Katy Perry’s long-awaited seventh studio album, 143, didn’t get off to a good start among music critics on Thursday night following its release on streaming platforms.
143, which refers to the expression “I love you” but is also what Perry considers her symbolic “angel number,” is her first album in four years, following Smile in 2020.
A scathing review from a major entertainment outlet stated that Perry is “struggling to regain past glory on the 143 flat track.”
Much of the criticism, even before the album’s release, was directed at Perry’s decision to work with her longtime music producer, Dr. Luke, who last year settled his long-standing sexual harassment lawsuit with Kesha, which he vehemently denied.
But even with the hitmaker on board (he produces 10 of the 11 songs), the reaction so far has been less than favorable.
Katy Perry’s comeback album 143 is being SLAMED by critics, who call it “cliché-ridden, as if it were generated via AI.”
Critic Steven J. Horowitz writes for Variety:’The album is flat, gliding over cascades of lyrical clichés and musical ideas that rarely reach their full glory. On many of its 11 songs, Perry sounds disgruntled and distant, as if she just arrived at the tapings of ‘American Idol.’
‘The album contains little of the clever wit that fueled some of her biggest hits, a disappointing departure from the intelligence she once exuded effortlessly.’
Horowitz adds that some of the songs sound “mechanical” and that the song Crush sounds like a Vengaboys B-side.
He adds: “Just like in their last albums, the lyrics of ‘143’ are riddled with clichés, as if they had been generated by artificial intelligence.”
Meanwhile, The Guardian He gave it two out of five stars, saying the album “isn’t the calamity expected, but it’s not good either.”
A scathing review from a major entertainment outlet stated that Perry is “struggling to recapture past glory on the 143 flat track.”
Critic Alexis Petridis writes: ‘It feels a little out of time, a run-of-the-mill mediocre pop album with the misfortune of being timed 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 haphazardly inventive and hugely successful albums that collectively suggest a certain raising of the bar for pop has occurred.
‘What would have been enough before, at least commercially, will not be enough now: the fact that its author and her team did not notice seems to be a much more intrinsic factor in the downfall of 143 than the questionable choices of the collaborators, the failed videos or even the damage to the sand dunes of S’Espalmador.’
The last line references Perry being under investigation for possible environmental damage to the Spanish dunes where she filmed the Lifetimes music video.
Mark Kennedy for AP He said the album was “uninspired and forgettable.”
Kennedy calls the final track, Wonder, the “worst” song on the album, writing that it is a “cynical attempt to get the moms in the audience to wave their hands in unison while balloons float by, even as it denounces cynicism.”
Although her daughter Daisy Dove makes an appearance on the song, Kennedy adds: “But by this point, she’s lost our trust, with the previous 10 songs being a plodding, sonic slog. ‘143’ has no soul or emotion; it’s just a number.”
Katy has had the support of her husband Orlando Bloom throughout the launch.
The Independent also gave it two stars, saying it was “painfully dated and glaringly out of touch.”
Suggesting that Perry is trying to score hits on the album, the review said: “Most of the songs here have an underlying hesitancy, too concerned with their commercial aspirations to be truly fun.”
A 5 out of 10 review of a music publication Shock He said that ‘the world has moved on’.
‘Yet there’s a sense on ‘143’ that the world has moved on: with Chappell Roan’s tour sparking Beatlemania-style adoration and Sabrina Carpenter maintaining a stranglehold on the charts, it’s hard to see where this playful but unsatisfying record fits into the pop firmament,’ he says.
Despite the criticism, Perry has received some favorable reviews from X fans.
Her husband Orlando Bloom also supported her during this sad release and cheered her on at the 2024 MTV VMAs last week.
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