Last year’s march marked a new era for Ariana Grande and her fans throughout the world with the release of her highly successful album, Eternal Sunshine, with millions tapping in to experience what might be considered her most personal and raw album up to date.
While the body of work was acclaimed by all her fans and critics, Ariana announced roughly three months after its release that she would be putting the Eternal Sunshine era in an indefinite hold in order to focus on promoting her new movie, Wicked.
After months of exclusively Wicked content on Ariana’s end, most fans had accepted that the album’s era was long over. But to everyone’s surprise, the singer would announce earlier this month that she had not abandoned the project, and would be releasing its deluxe version, titled Eternal Sunshine: Brighter Days Ahead, at the end of the month, accompanied with a short film.
THE Brighter Days
The deluxe edition of the album contains 6 brand new songs that were all written by Ariana herself and produced by longtime collaborators of the singer, Max Martin and Ilya Salmanzadeh.
The newest tracks all bring a newer and more raw perspective of the emotional turmoils that Grande has gone through the past four years of her personal and public life, while also fitting in with the previous tracks seamlessly.
To start off the deluxe side of the album, the fan favorite Intro (End of the World) was given an extended version, this time with an extra verse and outro filled with heartbreaking lyrics such as “Can’t you sense me? I’ve been here all this time; Would you still be here pretending you still like me?” that added a layer of deep meaning to the already existing track.
The chosen single, twilight zone, explores Grande’s feeling of unease after going through a very significant break up, constantly rewinding her memories of what happened and not quite believing that she actually lived that relationship in the first place, seen in lyrics like “Not that I miss you, I don’t; Sometimes, I just can’t believe; You happened”.
Warm takes us back to Ariana’s roots in pop production, with its main message being about how the singer is so cool on her own, “But it’s warmer; In your arms”, reminiscing back to her older tunes found in previous albums like Sweetner.
Speaking of being back to her roots, the vocalist revisits her trap/r&b production that once flourished in the Positions album on the standout love track Dandelion, with flawless background vocals in moments such as the bridge and main chorus “You can get anything you’d like; I’ll be your dandelion”.
The next track, past life, has a production with violin strings and trap beats- that take you on an almost cinematic experience – while Ariana sings about how liberating it is to leave her ex-partner ‘in a past life‘, while finally having a chance to get ahold of her own self. The vocals on this track are also named by many fans as a highlight on the album.
The closing track, Hampstead, named after the place where Ariana lived in London while filming Wicked, was also revealed by the artist as one of the favorite songs she has ever written in her career.
The emotional ballad shows a vulnerable side of the singer on her previous relationship and how it took a toll on her, emotionally and career wise. With lyric highlights like “Threw away my reputation, but saved us more heartache” and “I’d rather be seen and alive than dying by your point of view”, the song is a perfect closure to the emotional turmoil that the Eternal Sunshine album takes us through since the beginning,the heartbreak and public distortions that Ariana has gone through.
THE SHORT FILM
Only a few hours after the deluxe album was released, Ariana premiered the Eternal Sunshine: Brighter Days Ahead short film on her YouTube channel for all the world to see, with the artist also co-directing the project.
Directly linked to the previous music videos released for this era, the short film follows the character Peaches, who after erasing her most painful memories in the We Can’t Be Friends music video, returns decades later to the same clinic to revisit some of her own memories one last time.
Ariana Grande takes us all on an almost 30 minute long journey to her own career, from never seen before footage of her own childhood to the sound of Intro (end of the world), witnessing her “pop star” era with a performance of dandelion, to the tearjerker ending of her own father, Ed Butera, putting his own daughter back together in a frankenstein-esque way and bringing her back to life while playing Hampstead.
The short film was the most perfect way to wrap up the album rollout. Seeing Ariana take back the narrative of her own life, after having so many people trying to damage it, and narrating it in the most vulnerable and genuine way, will never fail to pull on your heartstrings in the best way possible, as well as proving that with her amount of artistry, determination, pure and raw talent, Grande is not going anywhere, anytime soon.
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The article above was edited by Malu Alcântara.
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