On Friday, February 8th, Ariana Grande dropped another full length album with 16 tracks, after releasing her last album, Sweetener, just five months ago. It’s huge for an artist to release two albums within a year but for her to do that as well as have both albums go number one on the charts is even bigger.
But is Ari’s new album worth the hype it’s getting? Or is it just an album that she threw together at the spur of the moment?
When Imagine first came out as a single, this song felt really random. It was the last of her three singles to come out before the album and it had such a musical theatre-meets-trap feel? Her vocals were melodic and full of range but each verse was her rapping. Which to me made the tone of the lyrics confusing. The lyrics told a story of how she would paint her ideal world, where she can love in peace and live in peace without any extra drama. Now that the album is out, the song makes so much more sense in the overall story she’s trying to tell, as it flows so much better with the other songs.
Songs like Needy, NASA, and Fake Smile stand out to me as songs that are about learning to accepting yourself for who you are, without caring about how others feel. We saw Ari touching briefly on that topic in Thank U, Next and diving even deeper into that mantra in her third single off the album, 7 rings.
Bloodline, Bad idea, Make-up, and Break Up With Your Girlfriend, I’m Bored are all songs that stand out to me as Ari’s confidence and how she’s no longer taking her romantic endeavors so seriously. Which honestly is totally understandable after everything she’s been through these past couple of years with romance.
Ghostin’ and In My Head was Ariana’s most honest song on the album. I feel like for the first time besides Thank U, Next, she brought us into her world and showed us her thought process and feelings on her relationship with both Mac Miller and Pete Davidson.
Overall I would give this album a 4.5 out of 5 stars. I do feel as though there are certain songs on this album that she could’ve done more with but at the same time, that may just be me being nosy and wanting to know what’s going on in the world she’s slowly bringing us into. She definitely worded her songs together carefully in a way that lets us in but without giving us every detail. Which is okay. The closest we got to a full diary entry of detail was in Thank U, Next when she actually named dropped, but even then the song still left us with questions. Which to me, as much as I would’ve loved to have more, shows that Ariana practices what she preaches, in terms of keeping her privacy, and living in a world of peace (despite whatever emotions she’s having towards certain people or situations).This album is definitely for anyone who’s figuring themselves out and where they stand in the life they live. As for Ariana as an artist, you can definitely tell that she put in real emotions, time and work into this album.