When Marvin Gaye found out his girl was ditching him on his version of "Heard It Through the Grapevine", all he could do was pine after her. The same goes for Motown heroes the Temptations on songs like "(I Know) I'm Losing You" or even the Supremes on "Stop! In the Name of Love". But even though they were wallowing, an indignant stubbornness came across; away from the microphone, they might chew an ex out more bluntly. A few decades on, Cee-Lo does just that, exploding with an instrumental steeped in 1960s pop while taking supreme joy in flipping some golddigger the bird.
Even in our cuss-addled times, calling a song "Fuck You" will get an automatic novelty spin. But while Cee-Lo modernizes the language, he's sure to make the song craft as timeless, efficient, and repeatable as any number of golden oldies. Like "Hey Ya" before it, "Fuck You" gets by on a generation-spanning simplicity, and, coming from Cee-Lo's mouth, the title phrase actually isn't illicit at all. It's beyond happy. Cathartic. It could be the new "Sesame Street" theme. It could play at a wedding, and your grandmother would hobble to it. It's post-censorship. The radio version replaces "fuck" with "forget," and it may as well not exist.
[from the forthcoming full-length The Ladykiller; also from the "Fuck You" single, available 10/04/10 via Elektra]
— Ryan Dombal, August 23, 2010
via pitchfork.com