The Good Witch, Maisie Peters

I honestly couldn't tell you how I first heard of Maisie Peters, but between her opening for Ed Sheeran's current tour and a period of time where rumors were floating around of her opening some of the European dates of the Eras tour, I felt like listening to her sophomore album within a couple days of it's release would be fun. And that's exactly what I got with The Good Witch-- a really really fun album to listen to.

Stand-out tracks: "Coming of Age" "Lost the Breakup"

My favorites: "The Band and I" "Therapy" "History of Man"

The album opens with the pared-back-turned-boppy title track "The Good Witch," which effectively illustrates every single theme that appears on the rest of the album; toxic relationships, emotional struggles, and good old-fashioned moving on. "Coming of Age" kicks the pop tones of The Good Witch into high gear-- the chanting of "I wish I could have seen it, God!" closes out a rock-solid pop punk song that's almost Avril Lavigne-esque. While the preceding track was very Maisie-moving-on, "Watch" is very Maisie-wishing-she-could-move-on; it carries on the poppy sound with a little more heartbreak sprinkled on top of her pop punk.

"Body Better" was one of the pre-releases from The Good Witch and between its cruising chorus that seems like it pairs beautifully with a drive along a coast in the summer and the clever back and forth of "I can't help thinking that she's got a better body/has she got a better body than mine?", it makes all the sense in the world why this song would have been picked as a single. "Want You Back" is the first piano ballad of the album, and honestly I feel like the natural poppiness of Maisie's voice, the backing instrumentals that are added to the production beyond the piano, and the simplistic lyricism makes this one of the tracks that I'll likely skip when I come back to The Good Witch. "The Band and I" is incredibly refreshing-- ultimately, this is what you'd get if you cracked open the diary of a touring musician and read all the little anecdotes of life on tour. If there ever comes a day when there's a coming-of-age movie about a young band in the 2020s, this song was meant to be on the soundtrack.

"Lost the Breakup" is one of the other pre-releases from The Good Witch and it absolutely deserves to be arguably the biggest hit Maisie Peters has had. A chorus that's composed of lines like "I know I'm obsessed, and/right now, I might be a mess, but/one day, you're gonna wake up/and, oh, shit! you lost the breakup" backed with a fun synthy instrumental deserves hype almost to the level of Carly Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe." "Wendy" is one of the other slower-paced songs on this album, but the poppier instrumental turns it up a notch. It's a little unoriginal in the comparison of a boy not growing up to Peter Pan that we've heard in a dozen other breakup songs, but it's better than the other ballads on this album like "Want You Back" and "Two Weeks Ago." "BSC" is another really fun track and when you listen to this track and find out what the title stands for, it makes it all the more fun. This song might also have the best bridge of the album (how can it not when it starts with "I am unhinged/I am scaling these walls I've gone within").

"Therapy" is the only track on The Good Witch that hasn't been made into a single that I think absolutely needs to be one-- it's one of the more dancy-pop songs on the album and personally, I love a song with clever, sad lyrics and a boppy beat. The next track,"There It Goes," is almost an Act II to "Therapy," illustrating more of the feeling of being happy moving on ("the comedown of closure/the girls and I do yoga/I wake up and it's October/the loss is yours") rather than the "but now you're gone honey I can't sleep/I'm just talking to your memory/I still love you, but you're taking me/from your arms/back to therapy" of Act I. In terms of quality of lyricism, this album ends on the highest of high notes with "The History of Man." I could describe this one, but I would never do all its complexities justice, so just go listen to it and thank me later.

Ultimately, I feel like cutting a few tracks off this album would have overall made it a little stronger as a complete project. But, the songs on The Good Witch that are great? They're really, really, really great.

AM I OBSESSED?

RATING: KINDA OBSESSED

Harry Styles, Harry Styles

Few artists are able to find colossal fame once in their career, but with Harry Styles, Harry Styles proved that the star power he found with One Direction was just the beginning for him. Harry Styles left behind high-powered bops like "What Makes You Beautiful" and "Best Song Ever" and leaned into more of a soft-rock vibe powered by incredibly introspective lyrics, fleshed-out instrumentals, and a certain level of humanity that we were never really able to see from Harry when hidden behind the One Direction hysteria.

Stand-out tracks: "Sign of the Times" "Kiwi"

My favorites: "Two Ghosts" "Ever Since New York"

Opening this album with "Meet Me in the Hallway" is Harry's acoustic, ghostly reminder that this isn't One Direction anymore; it's pining and definitively repetitive "I gotta get better" opens the album with the clear message that this album will be about personal growth. The second track, Harry's solo debut single "Sign of the Times," is in my opinion still one of his best-written songs both lyrically and instrumentally. This song almost feels like an ode to growing older and realizing how far you've already come, and the instrumental push and pull of stripped-back verses and dramatic, building choruses mimics that growing process beautifully.

