thread of the inescapable Espresso - Sabrina Carpenter

"me espresso" sounds like a lyric written by a swedish pop music genius who doesn't speak fluent english and thats why its the song of summer

— rebecca jennings (@rebexxxxa) April 24, 2024

i didn't think much of it when i first streamed the video. i encountered it on radio later and admittedly it did sound good there, but honestly anything that isn't several months-to-years old is a pleasant surprise on a top 40 station these days

i'm not entirely convinced by sabrina carpenter yet generally. for now i prefer her last single "feather"

It reminds me of Calvin Harris/Pharrell/Katy Perry's 'Feels' somehow but it's better than that.

it's no "stars are blind", feels very post-"say so". it's about as good as a song in this sort of mode can be but that's just 'solid'

me espresso" sounds like a lyric written by a swedish pop music genius who doesn't speak fluent english and thats why its the song of summer
— rebecca jennings (@rebexxxxa) April 24, 2024

it’s driving me crazy that this only quotes the last two words of the full lyric, which is “that’s that me espresso.” which is even more charmingly ESL imo

I prefer it to the other artists’ songs named above, but (like dyl) I’d rate “Feather” higher. Nice groove in both tracks…

the melody of this is really basic but in a good way, it's really easy to sing along to this immediately. Carpenter herself seems to be blandly blank but the charm of this is all those weird lyrics which don't feel focus-grouped for TikTok unlike a lot of other pop idiosyncracies of late

(I mean, they absolutely were designed to be viral like all pop in 2024 is, they just don't feel so obvious to my ears)

nashwan otm, this does feel very funk wav bounce. but carpenter has a lot of personality, and it's a very solid melody.

Pitchfork pays tribute: https://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/sabrina-carpenter-espresso/

there is a real dearth of good-quality, straight-ahead pop bangers on the charts right now so this will do nicely

can’t decide if it’s more fun to think about as the more conventional, “that’s that me: espresso” or the talk-like-a-pirate version: “that’s that, me espresso”

I’ll have to play this a second time. The first time, I thought “this is OK, but why is anyone rhapsodic about it?”

I hadn’t really thought about it much until now but like“That’s that me, espresso” in my mind is part extra syllable fudge to make the lyrics scan, and a combination of two daft nut cromulent for pop song phrases “That’s me! espresso” (I’m like espresso, you can’t sleep) and like…” that’s that me” like “oh well, that’s that, you know what I’m like” but I prefer your interpretation.

Daft but cromulent

this just seems like such a mediocre "Say So" rehash! ugh!!

this time without Dr. Luke tho

Yeah this song is automatically way better because Dr Luke isn't involved.

really boring i thought; wish it had a chorus

i hate dr. luke too but that's just not true xp

fuck Doja Cat too while we're here

Is this really the only Sabrina Carpenter thread? I thought ILX’s pop-loving denizens would be all over her. I haven’t heard her early stuff yet, but her latest album Emails I Can’t Send is chock full of club bangers. “Read Your Mind” is every bit as good as “Feather” and “Espresso”!

btw, what is up with record companies releasing sped-up versions of hit singles as b-sides? They did that with “Feather” and “Espresso”. Like, is that a thing in pop nowadays? Do people really want to hear that? I want some extended dance mixes, dammit!

the sped-up version thing is a TikTok phenomenon aiui

Dan Charnas's piece this week that uses this as a hook to do a look back was I thought very good, though a few folks haven't felt she actually sounds like this:

https://slate.com/culture/2024/06/sabrina-carpenter-espresso-song-summer-boogie-post-disco.html

It's a great read

Feel like a millions years behind the zetigeist on this one and only caught up after seeing that article shared around, and first impressions are very positive. If it’s not the sound of the summer it’s at the very least the sound that’s going round and round my head tonight as I struggle to get to sleep (due to unrelated reasons).

I like the song and that essay, I'm not sure the song is quite the ideal vehicle for the essay, but whatever. "Feather" is good too, I guess I should listen to the album.

If “Espresso” sounds like boogie music I need to listen to more boogie music.

its not as good. as good boogie music.

"I'm not sure the song is quite the ideal vehicle for the essay, but whatever."

it was a good excuse to talk about old music the author likes though. and its good music to give attention to. its totally internet-hip stuff though. club-hip. collector-hip. so, not forgotten by a long shot no matter what you call it. and that's the thing. there are 80s tracks that you could call electro, disco, post-disco, funk, boogie, dance, club, AND r&b. call it what you like. just don't call me late for dinner!

