Every Single Album - How the 'Hit Girls' Shaped Our Current Pop Landscape. Plus, Where's Our Song of the Summer?

Episode Date: June 19, 2025

Nora discusses her new book, 'Hit Girls,' about how stars like Britney Spears and Beyoncé shaped our current pop landscape (1:00). Then she and Nathan talk about Sabrina Carpenter's new single "Manchild" and her forthcoming album 'Man's Best Friend' (22:49), before previewing the upcoming Lorde and HAIM albums (46:43). Hosts: Nora Princiotti and Nathan Hubbard Producer: Kaya McMullen Buy Nora's book here. And enter the 'Hit Girls' sweepstakes here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome to every single album. I'm Nora Princeati and I am joined, as always, by Nathan Hubbard, who I'm really excited to catch up with because Nathan, it's been a minute since we've been able to dive into an episode and just chat about the goings-on. So we're going to cover a lot today. We're going to cover some Sabrina Carpenter updates. We're going to cover some of the upcoming albums from Heim and Lord. that we're going to get into with full episodes very soon. And we're just going to go through it all.

But first, if you will allow me to share, I wrote a book. And it's out today because we're recording this on Tuesday. And I have sent Nathan a copy. Nathan, have you received your copy? Am I in the book? You're in the book. You already know the answer to this,

and you've asked me this a hundred times. It's the only thing Nathan cares about. It's all I asked you from the time a year plus ago that you told me you were writing a book. I know. At first I was like, do you want me to write a chapter about you? But yes, you were in the book. You could never not be in the book. I have my copy.

You sent it to me. We were together in New York and suddenly I was on the plane and I was like, wait, I'm seeing all these people post-advanced copies of Nora's book. How do I not have a copy of the book? I know. I know. And you know what? I will be honest, not only did I have one copy in my bag. I actually had two copies in my bag that day because we saw each other because we were interviewing Miley Cyrus. And I was like, if I like, I was like, okay, I have this copy for Nathan. And then I was like, you know what? If I find the right moment, I'm giving Miley Cyrus a copy of this book. And then we stepped into that room and she had such an aura and we talked for two and a half hours that like I blacked out. Like nothing. It wasn't like I like got spooked or didn't. want to or whatever. I just like, I forgot about everything that was going on outside of those four

walls. And then you were like, why don't I have my book? And I was like, shit, I bungled it with Miley. Who do you think would be the bigger diva? Miley Cyrus in general or Nathan, if you had given Miley Cyrus a copy of your book and not me? Well, that never would have happened because I did have- The answer is me. No, it's definitely you. It's always, if the question is who would be a bigger diva and one of the option is Nathan Hubbard? Like, the other option has to be Michael Jackson levels before the answer is not Nathan Hubbard.

Who likes green M&Ms? Who's a celebrity who famously asks for green M&Ms in the dressing room? I'm not going to figure this out. Yeah, I know who it was. It's like Van Halen or somebody like that. Yeah, yeah. I'm just teasing.

You're a very down-to-earth person. I don't want to be at Michael Jackson levels of anything. You're in the book, so you deserved a copy of the book. It was essential for me to get you a copy. which I did. Yes, and I am thrilled. And it is a very sweet note that made me very choked up. But, you know, we sort of have actually, for all of the amount that you and I speak, we have not spoken very much about this book. And like, for me, I think it was actually on purpose because you have many endeavors and side projects that you do. But like I knew,

kind of what this book was about. And I checked in with you a lot on how the book was going. But like you and I have talked ad nauseum about like a million things in our lives. This is like the one thing that we didn't talk about. And I sort of wonder why that is. Was that my fault or was that not even a fault? Because in my, from my perspective, I was like, I sort of wanted to see what this thing became without sort of being in it.

Like I wanted to be a reader. I'm like your partner on the podcast. I'm your friend in life. But I sort of just wanted to be like a fan and a reader of this book. Is that what you wanted me to do? Yeah. No, I think yes. But it's funny because I feel like we in a sense have talked about it so much because

it's funny from my perspective. When I started it, I had this crystal clear laser focus on these are the people that need to be the focus of the book. These are the artists from my youth, such as it was, that I want to have a chance to go deep on in the same way that we talk about contemporary pop stars on this pod. And like that I knew like a bullet. But then I didn't want it to just read like a group of essays. Like I wanted it to feel like it had a real spine and a thesis to it. And so a lot of my process of writing it was figuring out like, okay, I have all these takeaways and I have all these lessons from these people on a sort of individual basis.

