Adams: Pharrell’s chromatic-stepping backbone sets a good foundation for the first minute, but then… nothing really happens. There’s some sound like tapping a microphone in spots, which adds some interest, but apart from that Puff Daddy isn’t engaging enough to keep me investeed.
[5]
Brad Shoup: These fortysomethings do not give a shit. Not about a bass tone that’s like a dental drill tapping your skull, not about making the world’s grouchiest go-go song. The Combs renaissance continues.
[8]