POP/ROCK
Harry Styles, "As It Was"
In his new single, Styles latches onto the kind of peppy electro-pop that the Weeknd updated from groups like a-ha. The song is from Styles' third album, "Harry's House," due May 20, and its insistently upbeat production stokes the ambiguity of the lyrics. When he sings "In this world, it's just us/ You know it's not the same as it was," it's impossible to tell whether he's pulling away or longing to reunite.
JON PARELES, New York Times
Angel Olsen, "All the Good Times"
Her forthcoming album "Big Time," out June 3, was written during an emotionally tumultuous moment in her life: At age 34, she came out as queer to her family, only to lose both of her parents, in quick succession, to illness shortly afterward. Olsen certainly knows how to capture and exorcise melodramatic feelings in her music, but the first single from "Big Time" is more of a slow burn, smoldering and occasionally sparking with sudden, cathartic surges. Harking back to Olsen's twangy roots, the song's melody has a laid-back confidence that occasionally brings Willie Nelson to mind.
LINDSAY ZOLADZ, New York Times
COUNTRY
Thomas Rhett featuring Katy Perry, "Where We Started"
Country superstar Rhett sings about a romance with a waitress who's hoping for a musical career (played by Katy Perry) in "Where We Started," the last song but the title track of his new album. "I'd be playing my guitar singing those covers in an empty room," she faux-recalls. The beats are programmed drum-machine tones, like trap, with guitars that sound like loops, and the collaboration with Perry may well have been remote. It's an artificial path toward a real feeling.
JON PARELES, New York Times