But like what does it mean all together? And I think the thing that really like over the course of when I was working on it, but also when we were continuing to do this pod, and especially with everything that's happened with, with Taylor and Beyonce, I would say, over the last couple of years, once it felt like I started to have a little piece of, like, distance on that, I think I had this moment of like, oh, there's just this way that we perceive what it is to be a pop star that didn't exist when I was growing up, or like didn't exist with the same level of clarity. And when you combine all the things that changed about how we think about genre,

how we just interact with celebrities in general, and how technology has influenced music, particularly over the last two plus decades, all of that kind of fit for me under that umbrella. So in a sense, I feel like we've been talking to each other about it forever, because to me, the primary process of writing the book was like coming to this.

that conclusion. And that is something that I feel like I've done a lot of my own working through on this very podcast. So I do want you to be a reader. But I also, and you are in the book, Nathan, you are, I am of the people, of the many, many people who I will be grateful to and indebted to forever for many things in my life, but including the ability to write this. I think you are right up there at the top of that list. And it will all. always mean so much to me. Certainly not true. But I do kind of want you to be a reader.

Well, that's what I am. That's the most fun for me. I finally have the book now. But you know how sometimes we get into talking about stuff and you're like, wait, wait, wait. And then you always set the scene. Yeah. We're now into talking about your book and we have not even set the scene.

I also, I like really hate talking about myself. So that's also part of why we don't talk about it. But we're going to do it now because it's good. Yeah. Yeah. You have a book called Hit Girl. And I want to know from you when you started this. When did you say, I'm going to sit down and write a book?

Two years ago? Like two years ago. Well, that's what I remember. Is that how long it takes to write a book? Or did you go on some sort of journey that evolved the way that you think about this? Because we talked a lot when you first started about this premise. You have a particular fascination with like 2000 era pop stars, pop girls in particular. and we talked a lot about like, I don't know, we have over the years talked about maybe even incorporating some of that into every single album, right? Like talking about, like, I don't know, who's a random 2000 era pop girl that like...

Lindsay Lohan. Lindsay Lohan speak, Miley Cyrus's first album as we learned two weeks ago, which like both blew my mind and also completely did not. But also like the Thousand Miles girl and the... Vanessa Carlton. Vanessa Carlton. Okay, just because I have at many points tried to get you to do an episode about Michelle Branch.

Yeah, Michelle Branch. Like, that is true. So there was, you have and had this obsession. I mean, listen, our friendship started around Taylor Swift. There's no two ways about it. But it has branched into the idea of what it is to be a pop star. But like, I have no concept for how to write a book

because I can't hold a cohesive thought longer than about four minutes as everyone who listens to this podcast knows. But I am curious, like, did what this book is about evolve over two years? Yeah. I mean, so, like, again, it didn't, it didn't. And the part that didn't was who those artists are, because I think where that impulse of me being like, we should cover Michelle Branch, we should do Michelle Branch comes from, is, you know, a big part of what was fulfilling to me about this project was getting to kind of go

back in time and create the type of analysis that's thorough but also fun that I would have wanted, but that didn't necessarily exist in the time of when this music was coming out, in part, I think, because we had a different sort of appreciation for pop stardom in general and go back in time and do that myself a little bit. and why the people felt so obvious to me is because I just do feel like over the course of my life, I have so many conversations with people my age who are like, oh, your first album was Metamorphosis by Hillary Duff.

That was also my first album. And there are these, it's the same reason why I was like, when we cover Hannah Montana. I don't know. What is your version of that? You must have a version of that. I don't know. Okay.

think about it and at some point you're going to share it with us. But it's the same reason why I was like, okay, we're going to have to spend some time talking about the climb by Hannah Montana when we do this Miley Cyrus project because that is going to be really important to people. And those people maybe haven't been given that many opportunities to dive deep on a lot of that music. And when you fill in those gaps, it's really fun. But so I'm answering this in a very long-winded way. that part didn't change.

The part that I wouldn't even say changed, but just that I had to come up with, was the overarching thesis and like the argument of why all of that stuff fit together and the ways in which that has made us come to a place where we think about pop stars in a way that's just different. Okay. And so that's what I was going to ask you.

Like I come from the world of like starting companies and you have to have this thing called an elevator pitch to try to convince somebody to invest in your business. And what you basically do is you get in on the first floor of the elevator and you go to like the 10th floor. And you assume you pretend that like the person, some rando stranger just walked into the elevator with you and you have like 10 floors to actually pitch them on your company.

