After the huge success of the single No Tears Left To Cry, Ariana Grande is back with her fourth studio album entitled Sweetener.
The Keys of Pharrell Williams
Rapper, singer, writer, producer and songwriter Pharrell Williams is responsible for producing 5 tracks from the singer's album , including blazed, the light is coming, sweetener, successful and borderline. Indeed, the songs have melodies that stick to the skin from the first listen, especially the charming sweetener and the blazed chorus "Once I have you, I will never let you go".
Melodically speaking, the album is very effective. Unfortunately, the melodies are not linked together: it is therefore a mixture of rhythms, sounds, within the same piece. In terms of production, it's a total mess, closer to Pharrell's sound than Ariana Grande's.
Max Martin's touches
Despite this mess, Ariana Grande decided to continue making magic with her older producers including Max Martin, Savan Kotecha and Ilya Salmanzadeh. The result is the wonderful breathin , a song that talks about anxiety with a lot of hope, or the everytime catchy with the chorus "I go back to you, back to you , back to you".
At the same time, the last four tracks of the album expose a more fragile , romantic, and far from the classic commercial pop of Ariana Grande, including the song Pete Davidson, the future husband of the singer. They highlight the fact that to have a true sound evolution, it is necessary to use a musical structure with meaning between each verse and chorus; Missing fact in the tracks produced by Pharrell, more experimental.
Sweetener turns the listener overexcited by Ariana Grande's new music into a mixed listener. There are pearls of pop, especially breathin but also songs that make you confused. Pharrell Williams gives new rhythmic bases to Ariana Grande, with whom she discovers music differently and she further develops her creativity. However, the result is a series of very good ideas without a common thread, in the first half of the album that contrasts with the participation of Max Martin and company. Ariana Grande has taken risks , she certainly has a desire to go beyond, which is very admirable on her part. If the musical universe of Pharrell allowed the singer to return to the music scene, despite a tragic episode, we accept this music as the most precious gift that Ariana Grande could make to the music industry.
7/10
