"Hold Up" is written in the key of C major in common time with a tempo of 84 beats per minute. The song follows a chord progression of C–F–D–G–D–F, and when it comes to Beyonce's vocals, they go from C3 to F5. The track features a light reggae beat. A demo of "Hold Up" was first written and recorded by Diplo and Koenig in 2014, paraphrasing "Maps" by Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Koenig, the frontman for the indie rock bandVampire Weekend, had tweeted the lyrics "hold up...they don't love u like i love u" – interpolated from the chorus of "Maps" – in 2011. This tweet had confused people as the song was written in 2011 but, as he explained on Twitter, it was just a random tweet at the time. According to Koenig's interview on Beats One, the demo he and Diplo made was simple track with only chorus in it. Beyonce gave this demo to various songwriters to get the best ideas, songwritings. MNEK said he wrote a full song over the demo, but Beyoncé only used 3 lines from his song, which were eventually used in the bridge. he also mentioned the unique process of Beyoncé: "The way she works, she is a writer in herself. And then she pieces together stuff and she pieces together, you know, Diplo's going to work on the track; she's going to send it to me to do a melody idea. That's the process. And it worked because she's overlooking everything" Father John Misty also said Beyoncé contacted him after she heard his song through Emile Haynie. She gave him the simple demo track and he ended up writing first verse and refrain. "With 'Hold Up' they just sent me the beat and the hook. I wrote that first verse and the 'jealous and crazy' part." from his interview. He didn't know if his part would be used or not but later Beyoncé told him in person that his part made the final cut at his 2015 Coachella set. In the outro of the song, Beyoncé sampled the hook from "Turn My Swag On" by Soulja Boy. She used the first two lines of the hook twice with slow falsetto vocals to express the feeling between denial and anger.
Critical reception
's Ryan Dombal named "Hold Up" as "Best New Track", calling Beyoncé's vocals "emotive" and stating "The music has no weight, no place, no time—a calypso dream heard through walls and generations...When Beyoncé works in the pained refrain of Yeah Yeah Yeahs' "Maps," she makes it glorious while allowing our memories to hint at the anguish underneath." Slant considered the song the 4th best one of 2016, while Pitchfork named it the 28th best. The song would later be voted in Village Voice's Pazz & Jop best in music in 2016, the 18th best single of the same period. Billboard ranked "Hold Up" at number 23 on their "100 Best Pop Songs of 2016" list: "Beyonce's Lemonade was designed for memes… and tweets… and gifs. But ask anyone the image that defines the album, and you're likely to see a shot from "Hold Up"." "Hold Up" was named the greatest song of the decade by Richard Walker for The National.
Commercial performance
After the release of Lemonade, "Hold Up" debuted and peaked on the US BillboardHot 100 chart at number 13. "Hold Up" also entered on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop songs at number 8. In overseas charts, the song entered in multiple digital charts in top 5: Denmark, Greece, Netherlands, New Zealand and Norway.
Music video
The song's music video is part of a one-hour film with the same title as its parent album, which originally aired on HBO and was also included with the purchase of the album itself. The Jonas Åkerlund-directed video features Beyoncé destroying multiple cars and security cameras using a baseball bat. The video is often compared by critics to that of Janet Jackson's video to her single "Son of a Gun " as well as the late 90s art filmEver Is Over All by Pipilotti Rist. According to Mashable, Knowles also makes reference of Oshun, the Yoruba goddess of water, fertility, love, and sensuality. It received two nominations at the 2016 MTV Video Music Awards for Best Female Video and Best Art Direction, winning the former. One week later, Beyoncé released the music video on her YouTube and Vevo channels.
