No actual pictures of them ever having been in the same room together, so this’ll have to do…

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[4.80]

Iain Mew: “S&M” was previously a rather by the numbers Rihanna banger that was never as naughty as it wanted to be. Adding in a lot more specific references to hurt and pain, rather than the previous approach which was a bit “chains, whips, fill in the details yourself”, and handing these lines over not to an assured Rihanna but to a Britney who sounds more strained and robotic than ever, makes it veer from blah right over to disturbing. Not really an improvement.
[4]

Zach Lyon: “S&M”:S&M::”I Kissed A Girl”:lesbian makeouts.
[3]

Anthony Easton: Closer to a real S&M scene, in its almost liturgical attachment to ritual and etiquette plus how it delicately and carefully calibrates power exchange — though Brit tops from the bottom in a few places.
[7]

Martin Skidmore: This is a major pop powerhouse team-up, on a housey Stargate number with a punchy chorus, though Britney’s contribution seems kind of unnecessary, more about star power than adding anything much. I’m also not entirely convinced by this ode to S&M — it reads more like they are posing as daring than confessing to or bragging about something real.
[7]

Chuck Eddy: If you have to brag about it, you probably are not as kinky as you think you are. Then again, maybe that’s why this hits me as more endearing than nauseating… Well actually, X-Ray Spex’s (R.I.P. Poly) and Devo’s and the Dazz Band’s and Madonna’s and Samantha Fox’s and the Crystals’ odes to bondage and/or discipline were cuter, but who’s counting? Still not sure if they’re really saying they “like the smell” of “sex in the air,” though. Like, on a trapeze??
[6]

Alfred Soto: I don’t know if it’s whips and chains or the prospect of yet another number one single that’s got this icebox excited — something’s got her to sing like the Auto-Tune is a cat o’nine tails. Britney, who at this point in her career lives for this kind of opulent electro-porn, exerts herself as if her agent promised her she could kiss Rihanna at the next MTV Video Music Awards.
[6]

Asher Steinberg: This song was an atrocity the first time around — appallingly literal, forced, and blaring — and Britney doesn’t really help; alongside Rihanna she sounds like a callow kid trying to impress/imitate her big sister.
[2]

Jonathan Bradley: Britney sounds like nobody explained to her what was going on before she was shoved into this, and she still hasn’t quite picked up on some of the finer details. The best hook here is still Rihanna’s cocksure “I may be bad but I’m perfectly good at it,” though even that sounds diluted with her growling performance trimmed by a half. Alone, Rihanna approached the tune with the single-mindedness required to maintain the suspension of disbelief; with Britney she just seems distracted.
[5]

Jer Fairall: There is nothing technically wrong with listening to a pair of high profile pop stars, one an abuse victim and the other a mother of two with a history of possible mental illness and/or drug addiction, engage in a little chain-‘n’-whip play for the titillation and grotesque fascination of their audience, but there is plenty about it that is creepy, gross and potentially cruel. Almost as cruel as placing Britney’s breathy nothing of a voice next to Rihanna’s actual one.
[2]

Doug Robertson: Other than her name, what exactly is Britney adding to this track? Of all the things in the world that really don’t need to exist, this is up there with ITV2 and Garfield cartoons.
[6]