What is the elevator pitch for Hit Girl? What's it about? It is about how the female artists of the 2000s in pop created the mode of modern pop stardom and the mode that we use when we're talking about Taylor Swift now, when we're talking about Beyonce. I mean, the funny thing about those artists

is that to me, they're not canonically 2000s artists, but they're in the book because they're a big part of that. And like the way that Taylor created online fandom for this age is a huge part of getting people to take artists

like her seriously. because they wield such significant power. So to me, it's if you want to understand why you and I are sitting here talking about the artists that we're talking about in the way that we are talking about them, I think it starts in the 2000s and it starts with the people that, you know,

as you make your way through the book, I tried to write about. And how do you think about the pop stars from the 80s and maybe a lesser extent to the 90s? and their role in 2000s, the Madonna's of the world, right? Did, in your mind, like, is that something for Nora book number two? Is that woven into the fabric of the way that you tell these stories?

It's definitely, I think it's woven into it because I think the 80s in particular, you know, Madonna is still such a blueprint and was such a blueprint for Britney Spears in particular, who was then such a blueprint for everybody in the 2000s, one way or another. And so, you know, I think there is a tendency, particularly when you are writing a book, to be like, this happened and it had never happened before, and it's completely new and fresh. And I think in reality, everything is pretty cyclical. And a lot of what happened in the 2000s is a reaction to the 90s, in particular, when you get away a little bit from venerating.

a pop star in a more traditional sense, a la Madonna. But I think the thing that was different was that if you, like, the Madonna version of it, or even like Michael Jackson. Oh, he's back again. Michael Jackson. Why I'm talking about Michael Jackson so much on this podcast. There's a breadth to that type of stardom where. I don't think that's quite the type of relationships that we have with artists,

which is not to say that there weren't, like, insanely fervent Madonna fans and Michael Jackson fans. But I think if you went to one of those concerts, a lot of people would have been there because it was just kind of a thing to do. It's just sort of like, oh, you go to the Madonna concert because everybody, like, why not? Yeah. And I, you know, with certain exceptions, I think eras got to a point where there were a lot of people who were in the audience to be able to say that they'd been there

because it felt like a part of history and it also felt like a status thing. I think there is a closer relationship with the artists and there's this idea that you know, like you went down the line of all of the contemporary artists that, you know, we identify as being in the pop pantheon right now

of what it is. about the relationship that the fans have with them that's sort of singular and defines their lane. Like, that, to me, feels like a bit of a new phenomenon. Well, I mean, you know, in the 80s and 90s, you were touring to sell albums. And increasingly in the 2000s and 2010s, and certainly today, you make albums to sell tickets on the road.

There's also a whole lot of things that have changed from a technology perspective. You know, when Madonna was on, air on radio, there were like 20 or 30 slots. And so if you were on radio, it's all people were hearing. Here we are today. You can find any music. You can find my stupid band. There just are all of these differences in the ways. You can do that. I perform under the stage name Michael Jackson. But I wonder, because you've thought sort of deeply about this, is it easier or harder to be a pop star today?

A, to become one, and then B, to be a pop star. I think, I don't want to shirk the question. I think to that, in that sense, I think that's sort of an impossible question in some ways. I think it is harder to achieve Madonna level pop star. I think it's harder to become Madonna. I think it's easier to become

Haley Steinfeld. I think it's easier to become Hime. I think it's easier to become Charlie X-CX. I think there, you know, it is the push-pull of the sort of

nicheification of how we consume culture, which is that there are more avenues than ever, but to get enough of those avenues to convert

so that you are truly a mainstream superstar bona fide phenomenon, I think that part is harder. Yeah, and then I wonder being a pop star. I mean, it just feels like there are a lot more people who sort of break to a certain point, but it is, it sure feels like from a mental health perspective, we're still kind of understanding what it does to people in the age of the internet and social media, right? Yeah, well, and I think that, you know, the tabloid culture of the mid-2000s especially, I knew that I wanted to be part of it just because I don't think that you can really talk

about that era and that era's version of celebrity without getting into it. And I do think that it, you know, Britney Spears is obviously a pop star first. I wrote about people like Lindsay Lohan and Paris Hilton. that had brief forays with music, but I don't think that we would define as pop stars first. But I don't think that it was an accident that they were sort of messing around trying to make albums right at the time when, you know,

the page sixes and the photographers were sort of bearing down their necks in the most intense way that they were during that period, because there is this core part of doing the job where you are a larger-than-life... character, but you're also yourself. And more so than being a movie star, where there's the idea of a character that's separate, the lines between the work and the person are inherently so muddy in pop especially because it is, it has commercial instincts on an inherent basis. That I just think that stuff, I think you're right that, you know, there's a lot of what you're saying that could be true of anybody who's in the public eye.

