The cover ofTate McRaes third album shows the pop spitfire lounging on a floor, her back turned to the viewer as she gazes at a floor-to-ceiling portrait of herself in profile head thrown back, eyes closed, holding a facial expression that seems like shes on the verge of doing something.
That sort of self-scrutiny is common for the 21-year-old singer, whorecently toldRolling Stonethat she has a never-ending loop of thoughts on her self, her success, and her satisfaction.
Her perpetual-motion mind has made her one of pops most exciting young stars, and it fuelsSo Close To What,a sleek, fast-moving collection of darkly hued pop confections.
Charlie Denis*
McRae crash-landed into pops upper tier in 2020 with you broke me first, a smoldering kiss-off to a poorly behaving ex with diaristically detailed lyrics.
A showcase for the Calgary-born McRaes trembling, taut voice, broke established her as someone who could report from the frontlines of young love and lust with gimlet-eyed clarity and repeat-listen-worthy passion.
In the years since, McRaes sound and ambition have grown, as has her sense of playfulness; greedy, the pumping 2023 track from her second albumTHINK LATERthat became her first U.S. top-ten hit, spins out of clattering steel drums, while the bad-bestie takedown were not alike, from the same record, balances McRaes purr on a blown-out bassline.
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So Close To What, which McRae began working on shortly afterTHINK LATERs release, continues McRaes upward trajectory, its tightly wound songs charting their own course through 2025s chaotic pop landscape.
Sports car sculpts synth squelches and grinding-gears rhythms into hooks, McRaes whispered come-ons acting as the connective tissue; Revolving door has a runaway-train beat that underscores her pleading I need a mine.
Lyrically, McRaes poison pen has grown sharper while her lyrics have become slightly more terse: The Flo Milli-assisted bloodonmyhands pairs its skipping UK garage beat with apologia like Yeah I move as fast as I can/And I know it fucks you up so hard, while Purple lace bra, a swirling 21st-century update of Madonnas sullen Bad Girl, includes the lacerating grouse Im losing my mind/Cause giving you heads/ The only time you think I got depth.
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The album also has another, newer element: Happiness, or something near it.
McRaes boyfriend, the Australian singer-MC The Kid LAROI, makes a cameo on I know love, a sweet recounting of their relationship; the lusty 2 hands is a show-dont-tell throwdown to someone who thinks jewels and bags can supply the same sort of contentment as touch.
When the latter came out in November, McRae told the British radio station Capital that it was kind of like my first ever love song I guess Ive ever written, which is crazy.
McRaes vision of love is, perhaps unsurprisingly, riddled with introspection and angst; If I cut you off/ It just means I care, she coos on the handclap-propelled Means I care.
But her ability to dig into those intricacies and turn them into arena-worthy singalongs makesSo Close To Whata pop album worth digging into.
