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October 30, 2020 - Republic
Ariana believes in the laws of attraction, or at least wants her audience to think she does. As much fun as the top tier of top 40s artists have had evoking Kabbalistic imagery and insinuating witchiness and sex magic, I can’t see a reason not to roll with it. The album is beautiful, put together with mirth and silliness and a narrative line that straddles the genuine and the ironic of “bad bitchness.”
‘maybe you should shut up’, displays a vocal range that’s typically reserved for confessions of love or revelations of pain and longing. Plucky instrumentals highlight Ariana’s performance. Synergy is achieved. What was before overloaded with pop is now tastefully reeled in to complement young Grande’s sensibilities. She’s been drinking coffee and eating healthy. She’s been so good, and she’s ready to fuck. “Can you stay up all night?” She pleads.
‘motive’ refines the common era of retro-hooks and choruses; using neither exactly but nodding to them with huge gestures. Doja Cat makes an appearance. She’s fun.
“I get everything I want ‘cause I attract it.” She’s gotta meditate.
Candid and intimate, yet highly produced and calculated, Ms. Grande strikes a rare balance. The sparse instrumentation works well for Positions, a playfully obvious double-entendre for sexual moves and different phases of life. The way love transforms and situates us from person to person, from one version of ourselves to another. It’s a quanta-based (discontinuous in the world of psychology) theory of development.
‘safety net’ asks questions about anxious-avoidant attachment styles. Ty Dollars encourages Grande, saying ‘let your guard down, girl.” But Ariana has “never been this scared before,” and doesn’t “know if [she] should fight or flight.”
Then, later, in ‘nasty’ she wants to get nasty. These songs have significantly more consistency than Ariana’s approach to romance. The instruments are understated to make room for Ariana’s ballads and professions. It’s a much better match for her virtuosic style. The structure maintains a lower level of hype but is less manic than thank u next. The result is a more convincing self-assuredness that enjoys its contradictions. Frankly, it’s a lot sexier.
‘love language’ continues the pop star’s penchant for the lower-cased title, and is yet another testament to how dialed back instrumentation of a more uniform energy gives the artist the time and space to come through in her vocals. Riffing as she does on the themes of self-love and pop-love-psych, Ariana positions herself deftly between cheek and wisdom.
‘positions’ and ‘obvious’ follow through with hushed pop. Turning non-lyricism into somehow enjoyable operatics, Grande’s last tracks meditates on the different identities we inhabit and facets we emphasize to keep our relationships alive, and the ways we imagine ourselves to be communicating about who and what we are. ⛰️