Bruno Mars – ‘Just The Way You Are’
Sorry, I can’t seem to get my thoughts in order today. I should really have written this a while ago, but instead I find…I…er… Hmm? Oh right, right…
See, I’m trying as hard as I can, but something keeps pulling at the edges of my ability to focus…on…whaaaat…I’mmmm….sorry, what? Oh yes! I was just saying. Try as I might, I can’t seem to get it together to concentrate on the job of making words and sentences out of what happens when this song is playing because…because…it’s…just…
Does anyone else find Bruno Mars to be an unsettlingly handsome man? I don’t necessarily mean that he’s hot, that’s kind of a matter of personal taste, far more than whether someone counts as handsome or not, but c’mon, look at that picture! He’s just…so…so…
Bear with me, I’m just gonna tape something over that bit of my monitor.
(Here’s the video. “Oi! I was listening to that!”)
Right, now that’s done, I can crack on. *rubs hands together*
The thing with this song is it’s a massive cheeseball of a thing. It’s clearly been written by a man who wants to say all the right things to a girl, but is slightly hampered by a restricted view of what really makes love work. It’s fine to be bowled over by someone’s eyes or the way their hair sits on their head. It’s very understanding and empathic to realise that people often can’t take compliments, and it’s always, always nice to go on ahead and shower the compliments down like rain, regardless of that fact.
But this is a string of lines which someone believes Will Definitely Work On Women. And it’s been welded to a tune which is light, yearning and warm, a great big sad puppydog of a melody. OK, the song’s production is pushing it towards anthem status, to try and make as much of a heart-stopping climactic romance out of the lyric as possible.
Speaking of which, it’s also nice that Bruno sings it rather well. I can’t go into specifics without firing up the video again, and that’s just going to cause further delays, but let’s just say if you could plot a chart where the higher you forced your voice to go was an equivalent to how romantic you are, he’d right up there with Justin Bieber and Taio Cruz in the upper margin of the graph paper.
So what’s the problem? Oh, there isn’t one really. It’s just all a bit too good to be true, especially when you’ve somehow managed to tear your eyes away from that face. That’s assuming you CAN tear your eyes away, of course.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some gazing-in-awe to get back to.
Download: Out now
www.brunomars.com
BBC Music page
(Fraser McAlpine)
Soul Culture says: “Not many can make an already great song sound even better, but Lupe Fiasco complements the song perfectly.”
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