Chris Ingalls: Lorde co-wrote this song for fellow New Zealanders Broods (siblings Georgia and Caleb Nott), and it’s a pleasant enough dance track, with a nice electronic beat pulsing throughout. Lorde’s involvement will certainly help — the song is a bit generic and unspectacular without her name recognition, sadly. [6/10]
Pryor Stroud: Broods’ Georgia and Caleb Nott may not be the most distinctive dance-rock architects in the contemporary arena, but they know how to engineer an unimpeachable synthpop anthem. They proved this with “Bridges” from 2014’s Evergreen and “Free” from this year’s Conscious; with “Heartlines”, they continue to showcase this deft sense of sonic craftsmanship. Co-written by fellow New Zealander Lorde, it’s an explosive, multilayered, cinematically-scaled statement of devotion gridded around a tidal pool of synthesizers and a sky-scraping chorus. Unsurprisingly, Georgia’s voice — a weapon of pure emotional power and kinetic force — seems to stretch across the entirety of the track’s space, sealing up every crack and filling up every corner. [7/10]
John Bergstrom: Don’t let the fact they’re from New Zealand distract you from the realization there’s a very fine line indeed between this and, say, “Brave”. [5/10]
Chad Miller: While this might not be the most original pop song ever, it’s still a really good listen. The beat and the production are fantastic and give the song the perfect amount of heft, especially in the chorus. I didn’t particularly like the part that leads up to the chorus, but the power of the chorus more than makes up for it in my eyes. [7/10]
SCORE: 6.25