"Drunk in Love" is a song by American singer Beyoncé featuring American rapper Jay-Z. The duo wrote the song with the help of its producers Detail, Andre Eric Proctor, Rasool Diaz, Brian Soko, Timbaland, J-Roc and Boots. The song was released as a single from Beyoncé's fifth studio album, Beyoncé, on December 16, 2013. The song features prominent influences of trap music. Its lyrics, which depict female sexuality, are performed in a confident, salacious manner.
Many music critics called the song a follow up to Beyoncé's and Jay-Z's song "Crazy in Love" (2003). "Drunk in Love" peaked at number two on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart, spending eight weeks in the top ten. It peaked atop the airplay chart of South Africa and reached the top ten in France, Ireland, Lebanon, New Zealand, Portugal and the United Kingdom. At the 57th Annual Grammy Awards, "Drunk in Love" won Best R&B Song and Best R&B Performance.
The song's music video was directed by Hype Williams and shot in black-and-white in Golden Beach, Florida at a beach front manse. The visual features scenes of the pair singing the song together. "Drunk in Love" was performed by Beyoncé and Jay-Z at the 56th Grammy Awards. It was later added to the set lists of the second European leg of Beyoncé's The Mrs. Carter Show World Tour in 2013 and the pair's joint On the Run Tour in 2014. Numerous remixes and cover versions of the song were made, including an official remix with American rapper and collaborator of both artists, Kanye West. The music video won the Best Collaboration and was nominated for the Video of the Year at the 2014 MTV Video Music Awards.
Conception and release
"Drunk in Love" was written by Beyoncé, Detail and Jay-Z at the end of 2012. Jay-Z also appears as the featured artist on the track. Production of the song was handled by Boots and Beyoncé as well as Detail. "Drunk in Love" was recorded at Jungle City Studios and at Oven Studios in New York City. Detail approached Beyoncé with a beat he had created called "Drunk" inspired by different situations from being affected by alcohol. Beyoncé further helped in the production of the song, adding elements that Detail had missed. She and Jay-Z later free-styled their verses for the song and Timbaland contributed keyboards. J-Roc, Dre Moon, Brian Soko and Rasool Ricardo Diaz contributed to the production of the song. Elaborating on the conception of the song, Beyoncé said: "We just kinda had a party. It was so great because it wasn't about any ego... we weren't trying to make a hit record, we were just having fun, and I think you can hear that in the record."
In 2014, rapper Future claimed that he had previously recorded a demo version of the song. He worked together with Detail who persuaded him to record vocals for the track as it would convince Beyoncé more easily to record it. Several days later, Detail informed Future that Beyoncé was in the studio recording "Drunk in Love". However, when the rapper was working on his second studio album Honest, he used the same melody of the demo version on a song called "Good Morning" as Beyoncé still hadn't released her version seven months after he was told that she worked on it. When Beyoncé released her album, the track was scrapped from the track listing of Honest.
"Drunk in Love" was subsequently included on Beyoncé's self-titled fifth studio album Beyoncé (2013) which was released on iTunes Store with no promotion having taken place beforehand. Following the album's release, Billboard reported that "Drunk in Love" would be sent to urban contemporary radio in the US exclusively. "XO" impacted CHR, hot adult contemporary and rhythmic contemporary radio in the US on December 16, 2013, as the first single from the album. "Drunk in Love" impacted urban contemporary radio stations on December 17, 2013, serving as one of the two lead singles from Beyoncé. On March 24, 2014, "Drunk in Love" was added to British radio station BBC Radio 1's C-List. A digital single, with "XO" as a double A-side, was released to streaming services such as Spotify, where the full Beyoncé album was not yet available to stream.
Composition
Musically, the song consists of bass, skittering drums, vague synthesizers, scintillating strings, finger snaps and a substantial amount of trap beats. Elements of hip hop music are also present in "Drunk in Love". Written in the key of A major, the track contains a moderately slow tempo of 70 beats per minute, while also following a chord progression of Fm—Bm—E—A. Beyoncé and Jay-Z's vocals range from D3 to E5. Many contemporary critics viewed "Drunk in Love" as a sequel or an extension to Beyoncé's own 2003 collaboration with Jay-Z, "Crazy in Love". Jody Rosen from Vulture found trademark Timbaland synths in the song and further went on to describe its production as "skittering, blaring".
Keeping in with the most prominent theme of Beyoncé, "Drunk in Love" explores female sexuality. Its lyrics express "unbridled lust" and love-making with a wholly committed lover. As she sings about how much she likes sex with her partner, Beyoncé uses several double entendres, including the line, "grainin' on that wood", where she is supposedly referencing a surfboard. The singer displays much attitude through her vocal inflections that were described as "sassy" by critics. Her vocal performance in the song was described as conversational, half-sung half-rapped, "talk-over-the-beat" styled further conveying spontaneity and truth-telling. Her singing is further ornamented by Arabic-scale vocal arpeggios. Beyoncé's vocal performance in the song has been noted for containing a flow similar to rappers Drake and 2 Chainz. The Verges Trent Wolbe felt that the song featured Animal Collective-esque vocal filtering.