But I do think that it wears on pop musicians especially because of that murkiness. But the thing about this book, I think, I mean, it's 270 pages. It's not like you wrote War and Peace. How do you want somebody to consume this? First of all, it's fun. And so it's not like this is like a heavy, like, no, oh my God. It's like a nonfiction beach read. That's how I want people to think of it.

Right. It feels like it's kind of a book of the summer. I answer questions about it in this like intense way that's probably really because I'm just like, okay, well, I devoted two years of my life to it. Like I want people to feel like I like feel seriously about it. It's a silly, silly book. Like it's a silly book about fun things. I want, you know what I want?

I want people to like take pictures of them reading it in like fabulous beach locations with a cocktail and send them to me. Like that's what I want. a book about pop stars. Yeah, kind of. What I want is like the next time you go to bar trivia to kind of be psyched about it because if somebody asks, if one of the questions is randomly about Ashley Simpson, like you know you're going to be able to answer it. I want people to like laugh at my jokes. I want like, honestly, that's what I want. I want people to laugh at the jokes. I always laugh at your jokes, Nora. I know you are proud of this. I am extremely

proud of you. People are able to get this in their local bookstores, of course. They're able to get this online. Where should they go to get this book? So if you follow me on Instagram, in my Instagram bio, there are tons of links for where you can buy the book. You can buy the book wherever you buy books, whether that's in store or online. However, what I want our listeners to know is that we are running a really fabulous sweepstakes where they can enter to win a copy of the book. But also, we have a partnership with the clothing brand, M.M. Lefleur. And there is a styling experience for you and, like, 10 friends where... Oh, I'm in on this shit. Yeah. It's like, they'll give you champagne. They'll take you to the store. Everybody gets, like, really good clothing advice. You'll try stuff on. There's also a karaoke machine. There are butterfly clips. There's hair glitter. There's, like, all of this stuff. And that link is all. also in my bio. And I will, I can share that with this episode. But, uh, I want, if in every single

album listener won that sweepstakes, I'd be really excited. So I think you guys should enter. Or Nathan, if it was you. Like, you could win it. I, but you already have a copy. Yeah, do I count as a listener? I'm occasionally a listener. I believe you can enter if you want to. It's a, you know, it's, it's, it's just a link. Nothing's stopping you. It just would be weird. Norah, how exciting. I'm so for you and mostly I'm happy for me because I am in this book and that was a big stressor for me over the last two years. Every time you ask me that, I'm like, do you think that you're not? Like, do you think that there's a world in which you're not in the book? Okay. Yes. We can talk about this offline, but like, why do you think that I don't care? I don't know. It just came from a place

of like what is it that I've ever done to make you think that there was any chance that you would not be in the book? Oh, nothing. This is a me problem. not a U problem. Okay, well... Like most things in life. Thank you for identifying it into these microphones that it is a you problem. Thank you for being in my book, Nathan. Love you madly.

Everyone go read Hit Girl. Shall we talk about Sabrina Carpenter, hit girl of the moment? We should because Sabrina Carpenter has struck a nerve. Sabrina Carpenter has the number one song in all the land. And I think for good reason, we can talk about that. the Jack Antonoff produced familiar synth vibe that is, I think, at the moment in the front seat for Song of the Summer, although we can have that debate. But it's sort of more than that, isn't it, Nora? Like, it is, like, we got, we got, culture has been formally permeated by

Sabrina Carpenter. And we're now having debates over, you know, that she did the brilliant retweeting of somebody who's like, does she have a personality outside of sex? And she's like, yes, girl, and it's good. Like, there's just, uh, there's a lot happening around this woman at the moment. Yeah. I mean, what I put in our rundown was that people have lost their minds about Sabrina Carpenter yet again. And it's funny because we're like, you know, not to, here's the funny thing about writing a book is that you can then forever after work into conversation. Well, in my book about everything, and I'm going to do that in perpetuity. Um, It is really funny to like, because I've spent some time thinking about Britney Spears lately, as we all should.

But it is, and you brought up Madonna. Like, this places her to me so clearly in the lineage of those icons who really had a knack for getting people's panties in a twist. And I have to say, and we can talk about Manchild, which I like but don't necessarily like ride for, quite as much as some of her other songs. Really? Okay. But to me, the very fact that all of this is happening

means she's got to be doing something, right? Well, yes. That's for sure. Well, but I don't, when I say that this is happening, I don't mean having the number one song in the world because that's sort of self-evident that that's doing something right.

