After playing the character of Cat on the hit Nickelodeon show Victorious, Ariana Grande became known for her music career as a singer. Releasing three albums, Dangerous Woman, My Everything, and Yours Truly, Grande released her newest album Sweetener on Friday, August 17. Over the first weekend after its release, the album hit number one on the iTunes Sales Chart.

To promote her newest album Sweetener, she periodically released three singles from the album before its release date.  The first released song, “No Tears Left to Cry,” hit the Billboard Hot 100 list, peaking at number three, after which she released “The Light is Coming” featuring rapper Nicki Minaj, months later, which hit spot 95 on the same list. Just recently, she released “God is a Woman” which peaked at number eleven also on the Billboard Hot 100 list. Based on the songs that released prior to the album, fans assumed that Grande’s new album would consist of different genres of music.

Grande counted down the days to the album’s release on her Twitter and Instagram account. As days became closer to the release of Sweetener, fans got more and more excited for Grande’s new music.

“Being a big fan of Grande’s, I have been waiting so long for the release of the album. I was keeping up to date with her posts on her Twitter. As the days got closer and closer to the release, I got more and more excited,” Junior Kamayah Richardson said.

On the release day of Sweetener on Spotify, Grande broke the record for the most streams by a female artist at 15.1 million album streams.

“I think Sweetener is going to be different from the rest of her past albums, she’s been experimenting more. I just honestly expect it to be really good and something we have not necessarily heard from her before,” junior Madeleine Sullivan said before the release of the album.

The album released at midnight on August 17, and its prevalence on social media platforms just minutes after the album’s release, such as Instagram and Twitter, provided further exposure for the album. The reviews seemed mostly positive from comments under the post Grande provided for her fans discussing the album’s release.

“[It’s] more vibey than her previous albums,” senior Chesley Lucas said.  

The album consists of songs from multiple genres. The album flows from hip-hop, “The Light is Coming,”  to pop, ”God is a Woman,” and back to slow, “Better Off.” Some of the songs on the albums seemed to take inspiration from her previous albums. For instance, the beat that “Successful” seems to resemble notes of  “You’ll Never Know” off of her Yours Truly album.

“My favorite song probably would be ‘Get Well Soon.’ The harmonies, beat, melody, and lyrics mix together to create a really musically interesting song that is really fun to listen to,” junior Grace Nthale said.

Grande’s last song on the album, “Get Well Soon” ends with forty seconds of silence as a moment of silence for those whose lives ended at the Manchester concert in 2017. In an interview with Perez Hilton, on air, Grande broke down and started crying while talking about what happened. Grande said after the attack, she “views places and life differently.”

Grande dedicated one of her songs to her fiance Pete Davidson, naming the song after him, “Pete Davidson”. Numerous fans disagree with the relationship between the two of them, but Grande does not seem to let her fans determine who she can and cannot date.

Even though her album broke records, fans still dislike some of her songs.

“My least favorite song is ‘The Light is Coming’ because Ariana Grande and Nicki Minaj did not go well together in this song. In this song, their styles clashed too much,” Lucas said.

Overall, Sweetener pleased fans and broke records, peaking number one on iTunes, and various songs from the album also peaked on the charts. The album provides songs to dance to and make listeners happy.

The Chant’s Grade: A+