I Love London

The track gained attention from BBC Radio 1, with plays from Nick Grimshaw and Rob da Bank.[1][2] "I Love London" was featured in Mixmag's Top 100 Records of 2008, placing at number 91; this being particularly notable due to this being the only song in the list to have been unreleased at the time.[3][4] The single was featured in Time Out magazine's "50 best London songs", coming in at number 49, with a justification as follows:

This deranged, stuttering ode to Crystal Fighters' adopted city of London does exactly what it says on the tin, the repeated near hysterical refrain, 'I wanna go to a friend's party', both refreshing in its cut-to-the-chase hedonistic desire and a reflection of the banality and boredom that relentless London partying inevitably brings".

— Time Out London, [5]

The release was again licensed to Kitsuné and this time included in their Maison 8 compilation album.[6] The Delta Heavy remix of the track can be heard in the 2009 Michael Caine action-drama, Harry Brown.[7]

Mimi Borrelli (former member of Crystal Fighters) features as the dancer in the video, which was directed by Martin Zahringer.[8]

[9]

The song received mixed reviews. The Guardian (2011) commented:

'I Love London, while as silly ("Willesden! Harlesden! Watford Junction!") as anything here, has charm'

In his review of the original album release, Benjamin Hiorns of online music magazine Subba-Cultcha commented that:

'I Love London' however is the most irritating, hipster bullshit piece of ass I've heard in months which sums up in 3 ear raping minutes why I hate the London music scene and the record looses [sic] a whole point as a result (yes it really is THAT bad).

— Benjamin Hiorns, [10]

When asked in an interview by Josh Holliday, of Virgin Media, as to the disparity between the album on the whole and this particular single, Pringle had the following comment:

We still love the track, and we did make a few songs that were more similar to it but it seemed like it would survive on its own but [sic] we wanted to make songs that were perhaps more conventional in their construction, incorporating more guitars etc. But yeah, in the future I think there'll be room for more single-orientated releases like 'I Love London'.

— Sebastian Pringle, [11]