I mean the fact that people are this upset about it or that there's this much sort of like friction as a result of what she's doing, that makes me think, like, keep doing what you're doing, Sabrina Carpenter. Though it must be annoying to deal with it on some level, it, I think, means that it is working. But there's been the, like, she's sort of danced around all things. I mean, I, my own vibe on Sabrina is she just understood that the clever, smart, horny lane was wide open. And she just grabbed it. And it isn't over the top.

I mean, even with the, the Juno positions and the end in the shadows of Bedchem on tour, like it feels just veiled enough that it's in these times, in the year of our Lord 2025, it's safe enough that she doesn't alienate people. A year ago, we were talking about the, you know, the joke on the Jane skit on Saturday Night Live about how Sabrina Carpenter not gay. I make out with Jen Ortega passionately.

And everyone's like, I heard this song about Sean Mendez. Right. Or nobody thinks Sabrina Carpenter is gay. Right. Nobody thinks Sabrina's gay and maybe we should. But, you know, listen, it's a pretty epic year. for somebody who definitely had a massive hit before the record came out.

But I mean, she's going to put out, it's not going to be her second album, but it's going to feel like the second album that everyone's focused on only a year after short and sweet. Only a year. And while she's still like in the throes of a tour for short and sweet.

Yes. And is going to be playing a whole bunch of shows this fall that were up on sale and sold tickets. I mean, it's part of the short and sweet tours. So how, it's interesting to me from a timing perspective because it speaks to how the cycles in pop music have compressed. Music overall. Yeah.

Because we're this TikTok culture that just swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe, swipe. And generally speaking, unless you become Taylor Swift in this moment, you really don't want to go away because people move on. Their attention spans are short. And there's such a breadth of. of content out there vying for eyeballs and attention across music, across video stuff, across just like everything. That like, it is important to stay present.

And so the thought of somebody releasing an album one year after their last one is pretty unheard of given the amount of success that she's had. Like, this is just not a thing that even five years ago would have been remotely regarded as acceptable. And I do think that she's showing us the way forward to stay in the public consciousness, without being over-exposed, I'd say.

I mean, I think Taylor goes away, and she is mostly away, although they're going to hockey games now, Nora. She and Travis are going to Florida Panthers games. And Wayne Gretzky. She's doing it. So she's back out a little bit after a few months of totally disappearing, as is her right, but she generally has understood when it was time for her to disappear for a bit.

And the size of focus on her, as you were sort of referencing with the era's tour, before was just so large that she can she actually needs it just for i'm sure her own sanity but sabrina is sort of definitely navigating that that line of staying in our consciousness having these big hits without like necessarily being everywhere yeah well and there's two kind of axes of it right there's how much do you want to be in the public consciousness versus pulling back so that you can be refreshing to people again and then there's also just the matter of making sure that she's taking care of of herself because she seems to be loving what she's doing.

She did a Rolling Stone cover story where it's always hard to know how much was this is what the interviewer asked about versus this is what she came in really wanting to talk about. But where there's a considerable amount of ink on the page spent of her sort of saying, there's no reason for me to go away because I really wanted to do this. I had a creative spark going and therefore I just chased that spark and that led to another album really quickly. It wasn't about keeping people's attention. It's not too much too fast.

I just had a creative urge and we followed that and it got us to this point. When I was reading that, I couldn't help but think about Miley Cyrus, I believe in the New York Times interview she did, bringing up Sabrina among the group of. of, you know, sort of the generation behind Miley women and pop with Sabrina and Chapel and saying she loves those girls and they seem sort of self-actualized to her. Found is, I think, what she said. Yeah, found. And that was such a good way of putting it. But she did, she called out Sabrina in the sense that she was like,

whenever I see her, I ask her if she's okay. Yeah. Because I look at the schedule and I go, like, isn't this, is this too much? is this really okay? And that has stuck with me a little bit, and I believe that came out before we, or at least I knew the whole kind of timeline of all of this stuff coming up.

I mean, I'll tell you this. My second third order observation is Sabrina does the work. Like she likes the work. She is in control. She is in charge. And, you know, she's all, also 26 years old, and she's been in this business for a long time now. Right, which is a lot older than, you know, I think we made the point with Miley, how can someone that young, even if they think

they like working that intensely, how can they really know when to say stop? Sabrina, I think in the grand scheme of things, Sabrina Carpenter is still a very young person, but she's, she is at a more adult phase of life, certainly, than Miley Cyrus is a 14-year-old. Yeah, and she's been in the business for a long time and I think has established the chops for when to say, yes, I want to do that. No, I don't want to do that. I mean, you can imagine in the last year a billion people have come at Sabrina Carpenter

with ideas. Let's do this product. Let's do this kind of show. Let's do this. She actually hasn't done that much. She did the Netflix Christmas special, which was cute and great. and sort of, to me, solidified some of her chops from an acting and comedy perspective.

