"Cherry Pop" is a song recorded by Romanian singer
Roton as the record's second single. The track was written by the singer, Lukas Hällgren and Erik Lidbom, while production was handled by the latter two. "Cherry Pop" was recorded at the Fonogram Studios in Bucharest
, Romania, with additional engineering being done at Lidbom's Hitfire Production.
"Cherry Pop" was written by Stan herself, Lukas Hällgren and Erik Lidbom, while production was handled by both Hällgren and Lidbom.[2] It was recorded at the Fonogram Studios in Bucharest, Romania and was additionally mixed and engineered at Lidbom's Hitfire Production in Uppsala, Sweden.[2] Further's work on the track was done during FonoCamp2013, the first Romanian international songwriting camp held in Azuga.[3][4] Fellow Romanian and international singers were also present at the two-weeks event, such as Delia Matache, Mohombi, Smiley and Deepcentral.[3]
Stan described "Cherry Pop" as a
The Singles Jukebox, described the song as a "popluxe", while Ian Mew compared it to "Bubble Pop!" by South Korean singer Hyuna.[8] According to Popdust, "Cherry Pop" uses dubstep for its breakdown.[1] The main idea for the song was based on Stan's first kiss which, according to her, "tasted like candy".[6]
Critical reception
"I am also very surprised [about the fact that "Cherry Pop" debuted atop the Japanese iTunes Singles Chart]. I didn't think that the song would enter so speedy to the iTunes Charts in Japan. My Japanese fans were waiting for me and I think they missed me. I missed them, too, of course. That's the life. When you choose to see the things as positive and to go on, there's nothing bad that can happen to you".
"Cherry Pop" received generally mixed reviews from music critics upon release. The Singles Jukebox gave the song an overall rating of 5/10,[8] with one of the writers, Andy Hutchins, confessed that "a better title for the song might have been 'Dr Pepper'".[8] Website Popdust described the song as "outdated", but at the same time catchy and funny.[1] Hitfire praised the song's refrain as being "earwhormy" and "trashy".[10] They went on saying that "Cherry Pop" "doesn't reach the standards like of her previously launched songs, 'Mr. Saxobeat', 'Get Back (ASAP)' and 'Lemonade'".[10] Music website Pop Shock described the single as a "grower track".[11] Website Addictivoz praised overall her album Unlocked, mentioning also that the song is "ironic".[12] Another article called the song ″rather obvious″ but ″perfect for the summer″.[13] In a 2019 retrospective for Unlocked, writer Jan Bran from R&BJUNK praised Stan's ability to navigate a variety of subgenres, citing ″Cherry Pop″ as an example.[14]
Commercial performance
According to the biggest Japanese profile site,
Number One Top 20 compiled on 6 September 2014.[19]
Music video
An accompanying music video for "Cherry Pop" was uploaded onto Stan's YouTube channel on 28 May 2014, where it has since amassed a total of 5 million views.[20] The clip was shot by Khaled Mokhtar in Buftea, Romania in a set built specially for this project.[4][21] The accompanying choreography was choreographed by Romanian performer Emil Rengle and the eight "shiny and glam" different outfits used for the video were designed by Andra Moga.[2][6][22] Particularly, Stan described the video as incorporating "both a futuristic and a retro point of view".[6][22]
The video opens with Stan and some of her male back-up dancers being presented in a dark white room. Subsequently, the room becomes enlightened and Stan is seen wearing transparent sunglasses, a white sweatband and a silver jacket. Following this, she retrieves a
wigs on, and dressing white clothing and red accessories. Following this, Stan is presented standing on a yellow plate which is kept in the air by two threads. She wears a silver leotard and a multicolored wig. Next, Stan is shown walking into a tennis field, whereon she plays a tennis match against herself. For the breakdown of "Cherry Pop", the video gets introduced into a dark-lighted room. There, her previously shown male background dancers are presented; the video continues with Stan dancing accompanied by her dancers. The clip finally ends with a pink tennis ball dropping out of the ceiling, while the screen becomes black.[20]
Live performances
On 12 December 2014, Stan performed both "Cherry Pop" and "Vanilla Chocolat" on an episode of Vocea României.[23] Shortly after her performance, juror Tudor Chirilă expressed how he was very disappointed by Stan's act, as she did not provide live vocals.[24] In an interview with Cancan, Stan confessed that "[her] conditions of appearance at Vocea României were previously discussed with the producers of the show, so no one should have been surprised about [her] performing playback".[24] "Cherry Pop" was included on the track list of her Unlocked Tour (2014) and her Cherry Pop Summer Tour (2014).[25][26]
