Singalingalingalingaling…

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[4.50]

Michaelangelo Matos: I used to think the jelly-bracelet hits of my late-’80s adolescence surely represented the lamest pop-music epoch I’d ever live through. The second I heard (I think) Cory Monteith sing, “I’m not thinking about you haters/Cause hey, I can be a superstar/I’ll see you when you wash my car,” I knew I was wrong.
[1]

Martin Skidmore: I’m a big fan of the show, but I don’t care hugely for any of the performances. This one is a rare original song, produced with bright poppiness by Max Martin. It’s sung by Lea (Rachel) Michele, with her usual confidence, and it comes over as enjoyable enough, but I still can’t work up any interest in the music out of the TV show’s context.
[5]

Jonathan Bogart: I wanted to hate this. Not that I’ve ever watched the show, or have any interest in ever doing so; I long ago joined the casually anti-Glee bandwagon. (Sometimes I’m happy to go with the conventional wisdom that says something very popular sucks.) But then I heard it and… well, Max Martin. I’m told the lead singers are Lea Michele and Cory Monteith, but those are just verses, and who cares about verses? The chorus is what digs its hooks into you, a digitally-spun candy gloss of massed voices, electronics and giddy leaps up the scale. Even the eyeroll-worthy lyrics — you’ll never guess what position these kids take on haters! — are translated from standard self-justifying narcissism to an anthem of underdog empowerment by the sheer sugar-crack dynamism of the melody and production. I hate being wrong… but I like liking stuff even more.
[8]

Chuck Eddy: Though the male Gleek’s revenge-of-nerd-on-bully verse is timely, and the female Gleek’s singing is better than competent, what makes the record is the riff out of “Mmmbop,” the lilt out of “Steal My Sunshine,” and the rap part out of the Bring It On soundtrack. A turn of the ’00s teen-pop revival? Hey, I’m game.
[7]

Jer Fairall: You mean to tell me there weren’t at least a dozen nearly identical songs in the current Disney pop canon that they couldn’t have lifted rather than go to the trouble of paying an army of songwriters to come up with this?
[3]

Al Shipley: Every Glee version of a pre-existing hit that I’ve heard flattens it only slightly less than Kidz Bop, so it’s not surprising that their first attempt at a Real Original Pop Song with Max Martin and everything is this awkward. Forget the headlines about them planning to tackle Rebecca Black’s “Friday” on an upcoming episode: how much better is this really than the average Ark Music Factory production?
[3]

Doug Robertson: It’s a little bit Pink, a little bit Kelly Clarkson and a whole lot of autotuning, but you know what? It works. It’s fun, catchy and knows exactly what its audience is looking for. It might not be overflowing with originality, but there’s still plenty of sparkle sloshing over the sides.
[7]

Zach Lyon: Before I learned this was from the cast of Glee, I actually thought it was being sung by a cartoon unicorn. I think I might prefer that? It’s a tad catchy, but not enough to make up for the vomity feeling I get every time she goes “all right” in that voice that only seems to exist in exercises like these. I do not understand this show.
[2]