Emmanuel Elone: “Get My Bang” has a much better ending than beginning. The wave of distorted guitar don’t match the high-pitched, falsetto vocals, and there isn’t much in the first minute of the song to take your mind off of the contrasting sounds. However, by the time Wild Beasts get into the heart of the track, specifically the chorus, second verse and bridge, “Get My Bang” suddenly feels more comprehensive, with a heavy drum-bass pairing that accentuates the chorus vocals and a short guitar solo that closes out the song with a bit of punch that was missing most of the time. Still, even these add-ons towards the end of the song are not enough to make it compelling or memorable; in the end, it’s too little, too late. [5/10]
Juan Edgardo Rodríguez: It was only a matter of time until Wild Beasts would fully embrace a more electronic sound. And though this is not necessarily a bad thing, I feel as if it’s continued to suppress their biggest asset: Hayden Thorpe’s vocals. Thorpe would instantly grab my attention with his lilting croon, and now he just sounds like your everyday singer in a synth-pop band who’s fighting for his place in the lower rung of the alternative charts. Zane Lowe is gong to love this one. [4/10]
Chris Ingalls: Britain’s Wild Beasts are back with a pulsing, sexy dance track that sounds sort of like Afghan Whigs with more keyboards. A slick, airtight beat holds everything together while the keys add interesting sonic layers. The whole song oozes a sort of leering sleaze (the Whigs comparison applies again), making for a solid, if brief, dance number. [7/10]
John Garratt: When Mick Jagger and David Bowie covered the song “Dancing in the Street”, they made a terrible video to go with the song. Fortunately for us the ’80s were a relatively irony-free decade. Nowadays, we can’t tell when the seriousness stops and the fun begins, like in this video for “Get My Bang”. The spontaneous dancing looks idiotic, the song goes absolutely nowhere, and the title makes me watch to smack somebody. “Get My Bang”? Someone get my pills. [2/10]
Steve Horowitz: What’s hear is on the surface, and there is not much going on. That may be the point, but with a band name like Wild Beasts and a song title like “Get My Bang” one expects more. The video doesn’t add much to the story and the tune really doesn’t bear repeated listening on its own. [4/10]
Chad Miller: Song has decent energy. I was interested by the crow-like sample that starts the song off, but I feel like the song never really knows how to work around it. The lyrics are kind of boring as well. The static infused base line is pretty cool though, and the vocalist gets into the song which is nice. [5/10]
Wild Beasts‘ new album Boy King releases August 5th via Domino Records.
SCORE: 4.50