The Reviews for Katy Perry’s New Album Are Brutal

By Kayleigh Donaldson | Celebrity | September 24, 2024 |

By Kayleigh Donaldson | Celebrity | September 24, 2024 |

It’s safe to say that 2024 has not been Katy Perry’s year. After a couple of underperforming albums, the pop star was hoping to make a splashy comeback with 143. It seemed like a good time for her to get back on top, as female-led pop music dominated the charts. But things fell apart almost immediately with the release of the lead single ‘Woman’s World.’ It was bad, outdated, a failed girlboss anthem, and it was co-produced by an accused rapist. Perry’s attempts to save the DOA record felt increasingly flop-sweaty, and the reviews for 143 don’t do much to debunk that image.

143 currently has a Metacritic rating of 35. For comparison’s sake, Eminem’s latest has 46, and the newest mess by Kanye West has 39. It’s open season on Perry slams, and frankly, critics have been having some fun with this. Look, this is what we do when there are not more 50 Shades movies left to review. But with 143, the tone of most of these negative write-ups is pretty gloomy. There’s not much excitement in taking on someone who clearly didn’t give a crap to begin with. Still, we got a few zingers here and there.

PITCHFORK

‘No stranger to a thrashing, Perry might as well have transformed into a fish, jumped into a barrel, and told critics, “Shoot me!” Regardless of intent, it’s possible to read this album as a metatext on the disposability of so much pop. 143 is Perry saying, “Nothing matters,” except instead of a “lol” preceding it, it’s a heart-hand emoji.’ (Rating: 4.5)

CONSEQUENCE

‘All that glitter gets dull after a while, and 143 is so lacking in fresh ideas and human touches that it accidentally slips into the AI Uncanny Valley; even if no AI was involved, it gives you the same queasy feeling in your stomach. 143 is a mercenary, soulless venture that raises lot of questions.’ (Review.)

VARIETY

‘The album is flat, coasting on cascades of lyrical cliches and musical ideas that rarely crest. Across many of its 11 songs, Perry sounds disaffected and removed, as if she’d just punched in between “American Idol” tapings. Little of the clever wit that emboldened some of her biggest hits peeks out on the album, a disappointing slide away from the savvy she once so effortlessly exuded.’ (Review.)

GUARDIAN

‘And that’s 143’s big problem. It feels slightly out of time, a common-or-garden mediocre pop album with the misfortune to be scheduled in the wake of Charli xcx’s Brat, Chappell Roan’s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess and Sabrina Carpenter’s Short N’ Sweet, a trio of messily inventive and hugely successful albums that collectively suggest a certain raising of the pop bar has taken place. What would once have sufficed, at least commercially, now won’t: that its author and her team didn’t notice seems far more intrinsic to 143’s downfall than questionable choices of collaborator, misfiring videos or indeed damage to the sand dunes of S’Espalmador.’ (Rating: 2 stars.)

PASTE

‘Where’s that poetry, exactly? Not in repetitive lines like “I’m just a prisoner in your prison” (“ARTIFICIAL”) or “Show me the fire / Show me the flames” (“TRUTH”). Even Perry’s few truly creative quips inspire little more than confusion. “Say the right thing, maybe you can be / Crawling on me like a centipede,” she sings on “GIMME GIMME”—a great line if you’re trying to charm Tim Burton, perhaps. The closest Perry comes to sharing true depth on 143 is “TRUTH,” which captures the gut-gnawing suspicion that a partner has been unfaithful. The track molds anxiety into sleek, confrontational pop that evokes Perry’s prior heart-bursting revelations, from the melancholic piano ballad “Not Like The Movies” to the kaleidoscopic romp “Never Really Over.”’ (Rating: 3.0.)

ROLLING STONE

‘Can somebody promise me our innocence doesn’t get lost in a cynical world?” Perry asks at one point — a great question to ask in 2024. But coming after the previous 10 tracks’ flop-sweat-flecked effort to crowbar Perry back into the zeitgeist, it sounds utterly hollow — and including her daughter Daisy on the track, which also happens to be the lone offering without any Luke involvement (it was instead produced by the Norwegian pop architects Stargate), feels more like a deflection against critique than a hope that the next generation will find a way to transcend the present’s muckiest parts. To drive home that point, Daisy gets the last word on the album, asking, “someday when we’re wiser/Will our hearts still have that fire?” It’s a pity that Perry doesn’t seem to have asked herself that while putting together this confused attempt to recapture pop listeners’ attention.’ (Rating: 1.5 stars.)

The reviews are united in their criticisms: the album is bland, phoned-in, out-of-date, and uninspired; accused rapist Dr. Luke’s involvement is tough to avoid and not just because his production efforts here are lacking; it’s fluff but not especially joyous; and it’s all boring. It’s not so bad it’s good: it’s just a waste of time. That might be worse. At least trainwrecks can be entertaining.

The biggest critique Perry has faced about her career (aside from the Dr. Luke of it all) is that she’s pure frivolity. Her music is about parties and kissing and good times, with no real substance to help steady it. She’s not a confessional songwriter like Taylor Swift or a boundary-pusher like Beyoncé. You’ll never be challenged by her productions in the way that Charli XCX aims for, or have to think too much about her lyrics, like Lana del Rey. She’s the candy floss of pop, and when the songs were bops, that was good enough. The moment the hits stopped, her cultural footprint began to shrink. Her attempts at ‘purposeful pop’ with the album Witness failed because the purpose was so hazy. Now she’s back trying to make simple dance songs but the times have changed. I don’t buy that she needed to suddenly imbue her music with deep personal or political messages — Kylie Minogue has had a decades-long reign as the Princess of Pop without getting that deep in her music — but you can’t half-ass a club banger. Brat Summer proved that. Hell, Sabrina Carpenter’s ‘Espresso’ is delightfully dumb in its lyrics but people didn’t care because the tune worked.

I’m not sure what Perry wants to be now, other than a big star. The 143 era is ill-defined in terms of message and aesthetic. She’s dressing as a couture badass with no time for the haters, but she seems uncomfortable with that kind of steely cool (again, it’s what Charli XCX does so effortlessly.) She talks about being ‘weird,’ but she’s never embraced that label much beyond Hot Topic kookiness. Frankly, she makes more sense as a cheesy pop girl than a vanguard of anything truly odd. Does she feel beyond the days of candy bras and bad-taste jokes (complete with unfortunate slides into racism)?

Perhaps society has moved beyond the need for Katy Perry. Pop has levelled up and even its silliest songs are better than anything 143 has to offer. There’d be more goodwill for her to keep trying had she not saddled up with an accused rapist in a transparent attempt to reclaim her golden years. Now, it all seems so desperate. Perhaps American Idol will have her back.