It just reminded you that she had that. She did the Paul Simon S&L opener, which was a really big slot for her. And she did a few of these performances at award shows that harkened back to old Hollywood, old music industry. performances that sort of connected the generations. And they were very purposeful in their performances. But other than that, she's been out doing an arena tour that started basically in

the fall. And she's in Europe now. She'll play Hyde Park over the summer. She'll come back to the U.S. The schedule hasn't been actually that crazy. And I think it's been well-charted by her and her team. I just know she's actually one that I don't worry about on that front. because she knows exactly what she's doing. And the wit and the humor and the cleverness that she combines with the horniness in her sort of stage personality behind the scenes is just intelligence.

And it's not the straight Taylor, full CEO of the world vibe, but it's, she has the chops to be amongst those people, those stars like Madonna, who manage that outward perspective, and have a very clear plan. And that's what, you know, she got together in Europe and with Jack and Amy Allen,

and they mode, they just made. And they made song after song after song and created pretty quickly what came next. And so I think if you're the record label, if you're her team and if you're her, you're like, hey, maybe these periods of, this period of creativity will continue forever. But while it's going and while it feels good,

let's lean into this. And what we, what you would have been worried about was, Is the world really ready for another Sabrina Carpenter album? Because, hey, we just put out the deluxe stuff, a busy woman and everything else from short and sweet. But the answer based on the data alone is yes. Yeah, so how do you feel about Manchild? I really like it.

I really do. To me, it felt very song of the summer. And I like the, there's a little bit of country in the end. I think it, to me, lands her voice. And I don't mean the tone and quality. I mean, there is a characteristic of a Sabrina Carpenter song right now in the way that she packs words in the cleverness. You have to, you know, the sort of fuck my life. She goes there, but it's not, again, it's not like raunchy.

mean it's just incredibly clever in the way that she packs it all in and that is you know i i saw jack antonoff's instagram post about it and he called her like voice of one of the voices of her generation and i thought actually you know i that people could say that that's a little bit hyperbolic but it actually rang very true to me she just is speaking in a way that resonates with people i think i think it started with espresso and went to please, please, please. There is just something deeply truthful about the way that Sabrina speaks,

and this song, for me, embodies that. Well, and truthful, but also just current feeling in the way that, like, in the way that she speaks, not even in the inherent truths of what she's saying, but to me, my single favorite piece of the song is why so sexy if so dumb. Yeah. Like I can't even say it without laughing.

That's really funny. And that is also that like I can has cheeseburger method of talking on the internet that is and has been sort of a part of the vernacular online for a long time, but is still a tricky thing to like weave into a piece. of art. I can't think of, you know, nobody else is doing it like that right now. And why so sexy,

if so dumb, and how survived the earth so long is so funny. Like, if, if humor is her superpower, that is genuinely one of the most laugh out loud funny moments in music that I've experienced in a good bit of time.

It's a hard world out there right now, no matter where you are. Like, weird shit. is all over the place everywhere you look. And she's just really easy in every way to process and to be a companion. She just don't have to take it too seriously when you're listening to Sabrina Carpenter album. No, she should make everybody smile.

If you are not, like I think this goes back to the album art and all of that quote unquote controversy. See, if you are watching Sabrina Carpenter and you are not smiling, look inward, is what I would say. Now... How do you feel about Manchalt? I mean, there's nothing revolutionary about the song.

I happen to dig the melodies a lot. In particular, I really like the verses. It is a standard right off the shelf, Amy Allen, Jack Antonoff, plus Sabrina collaboration from my standpoint. Like, you can hear it in the synths from Jack and some of the songstruck.

from Amy and like I said, in the sort of cleverness of Sabrina, but does this one not land with you in the way that it's not as much of a groove as espresso for sure? You know, it is funny because I, for the fact that it is the biggest song on the charts right now, for the fact that I have listened to it a ton and I really enjoy listening to it, it's almost like the worst thing that I could possibly say about it is that it's not espresso. and what's she going to do about that? You know, so I don't want to be, yes, my truth is that it left me a touch cold in a way that, for instance, the bonus tracks on the deluxe album didn't. There is...

I liked it better than the bonus tracks. Okay. I would, busy woman and 15 minutes continue to draw me in a little bit more. And that's just, but again, here, here's the problem again. That's so fucking impressive. Like, that's crazy. That after the hit parade that short and sweet was, the fact that the deluxe version had two more songs where I feel like they really, really stand up with espresso, with taste, with please, please, please, you know, with bed cam. That is such an accomplishment.

