Ariana Grande
Petal
REPUBLIC
From burying alive a man who wronged her to beheading her critics with a roaring chainsaw, Ariana Grande’s recent music video carved out a playfully vengeful tone to mark the release of her eighth album, Petal. Though these dramatic, bloodstained visuals set an expectation of full-blown rage, her new album never quite ascends to the extravagant spectacle it sets the stage for—even before it was overshadowed by the somber context of her upcoming retreat from the public spotlight.
While Petal lingers too long in comfortable territory, the record does sift through some stylish, rewarding highlights. The title track burns with escalating energy and assurance, with Grande declaring that she doesn’t need rescuing: “I am not a victim, bitch.” Similarly, the clever, brazen “Like I Do” scoffs at the toxicity of media (“You need me like I, you / 'Cause no one fucks you like I do”), and on the self-affirming “Oh Well,” she wishes her exes “good luck on your way to hell” in a way that feels surprisingly campy rather than cheesy. Per usual, her confidence is complemented by a sleek pop/R&B soundscape shaped by Grande and longtime collaborator ILYA, with additional contributions from Max Martin.
Sonically, Petal flits somewhere between 2016’s Dangerous Woman and 2019’s Thank U, Next, charged as it is with dark, distorted synths and textured guitar leading subtle but effective tempo shifts. Synth-heavy opener “Kiss Me” swells with opulence, pulling back a velvet curtain to unveil a tragic fairytale tinged with hope: “Kiss me like you know this is goodbye / We could try to make it all the way out.” The track establishes the type of vulnerability that pervades Petal: a gloomier, inured strain that’s sometimes dulled by frustratingly hazy songwriting and a slightly restrained vocal delivery.
Gone is the pure, starry-eyed love of “Supernatural” on Pedal, while the hungry liveliness of “The Boy Is Mine” is nowhere to be found—instead, make way for the trudging “big feelings” that could make “a grown man cry” and a new love tediously characterized as a “bad, bad thing.” On this record’s somewhat tepid love songs, Grande trades chirpiness for a darker outlook on life. She characterizes herself as being in control as she condemns the ever-present, ravenous tendrils of fame, but on tracks reflective on celebrity like “Freak” and “Hate That I Made You Love Me,” she sounds uncharacteristically and unintentionally withdrawn, even though her lyrics—presumably aimed at demanding fans—read as insistent: “No, I won’t do what you say, freak, any time.”
While Petal doesn’t fully flourish, the album’s titular metaphor of a “petal in the pavement” successfully imprints a lucid image of growth through hardship—and right now, it’s difficult to conjure up a more fitting emblem for Grande.
