The song "Can't Stop the World" was originally written and recorded for the short-lived TV seriesDrive. The song is also known by the alternate title "Some Days," but the finalized Wanderlust artwork has it listed as "Can't Stop the World."
Wanderlust received generally mixed reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 48, based on 7 reviews.[3] Mikael Wood, writing for the Los Angeles Times, found nothing groundbreaking in the album's musicianship but gave note of Rossdale's writing giving off "a whiff of universality" along with "an appealing guilelessness" saying that "Iffy lyrics aside, Wanderlust finds Rossdale circling back to the heavy pop he does best."[8] Brian Orloff from Entertainment Weekly called the record "at its best, a bright collection of Daughtry-esque rock boasting anthems" but that it falters when delving into "saccharine sentiments."[7]AllMusic senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine said that Rossdale's charismatic vocals work well in the album's field of MOR-style rock but concluded that "this is still deliberately tepid music, more concerned about appearances than hooks or drama."[5]Rolling Stone's Jody Rosen felt that Rossdale was ill-suited on the power ballads and worked best in grunge where he delivered lyrically thought-provoking material but said that it was "a goal that exceeds his gifts as a songwriter."[10] Rob Sheffield from Blender panned the album's tracks for coming across more like "a mealy-mouthed, cliché-ridden, bombastic Chris Cornell solo joint" and the use of Auto-Tune on Rossdale's vocals.[6] Michael Roffman of Consequence of Sound criticized the record for containing "double vocal tracks" and "Nickelback-like singalongs" that added to Rossdale's digital layered performance and lazy lyricism.[12]