"Two Ghosts" is another stunning track that's composed to sound like a slow-dance love song, but really tells the story of two people falling apart from one another. I don't pick up on any instrumentation in pared-back "Sweet Creature" besides acoustic guitars and beautifully-layered harmonies, resulting in a very real, sincere love letter. "Only Angel" is maybe the best-produced song on this album, starting with cinematic hidden audio that cleverly transitions into a classic, unflinching, upbeat rock song. The only song that could upstage the previous track is "Kiwi," which is audacious in every way-- from the scream-singing of "'I'm having your baby, it's none of your business'" to the delicious electric guitars-- this one is a heck of an intentional attention grabber.

The closing act of Harry Styles begins with my personal favorite "Ever Since New York." This song is best paired with a self-pondering walk through Central Park in the fall-- it's simplistic but effective in conveying the complexities of feeling disconnected from yourself and the world around you. "From the Dining Table" is a stunning conclusion to this project-- it's another pared-back, acoustic, heartwrenching letter to a lover who's drifting away. Closing the album with "comfortable silence is so overrated/why won't you ever say what you want to say?/even my phone misses your call, by the way" is so painstakingly human and romantic, which perfectly sums up the entire story of Harry Styles.

The entirety of this album is instrumentally dynamic and incredibly vulnerable, solidifying without a doubt that Harry Styles is a rock star in his own right in every sense of the word.

AM I OBSESSED?

RATING:

FULLY OBSESSED

SOUR, Olivia Rodrigo

Olivia Rodrigo hit the music scene hard and fast with 2021's "driver's license," which is one of my favorite pop ballad heartbreak songs maybe ever. The outrageous success of "driver's license" pushed Olivia to put out a full length album four months later, resulting in one of the best and most successful debut albums in recent years. SOUR deserves every bit of the hype and success it's achieved over the last year and a half since it's release; it's incredibly written (especially considering Olivia was 16 when she wrote most of SOUR), it's simultaneously raw and easy to listen to, and it has perfectly soft and powerful vocals that convey every bit of emotion imbedded in each song.

Stand-out tracks: "driver's license" "good 4 u" "traitor"

My favorites: "happier" "1 step forward, 3 steps back" "jealousy, jealousy"

SOUR kicks off strong with the "I want it to be, like, messy" and pounding guitar of "brutal," which laments all the subtle frustrations of life that might make anyone think "god, it's brutal out here." The mood shifts dramatically going into "traitor" and "driver's license," illustrating the most agonizing and reflective parts of teenage heartbreak with lyrics like "I always knew/That you'd talk to her, maybe did even worse/I kept quiet so I could keep you" and "Today I drove through the suburbs/And pictured I was driving home to you." It's hard for me not to have a soft spot for "1 step forward, 3 steps back" with its interpolation of Taylor Swift's "New Year's Day" (and the not-so-subtle 13 reference in the title), but the soft, gentle acoustic nature of this song makes it sound almost like a fond reminiscing of what went wrong in a relationship. One of the highlights of this album is "good 4 u," the unrelenting, Avril Lavigne-esque pop-rock song of utter spite that was literally made to be scream-sang at the top of your lungs; teenage angst looks great when it has lyrics like "Maybe I'm too emotional/Your apathy is like a wound in salt/Maybe I'm too emotional/Or maybe you never cared at all" (and the psycho burning of her bedroom in the music video? Gold.). "happier" is a wonderfully ironic title for what might be the most heart-wrenching song on SOUR. This song is a beautifully pared back to piano, vocals, and light percussion, depicting the result of mulling over a relationship past and all the good it held but being okay with the other person moving on-- just not moving on to someone that makes them forget you. "jealousy, jealousy" is the one track on SOUR I can't believe never became a single-- it's funky pop-rock exposing the grip social media and social pressures have on society and just how obnoxiously frustrating that feeling can be (and the rock version of this song from the "Olivia Rodrigo: driving home 2 u" documentary is even better than the SOUR original). The last true heartbreak of SOUR shines through in "favorite crime," putting on full display conflicting feelings of regret and fond memories. SOUR ends with the stunning "hope ur ok," telling the stories of figures of the past and the struggles they've lived with and simply hoping they're okay despite having fallen out of touch; this track is ghostly and ethereal sounding, with lyricism way beyond what would be expected of a 16-year old.

SOUR is a whirlwind, but in the absolute best way. It's an emotional rollercoaster of joy, pain, clarity, anger, self-loathing, self-love, and love. With a debut like SOUR, Olivia Rodrigo solidified herself as a multi-talented pop star who is here to stay.

AM I OBSESSED?

RATING:

FULLY OBSESSED