Hot (Inna song)

Background

The production and writing process was handled by Romanian dance music trio Play & Win. Before meeting Inna, they also had notable success in their home country and ranked high on the Romanian Top 100 with their own productions. Inna recorded the song in 2008 at the Play & Win Studios located in Constanta, Romania, while the song was published through her Romanian record label Roton. Evoking that the song's title "Hot" is an adjective for one's relationship, to the extent that when your lover is far away, you are still in love with him/her. The track features male vocals in some of the ad-libs as well as in the intro lyric "Go!". Inna's ad-libs fall in after the first chorus. "Hot" is composed in a tempo of 128 beats per minute and has been stylised to the European electro house genre. The single is composed in the style of: verse – chorus – ad-libs – ad-libs – chorus – ad-libs – chorus – chorus, with its build-up to the first verse being approximately forty-five seconds long. Two of the three ad-lib sections are sung by the male vocals of Marcel Botezan of Play & Win. "Hot" appears on numerous compilation albums including 538 Dance Smash 2009 Vol. 4, 538 Dance Smash – Hits Of The Year 2009, Damn! 26 – 100% Dance Hits, Disco Estrella Vol. 12, DJ Selection 262 – The Balkanian Explosion, Grandmix 2009, Hot! Summer Hits 2009, Jaarmix 2009, Love2Club, Máxima Fm Compilation Vol. 10, Radio 538 – Hitzone – Best Of 2009 and Todo Exitos 2009. In January 2010, an Ultra video mix which includes "Hot," as well as "All That Matters" by Mischa Daniels vs. De Nuit and "Feel It In My Bones" by Tiësto featuring Tegan And Sara was released by DJ Riddler on American record label Ultra Music. Another remix by Electrow Jungs was produced for "Hot". It features Cuban-American rapper Pitbull.

The word "hot" is not mentioned throughout the song. According to Inna, the strophes and the refrain can be interpreted in different ways. Mentioning the refrain, "Do it like a woman", the singer said that when she and her team had written the track, they had not thought of a pornographic context.

Music video

The first version of "Hot" 's music video was shot late 2008 in Romania. It was released onto YouTube on 10 November 2008, where it has since received over 40,000,000 views so far. The first video clip of "Hot" is known as the "True Love Video Edit", whilst the second version became the "Dancing In The Dark Video Edit". The sophomore clip leaked a few weeks after the first version was already did. It differs from the first and has no storyline. In the first version of the music video, Inna can be seen wearing two different looks. The first look comprises her having long hair, dressing traditional, more covered up Romanian clothing, while the second one comprises Inna wearing a strapless modern grey dress and having her hair tied up. The music video begins with a young blonde woman doing her hair and make-up, getting ready in a nightclub's back dressing room where she works as a stage dancer. Her fellow co-workers and friends are then seen around her as she receives a card from a supposedly secret admirer. The next scene involves the girl doing her job stage dancing in a nightclub. The music video then moves into a scene at the girl's home where she can be seen in casual dress arguing with her lover in front of their young daughter who is drawing busy. After the mother leaves, the father comforts his daughter, who seems to be upset about her parents arguing. After the child falls to sleep, the clip shifts back to the nightclub scene where this time the girl is crowded around by her friends because of the roses and card she received from her secret admirer before going back to the stage dance that night. Whilst the girl is stage dancing, her secret admirer is shadowed but visible in the crowd at the nightclub. The girl arrives the next morning home again where she fights again with her lover and then packs her bags and leaves the house. Toward the end of the video, the girl manages to find her secret admirer who then takes his sunglasses off and turns out to be the girl's lover who she has been fighting with. For the end, they hug and seem to be happy together. The music video ends with Inna and Play & Win standing together up against the white wall in the nightclub before they walk away together.

The second version of the clip begins with a round red speaker backed in red lighting visible onscreen, with it then moving to a scene where a man with tied back long black hair dressed in a black dance outfit can be seen dancing backed by pink lighting. "INNA" then appears onscreen followed by "HOT" – where the round red speaker is used as a substitute for the letter 'O' in the word. In Inna's first scene, she has straightened loose hair, a butterfly-like necklace wearing a beige short dress and dark-coloured bracelet, dancing to a yellow-lighted background. The video then moves to a nightclub scene where a DJ is busy DJing, wearing a dark pair of sunglasses and a beanie headpiece. A club full of people can be then seen dancing to a light green background. Scenes then move to two different girls dancing separately. One of them wears a short white top and black pants, with the other one dressing a short black top and white pants. Inna is then shown singing into a microphone built-in from the ceiling next to the round red speaker. She is wearing a very long, fluttered grey dress which is blown up and down during the scene by special wind effects. Additionally, she dresses grey-coloured make-up and eyelash extensions. In Inna's final scene, she has her hair tied-back and is wearing a tight black vintage pants over a white sleeveless top. Three of the main dancers are then coming together for a routine dance. The video ends with Inna and Play & Win standing next to each other.

