We have some thoughts on studio technique…
[Video]
[3.29]
Katherine St Asaph: Would be a solid Eurodance song, if the vocals weren’t recorded with a Fisher-Price toy.
[2]
Wayne Weizhen Zhang: Was this sonically engineered by the same people who did that Ashley O Black Mirror episode?
[3]
Will Adams: What is going on with the vocals here? Tiffany sounds like she’s suspended in Jell-O. Is it the mixing, blurring her vocals into the disco-pop production via Auto-Tune and EQ? Is it just her performance, made additionally strange considering how clear she sounded on “I Just Wanna Dance”? What could have been a simple, sleek Tame Impala-sampling number is saddled by its odd choices.
[5]
William John: The conceit seems to be that Tiffany Young is singing this while ascending toward the troposphere, in search of greater, celestial bodies, while us plebs listen to her back down on the ground. That, or the vocal production is just really poor. Either way, she sounds as if she’s some distance from the rest of us, and that vacancy renders her personal magnetism hard to discern, despite her clever dispersing of house piano here and there.
[5]
Kayla Beardslee: Some spark is missing here, preventing the song from exploding the way it deserves to. The production in the verses is lackluster, and even the bouncy piano in the chorus can’t quite make up for it. Young’s vocals are believably desperate as she draws out “Magnetic moon/Pulls me to you/With your ocean arms,” but she seems to suddenly forget her emotions on the “pulling me to you” hook, where her voice falls away into nothingness instead of bringing the listener closer.
[5]
Joshua Minsoo Kim: Tiffany Young’s solo songs are unimaginative, devoid of personality, and a reminder that K-pop is great for reasons beyond the singers. The lyrics aim for inspirational and enigmatic evocation, but the beat limps forward with zero verve. SM’s singles would never be this terribly mixed in 2019, nor would their vocal performances contain such marble-mouthed enunciating.
[0]
Alfred Soto: It takes guilelessness or cunning to slather airhorn falsetto over a putative dance track in which a slurry of clichés competes and wins. Or indifference.
[3]