Kim Petras - "brrr" + General Discussion

[popzone]

What confuses me most about her situation with this record, and countless other artists, is how it even gets to this point in the first place. The process for most artists, sans those who are stratosphere-level stars, seems to be that they have to present the label with a nearly finished product ahead of a release schedule being set. Does it not benefit everyone involved to like…check in periodically throughout recording instead? That way if the material isn’t doing it for the label they can intervene sooner?

That may sound incredibly naive to how things actually work, but it just seems quite common for labels to listen to a nearly completed body of work and be like “Nah, throw a couple more in and we’ll see where that gets us!”. Followed by more recording, more delays, rinse and repeat. It feels maddening from an outside prospective, but maybe these feedback sessions occur more frequently than it appears.

 

[Trouble in Paradise]

Her own shitty issues aside, I just don’t understand what exactly the label is expecting out of her? Like, it sucks but I just can’t see an openly trans artist become legitimately huge right now. That’s awful of course but I feel like that’s the (unfortunate) reality. They should have let her cultivate a devoted, niche base like Charli and then, later on give her the big push. Again, she’s obviously got her own personal shit she really needs to sort out, but it feels like the odds were stacked against her as soon as she signed with them. And given the aforementioned personal issues, I don’t know that she can come back from this whether she’s on a label or not.

I’d argue a trans artist could make it to the “minor leagues” of pop with some of our Quirky Pop Girls- I try not to think too much about what Sophie’s next era would have been like cause it’s too heartbreaking- BUT like you said they’ll need the type of devoted fan bases girls like Flo and Charli have. Instead of the type of plugged in stans she needs, Kim had to court white finsta gays who “don’t really care whose singing as long as I can dance to it!” Any committed fan spent so much time yelling transphobia to defend Dr Luke & Kim’s defense of him at the expense of Kesha to be ready to actually give her a real push. She made her bed, she can flop in it.

 

[Inland Empire]

No offense to Kim (okay, a lot of offense to Kim), but the idea of Kim "starting the trend" of the hyper-pop girls or "was about to take the mantle" from Charli is just plain revisionist when barely anyone knew who Kim was until she featured on Pop 2. Kim had a cute viral moment on Spotify with I Don't Want It At All but it was hardly some career-making, genre-shaping hit. And before Pop 2, Charli had already released Vroom Vroom and Number 1 Angel so it wasn't like she was inspired by Kim in any way.

I wasn’t trying to say she single-handedly started the hyperpop train, but she did feel like one of the major players in the beginning of the rise of hyperpop and adjacent genres - after she got some momentum on streaming but before the Luke connection clouded her reputation at every turn. Obviously Charli was there way before, but you can’t deny it took her a good while before her change in direction really started paying dividends, and I do remember people expressing doubts on the forum in 2017 about her commercial viability (which thankfully were of course proven wrong) - plus a few posts suggesting Kim actually had more promise instead. And the likes of Dorian, Slayyyter, Rina and 100 gecs, who are pillars of the genre-and-related-genres these days, didn’t really hit it off until 2019 or even later so choices were kinda slim.

 

[huntypoo]

I don't think there's any Kim Petras song I would really consider hyperpop - though she was definitely riding that wave.

 

[Ferk]

Having listened, assuming the label drama stories are true (and given everything that has happened I see no reason not to believe them) I’m…not really hearing what could give the label cold feet? Other than the optics of releasing it with that title considering the controversy around her career but none of the parties involved have given a shit about that before and if they did care about those optics then surely Slut Pop wouldn’t exist. It sounds pretty much what I expected it to sound like and honestly if I didn’t recognize her voice you could tell me these were leaks from Ava Max’s upcoming album and I’d believe it. Is there a sure fire smash? Not really. But it’s foolish to expect that of her anyway. And if they’re wanting something to go viral on TikTok or whatever…surely you should actually release the music?

And I don’t want this to come across as a defense of her, or that I’m advocating for her in some way. Absolutely not. She’s a shit person and as @Trouble in Paradise so eloquently stated “she made her bed, she can flop in it”. I’m just perplexed at how it got to this point with the label.

 

[huntypoo]

Having listened, assuming the label drama stories are true (and given everything that has happened I see no reason not to believe them) I’m…not really hearing what could give the label cold feet? Other than the optics of releasing it with that title considering the controversy around her career but none of the parties involved have given a shit about that before and if they did care about those optics then surely Slut Pop wouldn’t exist. It sounds pretty much what I expected it to sound like and honestly if I didn’t recognize her voice you could tell me these were leaks from Ava Max’s upcoming album and I’d believe it. Is there a sure fire smash? Not really. But it’s foolish to expect that of her anyway. And if they’re wanting something to go viral on TikTok or whatever…surely you should actually release the music?