Unfortunately her just-released new single “Please Please Please” (not a James Brown cover) is a bit “mid”, as the kids say. But it was cute seeing her with her real-life boyfriend in the video.

I like "Espresso" fine but find it weirdly forgettable. As in, I literally have trouble remembering how it goes when I'm not listening to it. The melodic range feels too limited, maybe.

I like the song and that essay, I'm not sure the song is quite the ideal vehicle for the essay

That's my only cavil. "Espresso" does not sound like early '80s R&B.

I also thought mapping Anderson .Paak's "Am I Wrong" over D Train was maybe a little bit of a stretch, but whatever it takes to introduce new listeners to boogie, all for it

ha, I did the same.

For some reason my brain keeps associating Espresso more with 90s stuff like Return of the Mack, Fastlove, and several singles from Canadian boyband SoulDecision (like Faded and Oooh It's Kinda Crazy) than 80s Boogie.

for me it's peak Aeroplane/Tensnake nu-disco era nostalgia

if you listen to any of the remixes of espresso you will note that nobody picked up on any early 80s vibe and they just do boring house stuff to it.

My first thought about “Espresso” was that maybe it means CRJ can have another hit. It feels somewhat in her wheelhouse to me, which also obv derives significantly from ‘80s pop.

Or Magdalena Bay, even more.

I like "Espresso" fine but find it weirdly forgettable. As in, I literally have trouble remembering how it goes when I'm not listening to it.

I agree with this... for a big hit, it is certainly not an "earworm" (at least for me).

truly, a slate editor was so desperate, or is so happy that Charnas is writing for them, that they did not say to him "yeah, I know you wanna make this point, but this song does not support your thesis" as they should have.

I have heard it a bunch of times, but it hasn't lodged itself into my consciousness…the way, for instance, "Million Dollar baby" has.

I've completely forgotten how it goes too! I just get 'Feels' in my head instead plus a couple of other things, but probably just one conscious choice to hear it will make it stick.

if you listen to any of the remixes of espresso you will note that nobody picked up on any early 80s vibe and they just do boring house stuff to it

I think all commissioned remixes of pop songs are contractually bound to be extremely unadventurous these days

Ha. Let me join the group here who do not think "Espresso" is rooted in the music Charnas discusses

i would like "espresso" way more if it reminded me even remotely of evelyn king's "i'm in love" like wtf

i must be doing something wrong because for a song that is constantly being proclaimed 'inescapable' i'm finding it... remarkably easy to escape? i hear these proclamations more often than the song. granted pop music culture is weak rn and there's rarely anything i would use that word for nowadays

that piece was an interesting read but would agree with others' already stated misgivings about it. other nitpicks: i know he wanted to go into the reggie lucas narrative but "never knew love like this" is quite a poor example of a song that 'never knew love on ... most pop stations' given that it was actually bigger on the pop charts (including r&r's airplay-only chart!) than it was on the r&b charts! also i really wish pieces like this would stop talking about the early 80s like a now-unthinkably culturally segregated bygone era when in fact several parts of the last decade were easily just as bad if not even worse in that regard. nearly always overlooked in these retrospectives is the fact that actually a non-negligible number of black artists were still crossing over during this time -- they were just adult contemporary singers, whose hits are now generally dismissed as irrelevant pablum or fatally compromised for mass acceptance among white folks. (incidentally, "never knew love like this before" is precisely one of these adult contemporary crossovers -- it was riding high on that chart about a month before performing similarly on the pop chart.) i don't say all this to suggest that things were not bad back then -- they were -- but instead to point out that, well, crossover from the adult contemporary side of things is almost impossible for black artists now and has been for quite some time! meanwhile crossover from black radio itself remains nearly negligible aside from your jack harlows + there are basically three black artists who are 'native' to the top 40/'mainstream' ecosystem (lil nas x/lizzo/doja cat), all of whom will be on shaky ground w/ programmers in an instant if they fail to deliver hits (two of them are arguably there already), unlike artists like dua lipa and taylor swift who can pump out straight duds (in the former's case) or superstar indulgences (in the latter's) consistently and still coast directly into medium rotation at minimum

and yes like come on this song/artist is not worthy of this connection to great black art at all. ffs this woman makes 'big black cock' jokes during live performances of her ariana grande-imitating first payola'd semi-hit, idk if she's just kinda dumb-slash-racist or if she's angling for a thinkpiece outrage cycle like it's still 2014

btw, what is up with record companies releasing sped-up versions of hit singles as b-sides? They did that with “Feather” and “Espresso”. Like, is that a thing in pop nowadays? Do people really want to hear that? I want some extended dance mixes, dammit!

