Minutes from the Jukebox Selectors Committee Meeting: “It’s Shakira, so why not?”
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[6.75]
Sabina Tang: Latin piano house sans left turns, or indeed any quirks apart from those inherent to Shakira’s voice. A flawless house party starter, though, and contender for summer 2012’s official kick-off. Is it really only 2:26?
[8]
Ramzi Awn: Shakira’s voice is as sexy as ever, and the shift from Spanish to English suits her. The adult contempo vibe might even play to her strengths. I wouldn’t mind listening to this while getting my hair done, hanging out at home, or — anytime, really. Shakira is never a hard sell, and “Addicted To You” breezily complies.
[7]
Brad Shoup: It’s fine but not the Shakira I should have been losing my mind over at the turn of the century. There’s the body celebration, but not the syllable-macerating yawps she does so well (the processed, wordless melody lines are particularly distressing.) The electric-merengue thing is fine for the DJ mix, but I wouldn’t slot it on the first greatest-hits set.
[5]
Kat Stevens: Man, that is one expensive drum sound.
[6]
Anthony Easton: Ballroom dancing rhythms and onomatopoeic choruses, along with Shakira’s usually excellent vocals, make me happy. The track is a little samey, could stand more ambition, but we’ll let that slide.
[7]
Jonathan Bogart: Sale el Sol was Shakira’s first self-consciously “Latin” record, the first one where she didn’t try (many) weirdo art-rock experiments or scavenge for novel pop sounds around the globe. It was, essentially, the first record that sounded like what people who had never heard any Shakira but “Hips Don’t Lie” would imagine a Shakira record to sound like. Don’t get me wrong, “Hips Don’t Lie” is a great record, a [10] of [10s], but its reggaetón is not the merengue of “Addicted to You,” and the fact that Shaki could be understood as “retreating” into a somewhat more classic, somewhat more traditional template for what people expect Latin music to be after the relative dance-rock experimentalism of She Wolf failed to set the world on fire is hugely bothersome. But though she’d never really made an entirely tropical record before, she’s got the moves down cold, and Sale el Sol is a great tropical record, maybe the best of the young decade. Within the record, “Addicted to You” is slight, a merengue workout that keeps to her frequent theme of love pushing beyond healthiness; but in the wild, it’s a great pop song, many times sharper and sexier than the vast majority of what people are choosing to listen to instead. More fool they.
[8]
Alfred Soto: As a man of Cuban descent I’ve been immune to her moxie, but the language switch makes it easier, to quote one of her admonitions, to love her. The bass and piano help too.
[6]
Andy Hutchins: Shakira’s tremendous at coming at a melody or a line at the exact right (well, acute, usually) angle, and handles all sorts of rhythms well, but she’s a lot better at that in Spanish than English; the weirdly hollow a-lingual part of “Addicted to You” is not so good, but there’s a lot of fun in the production.
[7]