And I think it just adds up to a tough act to follow. I really like the song. If there was a little bit of magical mystical pixie dust that I felt like I didn't quite get from it, I just don't think that I can come down too harshly on her for that because I really think that it is a factor of the expectations. Did you see the video? Yes. Yes.

I love the video. I do love the video and I love the... The little front of the truck missing the back of the truck. I don't know why, but that is so funny to me. Like, how you come up with... Yeah, he's going to drive up in the long-haul truck, but it's not going to have anything on the back of it. So it's just going to be this little nub of car.

It really makes me laugh. I like the creative direction on that very much. But I had a little bit of the please, please, please. that kind of vibe of it's vaguely Western a little bit like Thelman Louise almost. Yeah.

Yeah. And I think that's a really effective mode for her because she does have this you know, Dallie Parton-esque quality in how she sings where she can synthesize a little bit of country

into something that is inherently pop. And I think that's a really cool element of her toolkit. So I'm totally into it. I'm excited for the next one. You know, it's summer and we're getting Sabrina Carpenter. This is not me like hiding criticism. I'm just like, let's all be real here.

I'm not going to say that I'm not happy that this song is out in the world. Do you have any problem with her being on all fours with a man holding her hair on the photo that was released? I don't have. No, I really don't. Why do people get all bent out of shape about that? We're going to talk about Lord's upcoming album Virgin in a minute. Can I remind people that the album art for that is an x-ray of her pelvis where you can see her IUD? IUD insertion being like this thing that is notoriously so painful.

And like a thing that women who generally have pretty good pain tolerance will talk about as like the most excruciating experience of this. their lives. And like no one says a peep. No, like no, nothing. Nothing. Like it is just, it is again, like this is why I love pop culture and pop music is because it is such a mirror for what pushes people's buttons and what inexplicably doesn't. And I have to say that like there's very little rhyme or reason to it other than I think in

reality, Lord is a sort of esoteric woman from New Zealand. and harder to stir up a thing about than like a former Disney star who's blonde. Yeah. Her sort of... She's very dangerous is Sabrina in that like if you come at her, she's usually going to win. She's kind of a matador and will allay you

and you'll end up sort of face down in the dirt and she's patting you on the head. Like you don't really tangle with her. She seems to win almost every argument. Because she's funny. Right. Never pick a fight with someone who's funnier than you. No, and she is funny.

And she, I mean, she's just owning all these people on social media all the time. And that, to me, is, yeah, you just, you don't, you just don't fuck with Sabrina Carpenter. You're going to, you're going to lose. I'm curious to, it makes me very interested in the album. It sort of makes me interested in how much of a, how much is she trying to make a statement and how much is she having fun playing around? And I actually like, I don't even know if I have a preference. It might even be for the latter. And that actually might be what I think is kind of happening.

But I do, I will go back to the point that if we think of the lineage of the great pop stars who came before her, some element of pushing people's buttons is part of the recipe. So good for, good for Sabrina. Well, when it comes to two artists that you love, the aforementioned. Lord, and also you referenced time earlier on the podcast. What? Are you excited for these releases?

Are these like momentous things in your summer? How are you feeling about these? I'm feeling good about them. I'm very excited for these next two albums that we're going to cover. I quit from Hymne next week and then Virgin from Lord the week after that. I feel like two weeks ago, I was like five alarm fire of there's no song of the summer.

Literally what is happening. Everything on the charts is Alex Warren or Morgan Wallen and like something must be done. And, you know, we got Addison. We've had a few. We've had more of these singles. We got Manchild. Like I've been placated a little bit. So I think I'm less in the state of, of I need these albums or else I can't have my summer.

Yeah. But I'm obviously very excited for them. The Heim singles I have loved. Down to Be Wrong is probably the song of the last four months that I have had moments of the most intense moments of I need to listen to the song back to back to back to back and I actually can't do anything else or I'm going to scream. So I'm excited for that album. And then Lord, I think, is really, is sort of the most interesting one because what we've gotten from the first two singles, what was that in Man of the Year? One, they're addressing some messy but interesting ideas about gender, which I think is a fluid thing for Lord right now. Two, it is a real departure from solar power.