― Mr. Snrub, Thursday, June 6, 2024 8:09 AM (yesterday)

the sped-up version thing is a TikTok phenomenon aiui

― rob, Thursday, June 6, 2024 8:11 AM (yesterday)

hardly anyone actually wants to hear these. tiktok is the excuse for their existence, but it's really aimed at too-online stans who clamor for more 'versions' to be released so they can purchase more files they won't listen to in hopes that the song will chart higher. this was basically imported from kpop fandom and is now used routinely for artists with highly engaged online fandoms -- artists like nicki minaj, grande, swift. the same driving force is behind the release of endless 'variants' of physical albums, all containing one unique bonus track and an 'alternate cover' or some other such garbage. a good number of these are being purchased by ppl who lack the equipment to even play them but snatch them up anyway out of compulsion to collect or a misplaced desire to 'support my favorite artist uwu'. it's predatory and beyond disgusting. in korea a lot of these end up clogging up donation centers, and in some cases so many end up in those locations that they then end up in landfills. i suspect the same will happen here too before long, tho there are some signs of backlash. we luv capitalism!

but yes anyway those 'versions' are just there so stans chomping at the bit to buy more copies of the same digital files they won't be listening to through the files themselves can do so. the sped up versions aren't *really* meant to be seeding tiktok since it is trivially easy for sped up/slowed down versions of hits to end up as sounds on tiktok regardless of whether they're officially released. many of the songs that become hits in part due to such tiktok sounds only end up having these versions released after the fact or not at all. the artists pre-emptively releasing these versions are 100% doing it for the paypig stans

nearly always overlooked in these retrospectives is the fact that actually a non-negligible number of black artists were still crossing over during this time -- they were just adult contemporary singers, whose hits are now generally dismissed as irrelevant pablum or fatally compromised for mass acceptance among white folk

Look no further than Charnas' own piece. He mentions James Ingram's hits from The Dude. Add Peabo Bryson and Bill Withers-Grover Washington, Jr. and Jeffrey Osborne and -- well, you know already.

any similarity this song might have to that era of roller boogie (or whatever) is totally neutralized by carpenter’s narcotic singing.

it reminds me more of the chiller side of bloghouse than anything charnas cites in the article. something like air france, but warmed over for mass consumption

it makes me think of bloghouse which was like, an approximation of filter house/french touch, which was a flip of chicago flipping disco and boogie records

I think the likely path comes from through that

but people have been doing that for years now ... to me the sabrina record sounds downstream from stuff like, idk, this era of max martin working with ali payami

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqtUuHFAtzg

xp with voodoo chilli, yes, exactly, bloghouse

It's there on the album but she's really playing it up here.

xpost i meant to type "setting / arrangement"

the album is really good isn't it?

"sharpest tool" is kinda heartbreaking. "we never talk about how you found god at your ex's house / always made sure that the phone was face down / seems like overnight i'm just a bitch you hate now" is brutal. some production risks on this one that pay off. i like that behind the joke couplets and the risque bits she has a very adult sense of relationships.

i think "taste" is just a perfect song. so much joy and playfulness in a song about stealing someone's man and then giving him back. "i know i've been known to share" just sends it into overdrive.

my other fav is "coincidence". god it's such a rush to hear the narrator of this story celebrate with affection the obsessive love of her lover for someone else. a song that makes me believe in love and feel it. ugh i just love it! and not to mention what is my personal favorite lol on the album "this week you're holding space for her tongue in your mouth"

another line that's really good is in "dumb & poetic" - "just because you talk like a woman doesn't make you a man." someone could write a thesis on that one.

“nespresso” Remix when

"Taste" is a perfect song, indeed.

The Song Exploder episode w/ her and Jack about "Please Please Please" is fun.

I've been learning "Taste" for a future karaoke session.

the album is really good isn't it?

