Shakira Empire writeup for 2014 top 100

I have vague memories of hearing "Empire" from time to time when it was (barely) a hit. It was overshadowed by Shakira's colossal collab with Rihanna "Can't Remember to Forget You", a song that apparently released in January but only makes me think of the summer of that year. "Empire" was released roughly a month later, as the second single from Shakira's 2014 self-titled album. Yet, it never gave me 2014 vibes until I saw it mentioned in the comments of the announcement of this event? It's a rock ballad in a string of Shakira hits such as "She Wolf," "Loca" and "Rabiosa". I thought it was an older hit of Shakira's from the early to mid 00s, sometime between "Underneath Your Clothes" and "Beautiful Liar", and our TV channels/radio stations played it because she was just serving that much. While 2014 was not the height of the dance pop dominance on the radio, "Empire" still stood out to me at the time while other popstars were making hits like "Dark Horse," "Applause," "Where Have You Been" and so on. So I was always fond of the song as an outlier, and it helped that I thought the song was great in its own right.

Listening to "Empire" now, I can easily fit it into the 2014 zeitgeist as Shakira's take on stomp rock: it might not be in line with Katy or Gaga were doing, but instead it was of a kind with the hits bands like fun., Imagine Dragons, Bastille and OneRepublic were doing at the time. What starts off with a bunch of piano notes and Shakira's voice leads into the song's first chorus. "Like the empires of the world unite, we are alive. And the stars make love to the universe". A grand, poetic romance accompanied by one thump of the kick drum, which really gets going once the chorus loses its words: "and you touch me... and I'm like... and I'm like..." We don't get to hear what Shakira is like. Instead, a very autotuned shout of "AND I'M LIKE" takes us to the anthemic post-chorus and the realm of stomp rock trademarks, most notably, that loud ass kick drum and those WOOOs. You are now listening to 102.3 REAL ROCK FM. The second verse has Shakira pursue her soulmate and the instrumental adds some flourishes of acoustic guitar and strings. Pretty. But it is the second chorus where the song punches the hardest: the way Shakira sings the titular word this time around with all that emphasis (and also, that little inflection on the word "wildfire") just make for a killer hook.  If you weren't hooked by that part, her delivery of the bridge has you covered. It is also interesting how the song chooses to calm down not at its bridge (which it enters with full momentum swinging) but the final chorus. It makes for a song where you hear the same chorus three times but in very different ways. Arguably, the post-chorus is the actual chorus here. WOOO. WE ARE ALIVEEEEE.

I love this song, but it is not flawless. If anything, the era I just called stomp rock has many critics and "Empire" is similarly commercial (wooo) for a romantic love ballad. Critics who bothered to discuss the song at its release, however, reviewed it positively as a return to Shakira's earlier rockier work. The comparison is honestly a disservice to Shakira's late 90s albums. But it does showcase something about "Empire". You see, fun. are a bunch of indie dorks who disbanded after having 2.5 hits. Imagine Dragons play League of Legends. Bastille were too busy reengineering Eurodance classics to get a second hit. But Shakira? She was a fuckin' rockstar and "Empire" proves that she's still got it: despite the occasional autotune and the reverb on the vocals, she sings THE HELL out of this song. And it is glorious in a way few songs of this era match.