Come & Get It

Selena Gomez's "Come and Get It": A Solo Breakthrough and Stars Dance

Note: This article concerns the 2013 Selena Gomez single "Come and Get It" from her album Stars Dance on Hollywood Records. This is distinct from other songs sharing this or similar titles.

Selena Gomez had been a significant presence in American popular culture since the mid-2000s, primarily through her role on the Disney Channel series Wizards of Waverly Place, which premiered in 2007 and ran through 2012. She had also pursued a recording career with her band Selena Gomez and the Scene, releasing three studio albums between 2009 and 2011 and achieving commercial success within the teen pop market. By 2013, she was ready to reposition herself as a solo pop artist operating in the adult contemporary market, and "Come and Get It" was the record designed to make that transition visible and audible.

"Come and Get It" was released on April 8, 2013, as the lead single from her debut solo album Stars Dance. The track was produced by Malay Ho, who had developed a production style that incorporated Bollywood-influenced rhythms and South Asian musical textures alongside contemporary electronic pop production. The decision to build the lead single around these musical elements was deliberate and distinctive, setting the song apart from the pure synth-pop and EDM-influenced tracks that dominated pop radio in 2013 while still remaining accessible to the mainstream audience that Gomez needed to reach if she was going to make the transition from teen pop to adult pop successfully.

The song debuted at number six on the Billboard Hot 100, marking Gomez's first solo top ten entry on that chart and establishing her as a viable pop single artist in her own right rather than a television personality who also made music. The Hot 100 placement was particularly meaningful because it reflected real airplay, sales, and streaming data rather than the narrower demographic performance that characterized the Disney pop market. Gomez had reached a broad pop audience with a record that made no concessions to the sound she had previously worked in, which validated the artistic and commercial strategy behind Stars Dance.

Stars Dance was released in July 2013 on Hollywood Records and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200, another marker of Gomez's commercial strength as a solo artist. The album's number one debut demonstrated that her fanbase, built over years of television and music activity, had followed her through the genre and career transition. The album featured contributions from several prominent pop producers and co-writers, and the track listing reflected Gomez's intention to work in a more mature, electronic-influenced pop space than her earlier group material had occupied.

The music video for "Come and Get It" featured Indian classical dance elements and costuming that referenced South Asian cultural aesthetics in line with the song's musical inspiration. The video attracted both admiration for its visual ambition and criticism from some commentators who raised questions about cultural appropriation, a debate that had become increasingly prominent in the broader culture by 2013. Gomez and her team responded to the criticism while also defending the intentions behind the artistic choices, a dynamic that extended the song's public conversation beyond music journalism into wider cultural discourse.

Radio airplay for "Come and Get It" was substantial, with the track receiving rotation on pop, adult contemporary, and rhythmic pop formats. The song's production, which combined the Bollywood-influenced rhythmic framework with synthesizer textures and Gomez's airy vocal approach, made it adaptable to several different radio contexts, which contributed to its sustained chart performance and made it one of the more formally interesting mainstream pop singles of that year.

Selena Gomez's vocal style on "Come and Get It" was described by critics as deliberately understated, a breathy, conversational quality that contrasted with the more maximalist vocal approaches common in the 2013 pop market. This restraint worked within the specific context of the song's arrangement, where the South Asian-influenced production provided the rhythmic and textural density that the vocal did not. The combination created a distinctive sonic signature that made the track immediately identifiable and contributed to its airplay success.

"Come and Get It" received significant attention at the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards and was nominated for and won several teen choice and music industry awards recognizing its commercial impact. The song's success demonstrated that Gomez had successfully navigated one of the more challenging transitions in pop music, from a young Disney Channel performer to a credible adult pop artist with genuine commercial reach on the mainstream charts.

For the broader pop landscape of 2013, "Come and Get It" contributed to a period of increasing genre hybridity in mainstream pop production, when producers and artists were drawing on South Asian, Jamaican, and other non-Western musical traditions as source material for contemporary pop tracks. The song's success on the Hot 100 demonstrated that American pop audiences were receptive to these hybrid approaches when executed with enough craft and commercial instinct to deliver something that felt fresh rather than gimmicky.