Composition
"Say Somethin'" is a mid-tempo song lasting three minutes and forty-four seconds, while drawing influence from R&B and hip-hop music genres. It incorporates its beat from several musical instruments, including the organ, bass drum and several electronic and computerized sound effects. According to the sheet music published at Musicnotes.com by EMI Music Publishing, the song is set in common time with a moderate tempo of 88 beats per minute. Written by Carey, Snoop Dogg, Chad Hugo, and Pharrell Williams, and produced by The Neptunes, the song is composed in the key of E minor, with Carey's vocal range spanning from the low-note of F♯3 to the high-note of B4. The song's chorus has a chord progression of Emaj7 to Amaj7, while altering to a B minor during the bridge. Dimitri Ehrlich from Vibe called the song "a musical oddity" and described its production as "strange instrumentation, weird melodic shifts, and hectic drum patters".
In his review for The Emancipation of Mimi (2005), Jozen Cummings from PopMatters described the song's production and instrumentation: "The track is vintage Neptunes with big drums and intergalactic sound effects, and Carey adds to the breezy, easygoing feel of the song with a voice that is sexy, but subtle, like a shy woman who doesn’t need to say anything at all to get a man’s attention." Lyrically, "Say Somethin'" recalls an encounter in which a male expresses interest in having a sexual affair in a bathroom with a female, while she agrees and responds "If its worth you're while / Say somethin' good to me". In an interview with Newsweek, Carey described how she felt regarding the song: "You're right. It is a totally different approach for me musically. When I heard it at first I thought it was a cool and interesting track, but I didn't know if it was very me." Additionally, Carey outed the lines "Something like volcanic / You and me seems organic / Just like stars and planets" as "nonesense", but claimed she "loved it".
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