On the bridge, Beyoncé sings about having drunken sex in the kitchen: "We woke up in the kitchen saying / How the hell did this shit happen / Oh baby, drunk in love, we be all night / Last thing I remember is our beautiful bodies grinding off in that club". The second verse of the song is half-rapped by her. Jay-Z later appears to provide his rapped verse as he relates having aggressive sex to Mike Tyson who was convicted of rape in 1992. Tyson also bit off a piece of Evander Holyfield's ear during a boxing match in 1997 which Jay-Z references: "Catch a charge I might / beat the box up like Mike / In '97 I bite." He then compares his relationship with Beyoncé to that of Ike Turner and Tina Turner. He forgoes subtlety as he raps, "Foreplay in a foyer, fucked up my Warhol/ Slid the panties right to the side/ Ain't got the time to take drawers off on sight... your breasteses is my breakfast". Similarly to Beyoncé, Jay-Z sings about the places they have had sex in their house. During his lines, he raps about "reppin' that Third", a reference to the Third Ward area located in Houston.
In 2014, Hungarian Romani folk singer Mitsou alleged Beyoncé, Jay Z and Timbaland had used samples of her singing "Bajba, bajba pelem" without compensating her. Mitsou was seeking unspecified damages and an end to distribution of the song. The lawsuit was dismissed in 2015, in a ruling that said that the song was a "constitutionally protected work of art" and the New York Civil Rights Law did not apply to it.
Critical reception The song garnered universal acclaim. Mikael Wood of the Los Angeles Times wrote that Beyoncé "trades terrifically raunchy come-ons with Jay Z [on 'Drunk in Love']; it's like an NC-17 sequel to their 2003 smash 'Crazy in Love'". Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone chose the "sex song" as the album's best one, commenting that it is a "superb duet". Jon Dolan from the same publication also chose it as the album's best further comparing it with "Crazy in Love" with "100 percent more drunkenness". Andrew Hampp of Billboard called the track a "potential smash" as he praised its appeal to R&B radio stations and its "infectious, wailing of 'loooove' on the chorus". He also commended Beyoncé's and Jay-Z's rapped verses. Andrew Barker from Variety wrote in his review of Beyoncé, "a radio-ready pop single [is] buried somewhere within the Jay Z feature 'Drunk In Love,' yet Beyonce and Boots embellish it with enough strange grace notes and recitatives to create a much stranger monster than one might expect". Joey Guerra from the Houston Chronicle stated that Beyoncé was in "a fluid swagger" in "Drunk in Love".
Jody Rosen writing for Vulture described the song as an "appealing" record and one of the best collaborations between the duo throughout their careers. He concluded that "Jay's rap is goofy but not embarrassing." Nick Catucci of Entertainment Weekly termed Beyoncé's rap as "truculent" and noted that "Drunk in Love" is one of the few songs of the album that displays scale-busting. Kitty Empire of The Observer wrote that "Drunk in Love" finds Beyoncé "rapping lasciviously and making eyes at her husband. It's about 100 times better than that description allows for." Julia Leconte from Now praised the singer's "perfect" growling vocals. Chris Kelly of FACT magazine dubbed the song as the "requisite duet with Jay Z (whose Ike Turner-referencing verse caps off a year of cringeworthy efforts)". Pitchfork Media's Carrie Battan felt that the lines in which Beyoncé ad-libbed "surfboard" were "some of the most infectious snippets of pop music in 2013", elaborating "the single word serving as both shorthand for woman-on-top and a neat summation of an entire era of trends in rap cadence". Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune described the track as a "frisky reverie". Likewise, Evan Rytlewski of The A.V. Club wrote:
The D'Angelo-indebted grind session 'Rocket' and frisky 'Drunk In Love' are similarly sexy, but they're not sexy like a glamour shot or a steamy video. They're sexy like an overeager, pre-shower quickie, or a hushed morning make-out session before the baby wakes up. These are the most unapologetically raunchy songs she's ever sung, and in many ways also the most romantic.
Philip Matusavage of musicOMH noted that though "Drunk in Love" does not have a chorus, it absolutely manages to be "thrilling", further writing that it is "packed with ideas and touches" which listeners would understand after repeated listens. Anupa Mistry of Spin considered the song to be one of Beyoncés "elbows-up boom-trap anthems... ready to soundtrack both dive-bar antics and bottle-service quasi-sophistication." Philip Cosores of Paste highlighted that the track was highly evocative but found its lyrics to be "half-baked at best". Ryan Dennehy of AbsolutePunk wrote that "unconditional love has to be reciprocated to explain Jay Z's odious verse on 'Drunk in Love'". Stereogums Tom Breihan criticized Jay-Z's "pretty bad" verse in the song. Philadelphia Media Network writer Dan DeLuca panned "Drunk in Love" as Beyoncés biggest "misstep" due to Jay-Z's contribution.
Although being praised by media outlets, "Drunk in Love" sparked controversy for its lyrics referencing domestic violence. On the song, Jay-Z rapped the lyrics "I'm Ike, Turner, turn up / Baby no I don't play / Now eat the cake, Anna Mae / I said eat the cake, Anna Mae" which alludes to Tina Turner's abusive relationship with her former husband, Ike Turner. The lyric specifically refers to a scene from Tina Turner's biopic What's Love Got to Do with It (1993) in which Ike forced Tina to eat cake by pushing a piece of cake in her face. That particular scene was fabricated, but the film is loosely based on Tina Turner's real-life experience with a volatile husband. Rolling Stones Rob Sheffield described the reference as "tasteless" in his review of the song and The Guardian writer Tshepo Mokoena called the song's lyrics "disturbing" and "distasteful". British radio station Bang Radio aired an edited version of the song excluding the lyrics.
Recognition and awards