Like I have said before, my most played album of last year. Voting "Please Please Please" as my song of the year and "Taste" will also make my Top 25. I can't do three because if I did then also "Juno," not to even mention "Good Graces."

been hearing ‘bed chem’ everywhere lately. amazing song

verse of the year on "Bed Chem," that second one

"Bed Chem" definitely my pick of the album

realized this album is giving fleetwood mac vibes a lot of the time

"Bed Chem" does feel more like 2025 as that is the song that is blowing up at the moment.

Adore me, hold me, and explore me
Mark your territory
Tell me I'm the only, only, only, only one
Adore me, hold me, and explore me
I'm so fuckin' horny
Tell me I'm the only, only, only, only one

What an album!

Oh, "Juno" is purest Tango in the Night

"Bed Chem" sounds like The 1975.

"Taste" sounds like The Japanese House, whom I think are produced by the 1975.

don't sleep on "coincidence" you guys that song is a jam.

I was talking with a (former? unsure if he still posts here) ILXor on Bluesky about my inability to grok Sabrina Carpenter and he compared her to Meghan Trainor, which is an association I don’t think I will ever shake now that I have it

behind all the jokes and innuendo and immaculate songcraft her vibe is very trad pop princess - maybe that has something to do with it? it sort of seems like the love interests in her songs are all knuckledragging pretty boys, that she's over all of their bullshit but still falls for them. i gayly relate to that.

there's that hint of polyamory in 'taste' with that line "i know i've been known to share". i think chappell may have done something similar? anyway, i'm hoping for more poly from major pop artists in 2025.

she is approximately 100 times better and more interesting than Trainor

haha right

yeah, sabrina carpenter isn't unlike meghan trainor -- they're both blonde white women riffing on trad tropes who sing cheeky mainstream pop songs and overall rely largely on humor and innuendo to power their songwriting and celebrity. i think where the comparison breaks down is that 'short & sweet' is often really really great and meaghan trainor is..... meaghan trainor? idk how else to say it! it's kinda like eating a slice of domino's pizza and being like "hey this reminds me of one of those great new york slices!" like, you're not wrong... you *are* eating pizza... but anyone w/ taste would be like, well......

i mean, my comparison point for sabrina has always been katy perry, who is definitely better than meghan trainor but is also a white woman pop star riffing on traditional american notions of femininity and sexuality w/ punchline-y music who is divisive, non-respected and at this point kinda the current day avatar for no talent having pop flop desperation. not exactly someone who i'm dying to invoke in relation to one of my favorite albums of the year. but i think what i & other ppl are responding to in 'short & sweet' is that her jokes are both funnier and smarter, her music is indicative of someone w/ better taste in influences and production, and overall it just feels like the specific kinda pop star character we're talking out here has been sharpened to about as fine a point as you could muster. part of the frisson is in how close she gets to being what you describe, but actually tipping over to the other side of just fully nailing it in a way that conveys she's operating on a level that those others cannot. as map alludes to, she says stuff in her songs that resonates w/ the way lots of people feel about romance and dating right now, which i don't think anyone has ever ascribed to trainor or katy perry. 'short & sweet' has all the cotton candy instant gratification goodness of that kinda disposable pop but an emotional depth and ability to show its hand w/ influences while still feeling singular that those other artists have never really gotten close to accomplishing. imo

I was talking with a (former? unsure if he still posts here) ILXor on Bluesky about my inability to grok Sabrina Carpenter and he compared her to Meghan Trainor, which is an association I don’t think I will ever shake now that I have it

― DJP, Wednesday, January 15, 2025 12:59 PM

I think the difference is that while Carpenter will often wink at the listener Meghan Trainor winked so furiously she stabbed her cornea with the eyelashes.

i'm not sure one is winking less than the other, it's just that one writes good jokes and the other doesn't. so the winking actually does the job of drawing you closer.

or like, katy perry "i kissed a girl" is kinda the caveman scrawl version of sabrina's "taste"

MT is like the epic bacon pop artist and Sabrina’s at least joking about subtlety or the lack thereof

I never heard Meghan Trainor outside of a radio single but she struck me as the Austin Powers “do I make you horny, baby?!” of music

there's that hint of polyamory in 'taste' with that line "i know i've been known to share".

