The debut record from former TikTok star Addison Rae is both slickly made and subtly genius.
Rae in the video for ‘Headphones On’
Why do we listen to pop music? It’s a genre that, as its name (an abbreviation of ‘popular’) suggests, has a great reach across varying tastes, and can, at least in an idealistic world, bring people together. It packages big emotions into digestible choruses and hooks – as though it were an aural Nutribullet. It soundtracks so many of our Big Life Moments: the first kiss in the club, the drive down the coast, the wedding reception. Pop is full of dichotomies and contradictions, too; it’s built on formulae yet has the capacity to surprise and startle. Pop is both mirror and escape; it tells us who we are and who we could be. It exists in worlds neither happy nor sad, merely emotional on a full and rich palette. Pop is human.
With all these in mind, Addison Rae is undoubtedly suited for pop music. Indeed, her new record, Addison, at first scans as a laundry list of pop album essentials. Arena-sized hooks? Tick. Bouncy, slick production? Tick. Lyrics that are at times so absurd they circle back around to profundity? Tick. Name the album after yourself? Tick. On paper, Addison should’ve come and gone like many a pop release. Then again, like its creator, Addison is not like many a pop release. It’s idiosyncratic – weird, even – without ever being too out there to turn off the casual listener. It plays with its form and the conventions of pop, without ever abandoning either entirely. It’s subtly genius, in the same way that eating cheese and pineapple together is genius, or that an impulsive trip to egg your ex’s house is genius. Clever in an subversive way – but clever regardless.
Many underestimated Rae at first. Some still do. Her journey from TikTok blonde girl to popstar was facilitated by a sophistication of her public image. She listened to SOPHIE. She was an avid reader. She was, with millions of followers still in the bank, a diva. Her 2021 single, ‘Obsessed’, was (perhaps unfairly) maligned by critics, who saw it as another cheap and soulless cash grab from a TikTok star with brand partnerships drying up. (Rae’s fellow Hype House member, Dixie D’Amelio, released several singles the year prior to ‘Obsessed’, none of which were very good.)
Listening back to ‘Obsessed’ now, it truly holds up. It’s a winkingly ironic self-empowerment anthem, whose camp qualities Rae would lean into further with future releases. The critics, though – supposedly swayed by their view of Rae as just another basic blonde girl – dismissed her. It wasn’t until 2022, when several of Rae’s demos leaked online, that different people started to embrace her for different reasons. She was no longer the white girl doing dances in a big house; now, she was singing on top of old Gaga demos and making properly good pop music. (In hindsight, it’s warming to consider that supporters of Rae’s early music were terminally online queers; I don’t doubt she felt a kinship with their otherness.) Bolstered by last year’s hit single, ‘Diet Pepsi’, she won over the public. All of a sudden, it was cool to like Addison Rae.
Despite this success, though, Rae still has her naysayers. There’s a snobbery and cynicism, undoubtedly rooted at least somewhat in misogyny, around her and her music. In particular, many have questioned her ‘authenticity’ – that annoyingly crucial selling point in music these days – and are sceptical over whether Rae’s music was truly her doing, or was just the result of intense focus-grouping.
Addison, then, arrives with its work cut out for it. It more than dispels any notion that Rae is a puppet for a corporate agenda, or that her heart isn’t in this to any degree. The music here is too colourful, too brimming with personality and charm, to be the handiwork of someone who wasn’t intensely passionate. No, it’s not perfect, but I’d take that over the polished drivel of fellow Hype House alumna Alex Warren’s ‘Ordinary’. Across this whole record, Rae sounds like she’s having immense fun, imbuing the music with infectious warmth and wit. Ironically enough, it’s about as authentic a work as she could have made: cheeky, charming, and utterly beguiling.
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