[Single Review] Pink – Blow Me (One Last Kiss)

Much like Katy Perry, behind Pink‘s pop superstar persona lies a scarily savvy business woman. After suffering a slight dip in popularity with her underrated Try This album, Pink hooked up with Max Martin and worked tirelessly at clawing her way back to the top of pop’s food chain. She powered through two huge album eras with I’m Not Dead and Funhouse, and then capped it off with a heavily-promoted  greatest hits package, before finally allowing herself to take an extended break from the spotlight to start a family.

Now Pink’s back with a new single “Blow Me (One Last Kiss)”, but just because she’s taken some time off and gone through some major life changes, doesn’t mean that she’s about to fuck with her winning chart formula.

This time around, Pink’s hooked up with hitmaker Greg Kurstin, who owned the female pop-rock genre this year thanks to his producing Kelly Clarkson’s mega-smash “Stronger (What Doesn’t Kill You)”.

“Blow Me (One Last Kiss)” contains all the elements of a usual Pink single –ballsy attitude, man bashing lyrics, radio-friendly production, and some obligatory swearing– but Kurstin’s attempted to bring Pink’s trademark sound into 2012 by adding a dance beat and some electronica that sounds like it was plucked straight off of a Two Door Cinema Club record.

On paper, there’s not a whole lot wrong with “Blow Me (One Last Kiss)”, except for one thing: It’s utterly boring. You can only listen to Pink do the exact same thing so many times until it becomes stale and pedestrian. Pink’s refusal to evolve turns “Blow Me” from what should be a hands in the air anthem into something completely safe and sterile, and it’s a damn shame. When the now 32-year-old first started her career, she was bolder and more experimental, genre-hopping from the R&B of Can’t Take Me Home to the introspective pop of Missundaztood and the rebellious Try This. But once Try This failed to sell a squillion copies, it’s as if Pink got got scared overnight and grabbed whatever formula she could find that worked, and then refused to budge from it ever since.

Compare Pink to Kelly Clarkson, who is probably the most similar artist to her sound-wise. Both are masters of the Top Forty pop-rock genre, but Kelly has managed to switch up her sound enough with each new album that every release feels fresh, yet still familiar. Pink has the ability to do the same, yet judging by “Blow Me”, it looks like she’s content to keep serving up the same thing as long as people will buy it.

Bored now.

Score: 2.5/5

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 5th, 2012 at 2:31 am and is filed under New Music, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

  • http://twitter.com/TheHomosocial The Homosocial

    Amen!

  • http://twitter.com/SuzySooyoung Suzy Sooyoung

    Honestly this is a mess. Im fucking dissapointed. That’s all!

  • KingBeaArthur

    I’m majorly torn: I’ve worshiped Pink since “Can’t Take Me Home”, “Missundaztood ” was the album that got me through my freshman year of high school, and I actually loved both “Funhouse” and “I’m Not Dead”, but…this song just does nothing for me.

    The chorus is so forced & lackluster [apparently saying she had a "shit day" is the way to hook the youths. I'm not buying it]. The overall feel of the song reeks of wasted potential. Pink can do & has done better.

  • http://twitter.com/AlbertFuentes Albert Fuentes

    I like it. Not her best, but yeah, I’m kinda into it. My favorite P!nk song will always be “Eventually” from M!ssundaztood album, this new one is just alright…

  • http://twitter.com/themusicprophet The Music Prophet

    The vocals on the chorus are utterly atrocious … I’m really not sure she’s got a hit here … Maybe for Kelly, or Katy Perry, but I agree with the proph, this isn’t nearly balsy enough for P!nk … And she doesn’t have the voice to really nail that chorus. This sounds like a b side Katy Perry turned away :/

  • TLo

    The best part of this song that slayed me is the first 13 seconds opening lol, the rest of it is plain the same with her old catalog.

  • http://twitter.com/curdey Michael Curd

    Such an awfully generic “Pink” song – could barely make it through the whole thing… :/

  • PG

    I love P!nk, but this sounds so generic. Still hoping the album would be great. :)

  • theprophetblog

    I agree about the vocals. I was going to mention it but didn’t wanna go off analyzing all those parts of the song when it wasn’t that relevant to my point.

    The thing is that Pink can SING, but for whatever reason those vocals on the hook are not the business (production maybe?)

  • http://www.facebook.com/lucaswoodstock Lucas Oliveira Dantas

    i loved p!nk exactly until try this; gorgeous album with real gems like that masterpiece of a collaboration “oh my god” with peaches.

    she lost me when she kept her strings of complaints on how the world should appreaciate her more by trashing the likes of paris hilton and lindsay lohan [grow the fuck up and take responsability for your actions woman!].

    she won me back for a while with self-deprecating but ultimately funny singles/MV like “so what” and “please don’t leave me” – but still it was the same sly p!nk telling the very same joke about herself and her views of the world. it felt like the ever teenager who refused to grow and still kept kicking and screaming for attention. it had mine for 3 or 5 minutes then it was gone.

    soooooo it’s no surprise that in spite of really really really wanting and trying to like her new music [because she's always so cool and badass] i still feel i can’t hear the same complaint again. bye.

  • justemry

    LOVE P!nk usually, but I am not here for her starting a Two Door Cinema Club (who I’ll always stan for) meets Kelly Clarkson mashup act. And singing that “Just blah can’t get worse” or whatever in the chorus is seriously one of the worst melodic decisions she has ever made.

  • http://twitter.com/joeysauer J▲EY

    My first thought too – she sounds screechy and is all yelling and it sounds god awful.

  • theprophetblog

    Try This is SO good. Easily my favorite Pink album. It’s underrated as HAIIIIL.

