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It isn’t very often that synthesizers can produce the kind of warmth we find them offering in the new single “I Hope It Hurts” from Johnnie Mikel, but when they do, it’s something worth writing home about. Rather than serving as the bedrock of the song’s main harmony exclusively, the synths play multiple roles in this single – chief among them being that of the bridge between linguistic and sonic poeticisms. Mikel isn’t a one-dimensional performer in any capacity, and to get to the level of emotionality they want us to appreciate in “I Hope It Hurts,” limits of all sorts have to be pushed (starting with those of the instrumentation most artists would consider the stock componentry of any given performance).
The lead vocal is more relaxed in this song than the lyrics it’s dishing out are, and the conflict becomes a flashpoint for excitement as we push forward in the track. Although there’s nothing wrong with melding two similarly soft elements together to make something poppy and radio-ready, there’s just as much to be said about the provocative manner in which Johnnie Mikel is gaining a lot of time in the headlines lately, and “I Hope It Hurts” verifies as much. Mathy but still possessing the even flow all of us want out of an up-tempo pop tune, this is the kind of single that you don’t have to think twice about falling in love with, yet the story it has to tell is a lot more complicated than one would initially suspect.
The contrast between the way the front end of this mix was stylized versus the back is striking and important to ensure the degree of sonic punch Johnnie Mikel wanted on the other side of the chorus, and even though some critics will say it’s one dabble in excess too many, I couldn’t disagree more. While the other songs he has recorded before are more black and white tonally, this has a lot of brawn that is going towards emphasizing the theme of the lyrics. Everything is contributing something to the mood of the music and, more importantly, the context of the verses as they’re being delivered to us, which has not been true for the vast majority of new singles to debut in the past month.
I’ve been falling in love with virtually all the music Johnnie Mikel has given us in recent years, and after listening to the work he’s been doing in 2022 I feel like we’re witnessing a much-wanted extension of artistic ideals only highlighted in previous efforts. “I Hope It Hurts” is all-in on its conceptualism, and even if it willfully steps away from the predictable in the name of getting pop to somewhere new, exciting and different, I think it’s a worthy tradeoff for what we end up with in this single. I’m going to keep up with Mikel, and though the competition for this act is getting just as difficult to ignore in 2022, there hasn’t been anything to rocket through the underground with the kind of spirit songs like this one have in spades.
Jennifer Munoz
