Gies yer jaiket…
[Video][Website]
[5.33]
Jer Fairall: Wasn’t Sergeant Smash the guy on The Simpsons who signed Bart and his friends on for a boy band and then used their music as a form of subliminal advertising for military recruitment? If only this Sergeant’s lame double entendres (“Blow my whistle / You can beat my drum/ Let you hold my gun”) were anywhere near that subtle or witty.
[3]
Michaelangelo Matos: Moody, singer-songwriter R&B with a late dusting of rave-pop synths and an odd mix of registers — it sounds serious but the lyrics are so silly you wonder how far Riley’s tongue is in his cheek.
[6]
Katherine St Asaph: The worst title/premise in recent remembering, and that’s counting “I Punched A Lion In The Throat.” I mean, he’s Sgt. SMASH! It’s like Staff Sgt. Max Fightmaster but WITH MORE MAN-SMASH, which is apparently not incompatible with MORE AUTOTUNE! But the single’s not bad at all. Riley and producers handle the extended metaphor fairly competently, military drums and reveille hook included. What’s noticeably lacking, sadly, is the chorus, lollygagging too long until the percussion finally comes in to wake things up. Any drill sergeant could tell you that’s worth an ass-kicking.
[7]
Martin Skidmore: His singing is okay, quite pretty when not autotuned, but the song lumbers along rather leadenly, and it’s a bit boring.
[4]
Mark Sinker: Very silly song with very promising unintegrated elements: the obvious strength is his voice, but the way he slides the various building blocks of the composition round that descending sequence is actually much more intriguing.
[6]
Josh Langhoff: Talay’s in the bedroom mixing up the metaphors, AND he’s on the pavement thinking ‘bout the government. Or maybe he’s not thinking at all — what could be a stronger condemnation of the military-industrial complex than its casual infiltration of loverman talk? Besides the fact that it blows people up, I mean. Sonically, I love those background ululations during the chorus at 2:45, but there’s no denying their allusion to violent conquest. For all I know, Riley’s fighting, ordering, and dehumanizing are total turn-ons; I’m not really his target ululator.
[6]