    I think she’s kind of trashed it before in interviews, saying she just rushed it to give the label something, but I think it was actually her taking a bit more control and trying different things, and coz it wasn’t a hit she acts like she hates the album. Brandy did the same with human.

  • Bleahim

    I’m guessing that as this single won’t perform as well as expected she’ll take some more time to finish her album… :) )

  • http://twitter.com/BrotherlyLover Brandon Baker

    I appreciate the bad review; this song is beyond generic. I think the other, more obvious problem, is that I don’t buy her singing this like I did “So What” – she’s happily married with a child.

  • http://twitter.com/WeAreThe_Filter We_Are_The_Filter

    Totally agree. Pink’s refusal to evolve as an artist is very frustrating! She is
    more than capable. Was really hoping for a motherhood-induced ‘Ray Of
    Light’-type reinvention. Ended up with ‘Raise Your Glass’ Part II, which was
    already ‘So What’ Part II, which was…..

  • http://www.facebook.com/lucaswoodstock Lucas Oliveira Dantas

    i agree!

    and honestly i dunno what pop artists mean or want us to think when they give such excuses. you are above all a POP artist under a MAJOR label, of couse that pressure should be something to have in mind when making music.

    “try this” is surely an uneven album with some scattered totally forgetable fillers. but so is every other p!nk album; i happen to think that “try this” is less painful and the overall balance is better than let’s say, “missunaztood” or “i’m not dead”. she’s just full of bullshit.

  • http://www.facebook.com/lucaswoodstock Lucas Oliveira Dantas

    yeah i feel you. and i’d say that nowadays i like more p!nk’s fun and sarcastic persona than actually her music.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1127181558 Andrés Felipe Rodríguez

    The only good thing about this is the verses, the rest is awful about vocals and all, I really love P!nk and even the last 3 eras look alike “Raise Your Glass”, “So What”, “U + Ur Hand”, “Fucking Perfect”, “Funhouse”, “Please Don’t Leave Me” and the rest of the songs that “sound the same” actually sound kind of different-familiar and have the “it thing” going on this one not so much, and I’m dissaspointed by that, well I will sit and wait for the second single (aka. Sober/Who Knew)

  • http://twitter.com/SuzySooyoung Suzy Sooyoung

    I agree 100% with the “Shit Day” for the youth part!

  • http://twitter.com/themusicprophet The Music Prophet

    Agreed. She’s phenomenal … This just ain’t it

  • Huxley

    This shit is not good.

  • http://twitter.com/cuntgettineaten guetto baby

    This is clearly safe, but as Avril Lavigne says; “my label makes me release the catchiest tunes so it can sell!,” so I guess I’ll wait till September to thoroughly judge this new era.

  • J2201987

    I’m not gonna lie. I don’t love it the way I thought I would. I mean, when it comes on radio I may or may not turn the radio station. It is truly….basic. I’m keeping hope alive though that the rest of the album doesn’t sound like this and this song is just the ploy that everyone is calling it out to be. And I’m keeping hope alive that she comes to Atlanta next year.

  • J2201987

    I’ve never heard try this. Generally what always drew me to listen to P!nk was her singles (much like any other artist), so when trouble and god is a dj came out I turned in my Stan card. I enjoyed stupid whores, and u & ur hand, but wasn’t even motivated to get back into her music until after She started touring for Funhouse and I heard bad influence.

    Hopefully P!nk did do some experimenting and not just completely go the same formulaic route (through the entire album) just to get album sales and do a gazillion shows in Australia again. I want to see her grow artistically as well.

  • http://www.facebook.com/thebLainekelley BLaine Kelley

    i actually Love what she did with the vocals on the chorus!! she takes it to a part of her range that she hasn’t really touched
    (at least not in material back to “I’m Not Dead”…don’t really know her stuff prior to that)
    i think it gives it a rad edge, hearing her hit the register 2.75 area with the mixed voice.
    i meLted.

  • animasaurus

    Missundaztood was such a good fucking album. So much more raw and real compared to what she’s doing now with this song :/

  • Yumm

    I actually love it, but it’s probably because I can relate heavily to the lyrics!

  • mybiasbeatsyourbias

    Pink is tin times better than avril. And that quote is said by every fucking artist. Eh Pink could do better but if feels like a lazy summer jam.

  • http://www.facebook.com/carlos.a.cano Carlos A. Cano

    I agree it’s a very p!nk song, but man that formula hasn’t worn off just yet for me…I listen to this on repeat. I just Love pinks attitude…

  • Nick96

    I don’t really like to get into the songs too much to judge it.
    Either I like or not.
    And I can say that this song, for me at least, is a good song that I would gladly hear every day for some period of time.
    It’s not a masterpiece like other songs by P!nk but it is still good for me.
    I’m definitely buying it.

  • http://www.facebook.com/justin.vallejo1 Justin BearLover Vallejo

    I luv the song……pink is able to go deep down emotionally wen she has to and i think thts wat made her a top artist. Blow me one last kiss is something much better than her earlier work; its an improvement frm funhouse and shows wat she myt be facing in terms of marriage. Personally, i gt tht she needs to be evn more ballsy and step out of the pop/rock zone. I wud luv to see her do another R&B album, maybe an R&B version of this song

  • Bubba

    Every time I hear the beginning I think it’s ‘What You Know’ from Two Door Cinema Club… Haha, glad I’m not the only one

  • http://twitter.com/MeAndMyHand Harry

    I think people should wait till 18th September. Then lead single doesn’t show what the whole album is like. She said herself this album has all kind of songs in it.

  • ashley

    DISS SONGG<3 love this shit.