Critical Reception
"Give It 2 Me" received critical acclaim from music critics. Elysa Gardner from USA Today called the song "thumping" and "breathless", naming it one of the standout tracks of the album. Caryn Ganz of Rolling Stone described "Give It 2 Me" as a "thumpy self-empowerment anthem". About.com listed it as one of the top tracks on Hard Candy, and called it a "wonderful, fun Madonna song to dance to". Mark Beech from Bloomberg Television complimented the track's "insidious beats". Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine called it "a little careerism on the dance floor", for the line "Give me a record and I'll break it". However, she criticised the "Get stupid" interlude, calling it "plain stupid". Jon Pareles from The New York Times, and Alexis Petridis of The Guardian, compared the song with Rick James' "Super Freak" (1981). Mark Savage from BBC described the song as "one of the record's few out-and-out pop moments, featuring a cute, bouncy beat, and a sense of humour that has been missing from Madonna's music since her Dick Tracy days."
While reviewing Hard Candy, Chris Williams from Entertainment Weekly complemented the song, saying that with "tunes like 'Give It 2 Me' unabashedly reviving the celebrative spirit of early singles like 'Lucky Star' and 'Holiday' filtering it through hip-hop's sonic boom." He also called it the most exciting club banger. Joan Anderman of The Boston Globe said that the song "thumps relentlessly, euphorically, to the rhythm of a clanking virtual cowbell and freaky bass." Joey Guerra from the Houston Chronicle complimented the "furious house grooves and thundering beats" of the song. "Give It 2 Me" was compared by Miles Marshall Lewis of The Village Voice, to the earlier Madonna song "Material Girl", and the music of producer Nile Rodgers. Pete Paphides of The Times noted how different Madonna sounded in songs like "Give It 2 Me", "Dance 2Night" and "She's Not Me" from the Hard Candy album. The song received negative feedback from Thomas Hauner of PopMatters, who said that " West-African inspired percussion bridge — airdropped onto the album and randomly landing at this point — completely disrupts the song’s full potential."
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“Good critical writing is measured by the perception and evaluation of the subject; bad critical writing by the necessity of maintaining the professional standing of the critic.”
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