of the world. After a lot of turmoil involving break ups, being groped on live television and having to deal with the death of an ex-boyfriend, Grande bounced back with her inspirational smash hit, \u201cThank U, Next.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Looking untouchable, many waited with bated breath on the follow up. \u201c7 rings\u201d was released as the next single, and it has only been a disaster since then. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Coverage of Grande\u2019s music went from themes of inspiration to themes of mockery and criticism. News sites, as well as people on social media, were throwing jabs at her two failures of getting a tattoo that properly translated to \u201c7 rings\u201d in Japanese, as well as three different artists bringing accusations of cultural appropriation and thievery of imagery, flows and lyrics. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Add on the fact that \u201c7 rings\u201d is by far one of the worst songs she has ever recorded, it left a sour impression that Ariana Grande wouldn\u2019t be able to top what I believe to be her best album to date, \u201cSweetner.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now that I\u2019ve heard it, I can say I was half right. \u201cThank U, Next\u201d definitely does not top \u201cSweetner.\u201d While its flaws are numerous and glaring, this album is still a solid effort that is worth a listen. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The album starts awkward and slow – \u201cImagine\u201d in particular, with its clunky and stagnant beat, doesn\u2019t lend well to Ari\u2019s singing. The random heavy bass at the end with whistling turns an otherwise boring song into an unlistenable one. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The album only picks up from there with songs like the adorably intergalactic bop \u201cNASA,\u201d the introspection of \u201cFake Smile,\u201d and the exciting horns and catchy hook of \u201cBloodline.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had to remind myself that I love a lot of the tracks. It\u2019s just easy to forget that I do because of the horrible first and last impression the album leaves. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201c7 rings\u201d is at the tail end of the album. With its use of The Sound of Music\u2019s<\/em> \u201cFavorite Things\u201d combined with the sheer lack of structuring in the track, it feels like the laziest track on the album, as well as sticking out like a sore thumb.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n A lot of the\ntracks on this album deal with the intricacies of emotion, heartbreak and\nvulnerability. To transition from that to a song bathed in shallow and generic\nflexing taken right out of your average trap song is jarring at best and\nactively frustrating at worst. <\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s the\nsame issue with the latest single and album closer \u201cBreak up with your\ngirlfriend, I’m bored.\u201d It\u2019s another\nslow tempo track that delves into an uncaring need to steal someone\u2019s\nboyfriend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There\u2019s\nnothing wrong with songs like this, and I know many pop stars make them.\nHowever, in my opinion Grande doesn\u2019t have the personality to properly sell it.\nShe has tried on many occasions to have a savage edge to her music along the\nlines of frequent collaborator Nicki Minaj.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But Grande\u2019s\nvoice is far too angelic and easy on the ears for it to feel like a fierce\nattack. She is far too an emotional singer to properly portray cold and\nheartless, not to mention the real-life\npersonality of Grande doesn\u2019t seem to match this. When met with criticism for\nher tattoos and accusations of cultural appropriation, she responds with pleas\nfor sympathy rather than any bite or counter criticism. It just doesn\u2019t mesh\nwell. <\/p>\n\n\n\n These inconsistencies\nin tone, as well as some of the worst songs Grande has made in her career\ntacked onto it, it\u2019s a shame that this album couldn\u2019t reach the potential some\nof the tracks showed it could have.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those songs\nare in fact good enough to keep me out of claiming this album as bad. It\u2019s a\nmixed bag with extreme lows, but enough extreme highs for me to recommend you\ndon\u2019t say \u201cThank U, Next\u201d to this one. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" of the world. After a lot of turmoil involving break ups, being groped on live television and having to deal with the death of an… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[163],"class_list":["post-1771","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-entertainment"],"aioseo_notices":[],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"authors":[{"term_id":163,"user_id":8,"is_guest":0,"slug":"josue-villarreal","display_name":"Josue Villarreal","avatar_url":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/wp-content\/litespeed\/avatar\/9580769cb3ada2a586943d2ad90c47c2.jpg?ver=1778637593","0":null,"1":"","2":"","3":"","4":"","5":"","6":"","7":"","8":""}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1771","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1771"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1771\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1773,"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1771\/revisions\/1773"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1771"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1771"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1771"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesouthtexan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=1771"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}