The singer’s fifth album, “Thank U, Next,” is her most adventurous yet — and most in conversation with the rest of pop music.
No current pop star is more adept at stoking and channeling swells of online fan curiosity than Ariana Grande. In the past year, she navigated a tumultuous relationship with the comedian Pete Davidson; the death of an ex-boyfriend, the rapper Mac Miller; a public row with the Grammys; and more. In the process, she has become a master of the Easter egg, the clapback, the strategic tweet-and-delete. In the middle of a storm, Grande is cool and collected, hands firmly on the wheel.
This comes through in her use of social media, and also in her music and videos. “Sweetener,” an optimistic love-song album released last August, was hot on the heels of her high-octane short-duration romance with Davidson. And the singles leading up to her new album, “Thank U, Next,” aggressively fed the gossip machine, ensuring that just as Grande’s music was reaching its peak popularity, she was also the subject of continuous meta-musical conversation.
It is savvy gamesmanship, and an appropriately modern approach to pop superstardom in the age of social media and streaming. And yet that flirtation with tabloid ubiquity is the least interesting aspect of “Thank U, Next,” Grande’s fifth album, which has some hiccups but is still her most musically flexible and au courant release to date.
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A pure vocal talent who early in her career excelled with songs that gave her singing generous room to breathe, Grande hasn’t always been in close dialogue with the rest of pop music.