And I don’t want this to come across as a defense of her, or that I’m advocating for her in some way. Absolutely not. She’s a shit person and as @Trouble in Paradise so eloquently stated “she made her bed, she can flop in it”. I’m just perplexed at how it got to this point with the label.

Judging by the release today it certainly was not the title that was the issue ddd

 

[mindtrappa]

Other than the optics of releasing it with that title considering the controversy around her career but none of the parties involved have given a shit about that before and if they did care about those optics then surely Slut Pop wouldn’t exist.

Dd apparently nobody actually thought about the optics until she got the blow back for Slut Pop. Problematique as an album was scrapped shortly after that, and she rushed to record the album that was called Candy in the spring, which was also scrapped. However, the main reason we heard about all this happening is simply that the songs aren't good enough.

 

[Purple]

Between this drama and Jesy getting dropped it’s been a great week for karma.

 

[selectual]

After listening to all (most?) of the songs... It's a bit confusing that the entire thing was scrapped? Sure, when pieced together it's not really inspiring as an entire body of work, but they could've dropped Revelations or All She Wants (or maybe a revamped Left My Body) at some point while she recorded more material.

I'm also just wondering who she's even working with at this point. Aaron seemed like her main collaborator. I don't think L*ke really had any part in producing Slut Pop despite being credited as the sole producer (or is actively working with her at all at this point). As Doja previously implied that he ended up with credits on Planet Her despite not doing actually anything... I doubt he's even bothering with Kim if he can get his name added to credits on a much bigger artist.

 

[mindtrappa]

I'm also just wondering who she's even working with at this point. Aaron seemed like her main collaborator. I don't think L*ke really had any part in producing Slut Pop despite being credited as the sole producer (or is actively working with her at all at this point).

Ian Kirkpatrick mentioned recording with her recently. Apparently working with Madison Love, Sarah Hudson, and Earwulf as well.

 

[Secret]

According to ATRL insiders the release of the era 1 compilarion was pulled at the last minute.

How is a compilation of existing tracks being scrapped last minute too? This is insanity ddd

 

[Ferk]

The mess. I can’t.

 

[Andy French]

Having listened to it all now...I can definitely see why the label said nah, honestly. There are a few good or potentially good songs here - Dance To Forget is a blatant attempt at capturing the attention of gays whose interest in dance music peaked with Dancing On My Own but it's cute and feels kind of Gigi d'Agostino-ish melody-wise, if she or her team had any sense at all they would have pursued Hit It From The Back as a single over Coconuts and Slut Pop, and All She Wants would have been ten times better without Paris doing...whatever she's doing on it.

The rest is just so...bland, though. It all blends into a pile of dully throbbing, vaguely similar, vapid nu disco-adjacent slop. Also, Something About You genuinely annoys me because it's trying so very hard to be a Thomas Bangalter homage but even at his most loop-happy, his work never felt like a slog, which is more than I can say for the song itself. I know I said it before but how do you miss the mark on doing a French House inspired album this badly?

 

[mindtrappa]

I know I said it before but how do you miss the mark on doing a French House inspired album this badly?

Slayyyter hopefully coming to show how it's done with her album

 

[drewsky]

Of all the leaked tracks, only 3 were release worthy (All She Wants, Hit It from the Back, Your Time to Cry) and Revelations sounds like a Turn Off the Light cast-off. The rest sound like her phoning it in and absolutely deserved to be scrapped.

Drop an EP of those tracks as a consolation for rejecting most of the album instead of releasing SlutPop and send her back to the drawing board for another year.

 

[KYLE]

It just feels so right when someone gets what they deserve.

 

[timothy_b]

She should listen to Limbo by JoJo and draw some inspiration from that… because the leaks are not it.

 

[Subspace]

According to ATRL insiders the release of the era 1 compilation was pulled at the last minute.

How is a compilation of existing tracks being scrapped last minute too? This is insanity ddd

The way they're scrambling at this point. "Let's re-release six year old songs, but actually let's not"? A strategy!

 

[Noir]

Slayyyter hopefully coming to show how it's done with her album

Okay but can she make this 120 BPM or faster?

 

[lushLuck]

The leaked album/tracks are exactly the sort of shallow, mindless bops I expected them to be. They're all perfectly serviceable, if entirely bland, and they're certainly not helped by the resurgence of her first era tracks - all of which just highlight how disappointing the more recent material is. They all are perfectly aligned with The Future Starts Now, so much so that most of the tracks blend together into one long faceless beat. While I would say the highlights here are... minimal, they far surpass the Coconuts/Slut Pop disasters that came in their place, so the choice to shelve all of this is odd. Oh well, doesn't feel like anything of value was lost.