Artist Ariana Grande’s fifth solo album, “thank u, next’ was released on February 8,

2019. Since the album’s release, it has been widely played on the radio and through streaming
services, becoming widely known to people throughout the world. The album is available in the
forms of digital, cd and even vinyl, offering many opportunities to listen to it’s songs.
The album features “imagine”, which was the album’s preview and intro song, and “thank
u, next” which references her past relationships with Pete Davidson, Mac Miller, Big Sean, and
Ricky Alvarez. Grande told fans that “break up with your girlfriend, I’m bored” replaced a song
she preferred to keep, and “7 Rings” was written after a shopping trip where she bought rings
for her friends. Grande received a Twitter shoutout from an agent about “NASA”, named after
the international space organization. The other songs in the albums, “needy”, “fake smile”,
“bloodline”, “bad idea”, “ghostin”, “make up”, “in my head”, are popular as well.
Grande’s debut single in 2011 was “Put Your Hearts Up”, which kick-started her
reputation as a pop singer. However, Grande was introduced to the world as Cat Valentine on
the hit Nickelodeon TV show “Victorious” and the spinoff series, “Sam and Cat.” She became
more widely popular with kids and teenagers who watched both of the shows. Since then,
Grande’s talent has only grown and become more widely renowned.
“thank u, next” dropped less than six months after her second-most recent album
“Sweetener”, was released. Since the album came out so soon after her last one, the
excitement built up well before it was released. As soon as the album came out, it reached No.
1 on Billboard’s top 200, and became a woman’s pop album with the biggest streaming week
ever. Grande broke the No. 1 album record with her albums five months, and twenty two days
apart on the charts for a woman, since 1974-75. She is also the first female artist to have
singles at No. 1 (“break up with your girlfriend, I’m bored”) and No. 2 (“7 Rings”). The album had
59 million streams, and is the third most streamed album in a week.
Her other albums, “Sweetener”, “Dangerous Woman”, “My Everything”, and “Yours
Truly” all consisted of mainly pop songs featuring various artists. The songs in “thank u, next”
contain a different combination of music genre, changing the genre she’s written songs in the
past. Besides just pop, the album includes R&B and trap music as well.
Grande hit a new spark of creativity when writing this album, making it one of the most
dynamic ones she’s written so far. She fused R&B and nursery rhyme in song “7 Rings”, which
was based off of “My Favorite Things” from “A Sound of Music”. Although it sounds like an
unlikely combination, the song is catchy, involves her rapping, and is one of the more popular
songs. “ghostin” is about grieving the death of her ex-boyfriend Mac Miller and maintaining the
relationship she was in. It uses soft music, and touched the hearts of many listening to the song.
Written about relationships, “NASA” even features the line, “That’s one small step for woman,
one giant leap or womankind”, in the beginning of the song. In her previous albums she’s
released songs with other popular artists, but in this one she went down the solo road. Each
song has a meaning behind it and every one was written from the heart, and Grande shared
that she just wanted to share her music to the world the way other rappers do.
While the album is by far more mature than the others, there has been some controversy
surrounding it. Lyrics in “7 Rings” mention expensive name brands, and using hair extensions.
These give the Italian singer a “bad girl” vibe, and almost imitating other rap songs. The song
had also been accused of copying “Mine”, by Princess Nokia, and “Pretty Boy Swag” by Soulja
Boy. 2 Chainz also claimed her music video imitated his for “Spend It”, with the pink trap house.
Grande also got a tattoo in Japanese saying “7 Rings” trying to promote the album, but messed
it up, and it ended up saying small charcoal grill. After another attempt at fixing it, the tattoo said
Japanese barbeque finger.
The past year and a half has been a full out rollercoaster for Grande. She’s dealt with
more than deemed fair for one person; the bombing at her show in Manchester, the death of
Miller, whom she was very close to, and the engagement and break up with comedian Pete
Davidson. She uses these tragedies in her music, and if listened closely, many songs are
related to her emotions. Instead of waiting for “Sweetener” to continue to sell, tour the album,
and then die down, Grande hit the studio once again, and busted out a new album right away,
which amazed many when first heard. No one expected her to drop an album like “thank u,
next”; there’s no other like it.

“I really like ‘imagine’, and a couple other songs,” said freshman Elizabeth Jewell. “However, I
don’t think it’s one of her best albums.”

“The singles on her previous album, ‘Sweetener’, are better,” said freshman Bella Weiss. “Yet
overall, the ‘thank u, next’ album is better.