Live performance

Inna has performed "Hot" during her Romanian and European 2009–10 promo tour. A major performance of the song was at the Starfloor 2010 in the Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy venue, where she performed "Hot" in a medley with "Amazing" and "Deja Vu". There, she was accompanied by the percussion band Sensor and the frontman of Marker, called GuitarINNA. She performed "Hot" as an encore in her INNA en Concert tour in 2011, while it was part of her setlist for the INNA: Live la Arenele romane gig in Bucharest, the capital city of her homecountry. The song was also sung during her I Am the Club Rocker Tour in Mexico and the United States, where it served as an encore to the San Francisco and Las Vegas concerts. Inna has performed "Hot" live at the 2009 Eska Music Awards, Legendario Ice Experience and at the 2009 Sopot Hit Festival in Poland. Furthermore, she sang the song at Loop Live in Sofia, Bulgaria on 11 October 2009.

Critical reception

The song received mixed and favorable reviews from the music critics, praising the tune, whilst not being that pleased with the lyrics. Fraser McAlpine from the BBC Chart Blog said that:

"Yesyesyes English is not her first language – she's Romanian – and she is clearly using the words to this song as a kind of percussion to break up the music. Unless you good-at-crossworders have anything to add at this point?(...)Assuming there IS no answer, 'Hot' serves to prove that sense is not a prerequisite of happiness in music.

In fact, it's where a lot of pop songs fall down. The recent crop of Sugababes singles all tripped over the same problem, attempting to find a way for the girls in the band to describe how sexy they are. We don't really need that bit explaining. Thankfully, Inna's pleading gobbledegook is a far more appealing proposition, especially when those ticky synths vaguely recall the glory of Boney M's 'Ma Baker' (LOOK! Lady GaGa's fashion parents!). You could argue that this is fly-by-night dance music, that nothing really happens after the first minute or so and that it won't stand the test of time. It's basically Jedward's record contract in song form. But that's missing the point. This IS now, if you can't enjoy transitory stuff while it's happening, it doesn't make you too clever to be duped by silly tricks, it makes you the guy at the party who sits in the corner and won't dance. Perfect crossworder material, in other words."

Robert Copsey from Digital Spy enjoyed the song, admitting that he discovered Inna and "Hot" quite late:

"You know when you feel like you're the last person to know what's going on? Well, that's exactly how we feel about Inna's new single – probably because it isn't actually that new. The Romanian-born singer – real name Elena Alexandra Apostoleanu – released 'Hot' across the continent last year and her eponymous album has been number one in every Eastern European country you could think of. She's even had success in the US, topping the Billboard Dance Airplay chart. So, what's all the fuss about? Well, the track is essentially two-and-a-half minutes of pure and stylised European electro-house centered around a nagging hook of "Fly like you do it / Like you're high like you do it / Like you fly like do it / Like a woman". Sleekly produced by Romanian dance trio Play & Win, its biggest draw is that it's so simple. Simple but effective though – expect its trancey, hypnotic beats to coax you onto the dancefloor next time you're out on the town and up for a strut."

Paul Lester from The Guardian said in his Inna review that "Things get better on the album's title track, which at a pinch suggests Ibiza-era New Order in a clinch with David Guetta, though that's being generous (ie exaggerating aka lying). The "la la la" bit by the male singer sounds as though a hunky waiter from the local beach cafe wandered into shot."

Chart performance

On 31 May 2009 "Hot" debuted at number 33 on the Spanish Singles Chart, where it later entered the chart's top ten on 12 July 2009 (number 9) and went on to peak at number one on 26 July 2009. In Spain, the single spent twelve-consecutive weeks within the top-ten and twenty-three-consecutive weeks within the top forty, leaving the chart on 8 November 2009. PROMUSICAE certificated "Hot" with the Platinum disc after exceeding the sales of 80,000 shipments. The single entered the Dutch Top 40 in August 2009 at number thirty-seven and moved on to the chart's top-ten in September 2009. "Hot" achieved a peak at number 2 in Netherlands and spent ten weeks within the chart's top ten and eighteen weeks within the top forty. On 19 September 2009 "Hot" debuted on the Flanders Belgium Singles Chart at number 50. It went on to enter and peak in the top-ten at number 6 on 7 November 2009. Inna's single managed to achieve the same success on the Wallonian Singles Chart, where it climbed to its peak position at number 6. Furthermore, "Hot" spent ten weeks on the German Singles Chart, where it peaked at number 80 in the second last week of 2009. The track was a major success on various airplay charts as well, reaching the top-ten in Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Russia and Slovakia. On 21 March 2010 the song debuted on the UK Singles Chart at number 8, while also managing to reach the peak spot on the UK Dance Chart. The following week, "Hot" climbed two spots higher to its peak of number 6.