Single Review: Pitbull – ‘We Are One (Ole Ola)’ (Feat. Jennifer Lopez and Claudia Leitte)
2 min read
That’s right, it’s almost time for that quadrennial event again (and if you don’t know what quadrennial means, neither did I, but I looked up the meaning for every four years on Google, and this apparently is the word). People the world over will join together and watch copious amounts of football; they will scream at the TV for their country, they will drink silly amounts of alcohol, dress up in their teams colours and embrace the nearest person to them with more love then they would their own mother when their team scores a goal – I’m of course talking about the world cup.
Music and football have been bound together since the sport began, with stadium crowds creating clever (and a lot of the time offensive) chants to egg on their team, or berate a player or the other side’s fans. So you’d think FIFA might have wanted to stay away from this type of thing when it came to looking for someone to represent the world cup through music. Instead they plumped for Pitbull, who has been renowned in the past for his controversial lyrics. The UK’s Radio 1 DJ Sara Cox recently stated his previous sexist songs make her ‘soul weep’, but the World Cup bigwigs have decided the singer is a good fit for the official song, and so Pitbull releases his new single We Are One (Ole Ola) with the backing of FIFA.
And there isn’t anything for FIFA or Sara Cox to worry about with this track, it’s fun, it’s happy and it sounds like the world having a jolly good time. Kicking in with the familiar sound of Samba drums, the track is particularly feel good and perfect as a showcase of what Brazil should offer the world by hosting the world cup. “It’s your world, my world, our world today and we invite the whole world to play” sings Pitbull being typically cheesy, but it wouldn’t be a proper world cup song without the cheese and inclusiveness of everyone. J-Lo and Brazilian born Claudia Leitte chip in with vocals now and again, but with nothing to substantial; this could have helped the song out if they were included a bit more – the track can seem lacking in character in areas, despite the heavy Brazilian feel.
It was never going to be a lyrical marvel, but it doesn’t need to be. It just needs to be catchy, Brazilian sounding, upbeat, and something the crowds can sing when at the greatest show on earth. This is exactly what it tries to do, and mostly succeeds, but could have been better with more input from its female featurettes.
