Ariana Grande’s petal is a twelve-track album built on a single idea: pull from everywhere she has been before, and make it sound new. The result is an album that never quite lands, a record where the voice remains the star even when the songs underneath it refuse to rise.
Opening Tracks Set the Tone
kiss me opens the record with a gentle, piano-led ballad that sets the tone for what follows: Grande singing about love that is both wanted and hard to hold onto. It’s pleasant, but it also signals the album’s central problem early: a singer who can hit every note she aims for, and a writer who seems less sure about where to aim them.
hate that i made you love me follows with a stronger sense of urgency. It’s a track about wanting someone back even while knowing the feeling is wrong, and it earns some of the album’s best moments through its directness.
Middle Stretch Struggles
petal, stay, and oh well form a stretch of songs that lean on repetition and atmosphere over precise writing. big feelings tries to build a case for itself with a bigger chorus, but it doesn’t quite land either. The three tracks sit together as the album’s weakest run, songs that don’t do enough to justify their place on the record.
freak stands out here as the one that almost works, a track that reaches for something edgier than the rest of the record. It’s the closest the album comes to a statement of intent, even if the statement isn’t fully carried out.
“I think they’ll feel familiarity and comfort in it because it just feels like it pulls from many different parts of myself. And yet at the same time, it is very experimental and different for me.”
Back Half Closes With Two Strong Songs
warning signs (interlude) breaks the rhythm briefly before like i do arrives as the album’s strongest moment. It’s a track that finally pairs Grande’s vocal precision with a melody that matches it, a song that shows what the album could have been throughout.
never get over me keeps the momentum going, another track where the writing matches the delivery. Then bad thing (bunny hop) brings in a production shift that gives the record its most distinctive sound.
nowhere, nobody closes the album on a quiet note, a fitting end to a record that spends most of its runtime searching for its footing.
What Works, What Doesn’t
The album’s strengths are easy to name:
- like i do — the track that finally gets the voice and the writing on the same page
- never get over me — another strong example of the same pairing
- Grande’s vocal control, which remains the best instrument in pop music today
- The ambition behind pulling from multiple eras of her career
Its weaknesses are harder to ignore:
- petal, stay, and oh well — three tracks that add nothing new to the record
- A writing style that favors comfort over risk
- A running time under 36 minutes that still feels padded in spots
The Verdict on petal
The New York Times praised Grande’s singing, and that observation holds up across the record. What doesn’t hold up is the writing around those vocals, an issue that has followed Grande across her recent work.
petal is a competent record from a performer who has rarely been anything less than that. It’s not a failure, but it’s also not a step forward. It’s a holding pattern, a record that respects the past while refusing to commit to the present.
- kiss me3:40
- hate that i made you love me3:18
- petal3:04
- stay2:28
- oh well3:16
- big feelings2:54
- freak3:20
- warning signs (interlude)1:17
- like i do2:47
- never get over me3:49
- bad thing (bunny hop)3:28
- nowhere, nobody2:52