The whole song is pretty poly, some of it is just in her intonation — Taylor Swift would make it sound vindictive, "You'll just have to taste me," but Carpenter sounds like she's enjoying the idea.

i still stan golden-age perry hits but imo both her and trainor are pretty awful singers. they just kind of honk away in a narrow range. whereas carpenter's slipping into falsettos hitting sweet dulcet tones. not saying she's a vocal acrobat but i don't think trainor or perry could sing her songs

i've had "espresso" stuck in my head for 2 days while nursing a cold and i can only remember two lyrics: "espresso" and "i guess so"
the rest is melody. she has a knack for making the words irrelevant until you care to pay attention to them. it also leads to massive earworming.

i think the word "vacation" is in there somewhere at the end of a line

“Walked in and dream-come-trued it for you” is just an incredible line

my give a fucks
are on vacation

yeah like when you DO finally realize what the words are, they're clever and funny and v original
i appreciate that

the little hint of nonchalance in "is it that sweet i guess so" is so delish

i also love her hints of bro-down-ableness, referencing nintendo and mountain dew and then the line about high-fiving her girlfriends in another song - i think it's juno?

The part in "Espresso" that I always get stuck in my head is the "I'm working late, cuz I'm a singer." At some point, for no real reason, I started singing "I'm working late, Barack Obama."

Same! She sounds like Alanis in that bit.

my earworm is literally

bleppeta blee bleppeta blo bleppeta blee espresso-o-o
bleppeta blee bleppeta blo bleppeta blee i guess so-o-o

i could look up the words but it wouldn't make it go away it would just make it more detailed

Neither Katy Perry nor Megan Trainor (lol) have that inscrutability that i enjoy about Sabrina Carpenter. I also only remember the lyric "don't embarrass me motherfucker" from the other song. Like, real life kudos to her for squeezing that super relatable sentiment into a pop song.

she has so much relatableness going on! her melodies are great for sure. lots of pleasure in little zaps of truth lightning everywhere in her lyrics too.

The whole song is pretty poly, some of it is just in her intonation — Taylor Swift would make it sound vindictive, "You'll just have to taste me," but Carpenter sounds like she's enjoying the idea.

― paper plans (tipsy mothra), Thursday, January 16, 2025 4:59 AM (sixteen hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

right? there's a hint of this idea that the narrator kind of educated him and took him to the next level and she's getting pleasure out of the ex enjoying the fruits of that.

on paper sc is similar to ts but i think they're coming from very different places. i've tried with swift and i guess i have the stomach for a few songs but i just don't fucking like her and her broad self-conscious schmaltz at all. swift is like the disney channel to sabrina's comedy central? i'm honestly so happy 2024 was the year that broke major pop talent outside of the swift bermuda triangle.

Taylor Swift running off to write a song about being the Bermuda Triangle

The part in "Espresso" that I always get stuck in my head is the "I'm working late, cuz I'm a singer."

Same, the most mundane line but very memorable I guess

My main issue with Taylor Swift these days is that she's painted herself into an aesthetic corner. On TTPD, she's perfected the idea of the Taylor Swift song, with all of the familiar chord changes and production choices and autobiographical lyrics rooted in personal obsessions. It feels hermetic. What's refreshing about Short n Sweet, by contrast, is not just the frothy fun that Sabrina brings to the songs but also their stylistic range, from R&B to country to disco. And it all works, too.

Well well:

On the heels of her double GRAMMY win, global superstar Sabrina Carpenter has announced that the deluxe version of her number 1 album Short n’ Sweet will be released on February 14. The album will feature five new tracks, including a duet with Dolly Parton on “Please, Please, Please.”

Well well well

Just popping into this thread to say that I adored her Grammys performance, okthxbye!

It was a lot of fun!

Between this, Taylor and Charli.. it just doesn't pay to bother buying a new pop album until it's at least a year old.

And Olivia. And almost all of them (annoyingly not Chappell, who reissued the album on vinyl but didn't add anything, including "Good Luck, Babe").

I don't mind the "year later" reissue to re-stoke interest. It's the Taylor and Charli thing of "tomorrow there will be another 6 tracks and then next week 3 more" etc that bothers me most*. I want an album to be an album and know what is. Short n Sweet is gonna be those 12 songs/36 minutes on the vinyl copy I've already got.

*Beyonce actually the worst one for this but not with that intention.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DF70ijjpCWs/