Tag: Bebe Rexha

Louis Tomlinson feat. Bebe Rexha, Digital Farm Animals – Back To You

“Doncaster.”

Tom: Let’s get the ridiculous things out of the way first. And I don’t just mean “Digital Farm Animals“; I mean this is filmed in Doncaster. Bebe Rexha filmed a music video in an alley somewhere in Doncaster. And Louis Tomlinson joined her, in a purple-and-yellow tracksuit.

Tim: Well he is signed to the football club, that’ll probably cut down on some of the costs.

Tom: On the plus side: brilliant, you’re representing Doncaster on the world stage! On the downside: mate, Doncaster?

Tim: Tom, I feel you underestimate Louis’s feelings for his hometown – don’t forget at one point he tried to buy the club.

Tom: This has one of the least promising intros and first verses in a while: oh, blimey, it’s going to be one of those terrible stripped-down tracks that just plod on. And then… then it starts doing something.

Tim: I’m guessing you mean when Bebe arrives?

Tom: “You drag me down, you fuck me up” is a really good lyric. And it’s about the first time that I heard that — as the piano really starts to build — that I thought “hang on, this could be good”.

Tim: It could be, and indeed it is, which is very nice indeed.

Tom: And then everything from the half-way point onwards — ie, not the verses — is just great. Yes, it’s all a bit quiet, yes, it’s a bit plodding at times, but that is just such a good chorus. For the first time in a while, not only is this a song I could sing after one listen, but it’s a song I wanted to hear again.

Tim: HUZZAH! I completely agree with you, it is a great chorus. Dips for the middle eight, but rises back up again in due course.

Tom: And it’s from Louis Tomlinson!

Tim: YAY!

Bebe Rexha feat. Nicki Minaj – No Broken Hearts

Tom: A name I haven’t seen before, but she’s got Nicki Minaj as a featured artist — and a decent songwriting career. Okay, I’m intrigued.

Tim: Ah, I see we’ve gone back to 2009.

Tom: Harsh, but not entirely unfair. That is an astonishingly good introduction, leading into an amazing hook. And note that they went straight into the hook — no first verse here. It’s a weird combination of upbeat lyrics and melody with downbeat tempo and percussion, and, for me at least, it really, really works.

Tim: Ehhhhh…I quite want to like this, because you’re right, that is a good hook. But the rest of it? It’s just terrible, mate. The verses are tedious, Nicki Minaj’s bit is, well, exactly what I expected, but most of all, that autotune – it sounds like something movie kidnappers use to disguise their voice, it’s been laid on so thick.

Tom: The verses: they’ll do well enough, and as for Nicki Minaj’s bit: well, that was never going to be a good match for either of our tastes, was it? But then we’re definitely not the target audience.

Tim: Understatement of the decade, there.

Tom: I can’t explain why I like this. It’s not even because of the near-nudity in the music video, I had it in a background tab. It’s just the hook: it’s that good.

Tim: As was yesterday’s chorus. But similarly, it’s nowhere near good enough to rescue the rest of it.