Yeah. And one that seems to be more referential to her earlier work, but also has her working with some newer people, in particular, Dev Hines and then Dan Nigro, and not with Jack Antonoff. So the Lord album to me is this big sort of question. mark. And I'm just really excited to see what it is that she's thinking about, what it is that she's

writing about, what it is that that album sounds like. I mean, the first two aren't really like song of summer type songs. You don't think what was that is piercing through? I think it's a great song. And I think it's I think it's listenable in a lot of the same context, but it's sharp and it's a little, it's got a real darkness to it. I'm seeing it in a lot of like, hey, I'm in Ibiza. Hey, I'm in Mekanos and we're day drinking, eating seafood under a trellis Instagram and TikTok posts. But maybe that's just my feed.

I love that for you. I mean, it does have, because it has a little bit of that like Euroclub feel, which is cool and I guess make sense in those contexts. It's not like light, easy, breezy. That was solar power. Come on and let the bliss begin. Think three times when you feel it kicking in. Right? Like, Lord is off the beach.

Lord threw her phone into the ocean and she has fished her phone out of the ocean and she is like, you know, running up and down the East River wearing AirPods pros. Yeah. So to me it confers a different vibe and like song of summer,

but it's, that's like a party song. So like, I get it. Yeah. Do you have a preference between the first two, between what was that man of the year?

Yeah, I like what was that better. I think me too. Although, man of the year, again, there was the revelation in the Rolling Stone piece

that Lord did where she said that she's gone through a lot of thinking about her gender identity, and there's a moment in the piece where she says that she saw Chapel Rhone at a party and Chapel was like, so are you non-binary now? And in the Lord doesn't answer to Chapel in Rolling Stone.

Like the implication is that she didn't answer Chapel and then she's also not sort of defining that for the magazine. I think it sounds like she doesn't really define it for herself or feel the need to. But there was a New York magazine article where the headline was Chapel Rhone straight up asked Lord if she's non-binary now. And it really did. That was a good one. They're good at headlines over there.

So I'm interested in the idea behind Man of the Year. But yeah, I'm spinning what was that a little bit more? How are you feeling about just sort of the four years later pivot back away from the aesthetics of solar power? I think Lord has just kept her head down and kept working

and kept making stuff and I think the smartest thing that she's done in the last five years in her career was to immediately respond to Charlie and get on the remix and that just rejuvenated lots of love

an interest towards Lord. I'm excited for that. How have the Heim single's gone for you? Yeah, I dig him. I think I'm with you. Down to Be Wrong, I think is my favorite. It's just that chorus is just, it's like a 90s Cheryl Crow thing where it just soars.

And I absolutely love it. I like relationships a lot too. It reminds, it down to be wrong reminds me of like Tom Petty's, you don't know how it feels. It's like just got this like just sitting in the groove and I'm into it. Yeah, I'm into relationships too. I think relationships didn't have that like soaring moment for me, but it it actually is a little earwormy for me. Yeah, that you know what it is is I think they, they often sort of play with that 90s R&B kind of groove. And I do think that that song is one

of the most effective ways in which they've used that. And it sinks into you where the first time I heard that song, I thought it was fine to good. I love Hym. So I, you know, I'm sort of like, oh, I'm happy to be listening to Hym. We never talk about that on here. I love Hive so much. I tell you that all the time. And then I listened to it a few more times. And then something hit me like a week later where I was like, oh, I need to listen to relationships right now. And it wasn't quite as intense as the thing that I went through with Down to be Wrong. But it was, it, it happened subconsciously, I think, where something about that groove sank into my brain. Well, Nora, we're going to have fun the next couple of weeks diving into them.

I'm very excited. I do. There's something about the Haim album where they're pitching it as this album about, you know, post-breakup sort of freedom and letting loose and, you know, feeling like yourself that has been effectively marketed to me and feels fitting in summer. Well, Hime can do no wrong in your eyes, but I will be very interested to hear your reaction to this album, which we're going to get to do soon. Yeah, we're going to get to do it.

Okay, let me give a little bit of programming, which is that we are going to, next week, we're going to talk about I quit, the week after we're going to talk about Virgin, and then nobody get mad at us. We are going on summer break for two weeks. We will be listening to all the songs of the summer. And then we will be back. We will be talking about summer tours or obviously going to talk about Sabrina. I think we're going to get some Renee rap going at some point.

There's a lot of music that we're really, really excited to cover it. But I just want to tell people that we will be off for two weeks. Sorry. Not sorry. It's going to be great. If you want to order my book, that's cool. Go to my Instagram bio. Enter the sweepstakes. I want you guys to get to go shopping. This has been every single album. I'm Nora Prenziotti. As always, he's Nathan Hubbard. Thank you to Kai McMullen for producing this episode. And to you for listening. We will talk to you next week.