I hear that you and your band have sold your turntables and bought trumpets…
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[4.00]
Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: First of all, let us acknowledge that Timmy Trumpet (Timothy if you’re nasty) is an excellent name, a moniker deserving of a playground king. Fittingly, “Freaks” sounds bright and jumpy, a hopscotch beat with all sorts of wriggly SFX to hold the attention. Then there’s the solo trumpet parping out into the night, a marching band reject trying his hardest to turn against the tide of popularity. It’s a cute moment of wink-wink preteen rebellion, far more effective than Savage’s voice, a Bone Crusher-esque rasp without the purpose to husk and growl. The vocal giants Savage replicates all wanted to tear the club up — he doesn’t even know what to rip. He’s talking about “Freaks,” but he’s speaking from a teenage daydream, unconvincing in his repetition. One side enthusiastic, the other underdeveloped — the song jabs silly youth against pubescent youth. It gets old pretty fast.
[4]
Cédric Le Merrer: I remember being an awkward angry 13 year old at parties, and the girls dancing together to the sound of pure vintage bosh and us boys chasing them out by playing Scooter and moshing. Stomping your feet on the ground, jumping into your friends and pumping your fist are the only acceptable forms of dancing in certain insecure circles. This is a beat for the lulz, born to soundtrack gamergate conspiracy videos. It’s awkward and a bit icky, and doesn’t seem self aware at all. Which makes it perfect, in a way.
[5]
Jonathan Bradley: A belligerent synth ditty whose varying resemblance to a horn stands in for compositional progression. It’s as austere as a warehouse and also as spacious as a warehouse, and so ideal for dancing. Savage’s genial growl is big and empty too, but, on a track that spends a lot of time in the right side of dumb, he uses it in service of a hook that falls severely on the wrong side. “Ah the mighty trumpet,” he toasts in grasping gentlemanly aspiration. A real fedora tip of a chorus.
[4]
Micha Cavaseno: More like geeks.
[2]
Josh Winters: *hops into cold shower*
[2]
Jonathan Bogart: If I could be convinced that obnoxious bro-bass music was all going to feature parping horn sections thanks to the influence of this, I’d give it a [10].
[6]
Brad Shoup: That sounds like a fucking tuba! And it’s not particularly berserk. Add Savage nearly passing out on the “ahhhhh” part and this is a lock for a comedy-EDM compilation as yet compiled.
[5]
Kat Stevens: I can see this being used as the backing for a Children In Need segment where the contestants of Great British Bake-Off do a dance routine in Halloween costumes (Mary Berry = werewolf, Norman = Herman Munster, etc). There’s a decent beat lurking underneath all that huffing and puffing, but the hook is not nearly silly enough for me.
[4]
Thomas Inskeep: This makes me long for the subtlety of Vengaboys.
[1]
David Sheffieck: I never would’ve guessed that other countries had their own versions of Flo Rida, so it’s reassuring to discover that Savage has Oceania locked down. This is utterly mindless, but undeniably, infectiously so.
[7]
Katherine St Asaph: This is the dumbest thing I have ever heard, I want to punch the dudevoice in the dudevoicebox as the freaks flee the floor in disdain, and I’m pretty sure I used some of these presets on the soundtrack to my senior English project. And yet I don’t hate it. What’s the saying? It’s only freaky if you throw in the chicken squawks?
[5]
Anthony Easton: I never quite know what this is quoting. The circus calliope is directly quoted, but it is processed to hell; the lyrics and the spirit of the music has a solid Sammy Davis Jr. in a “Rhythm of Life” vibe, but the narrative is cleaner and more precise in Davis. It doesn’t grind enough to be some kind of “Freak on a Leash” ’90s nu-rock, and it’s too sincere for an offcut from Moulin Rouge. I kind of love it.
[6]
Alfred Soto: No one thought of recasting this as a death metal song?
[1]
Patrick St. Michel: Like 70 percent of EDM-branded songs in existence today, “Freaks” only makes sense in a live — festival, for best results — setting. That’s fine, and I can imagine being a few sponsored-energy-drinks-and-mid-shelf-liquor drinks down, surrounded by my friends on a nice sunny day (and, uh, maybe four years younger) losing it to that trumpet. But I’m sitting at home in my pajamas, and this is far less dazzling.
[4]