Chart Topping With: Cardi B, Doja Cat, Justin Bieber, Lil Wayne & Taylor Swift: Rapid Fire Reviews
AM I THE DRAMA? - Cardi B
Cardi B's story is something I've always been very interested in. After years of teasing the release of a sophomore record, I really thought she might have waited too long to capitalize on any of the meteoric hype she generated from 2017 to 2020. Now that the record is out and being digested by fans, the verdict is very much still out. One person who thinks about Cardi's place in popular culture even more than I do is Cardi herself. Her debatably triumphant return is the subject of the first two tracks on the record, the pretty good "Dead" and the mediocre "Hello." While Cardi does a lot of flexing on the record, the results are pretty inconsistent, and the best victory lap she takes on the song "Check Please" outclasses everything else.
Another thing Cardi talks about a lot is her love life, most notably her notorious marriage to former Migos member Offset. "Man Of Your Word" is the most direct confrontation, and it absolutely soaks itself in juicy details that heighten the drama. The other best relationship anthem is "Principal," which weaves together a clever hook where Cardi confronts her own acceptance of the romantic treatment she deserves. The reason I'm focusing on highlights is that across this exhausting 23-track album, no idea is done just once. For example, "Pretty & Petty" is a BIA diss track that turned heads when the album first dropped. While Cardi gets a few good shots in, it's worth debating whether BIA was even worth an entire diss track in the first place, something she actually undercuts later on "Killin You Hoes." Despite its conceptual flaws, the song still has much more punch than the tracks where Cardi has no specific target at all.
Finally, there's the pop rap cuts, and I can't believe I'm saying this, they're probably the best of the bunch. For a firespitter like Cardi B, it's almost shocking that a crossover with Selena Gomez on "Pick It Up" is better than either of the more intense singles. The resulting album has imprecise flashes of what made Cardi B so endearing when she first broke through. It has an EPs worth of legitimate highlights, and maybe an album's worth of decent enough, passable songs. But with all of the clutter here, the best two moments by far being two singles that dropped 4 and 5 years ago respectively, it's hard to feel excited about AM I THE DRAMA? 5/10
Vie - Doja Cat
Calling Doja Cat a singles artist will get you tarred and feathered in some circles of the internet, but when you listen to her albums... come on. Doja has made tons of singles that I absolutely love in the last decade, as much as almost any popular artist. But when it comes to her albums, the closest they've ever come to passable was 2023's Scarlet. I didn't really come into Vie expecting that to change, but I expected more than I got. The record's singles didn't really click with me, though I can tolerate "Jealous Type," it was clearly missing something compared to Doja's best work. That continued to be the theme of the entire album which fails to even flash the greatness Doja conjures once or twice a record on average, but maintains all of her persistent flaws.
One of those issues is songs that are completely and utterly pointless. "Couples Therapy," "Stranger," and "One More Time" are all too boring to even have anything to comment on. That's actually pleasant compared to songs like "Silly! Fun!" and "Make It Up" which swing for the fences in much more garish ways that are outright intolerable. "AAAHH MEN!" feels like a song I'm designed to like, and Doja even gets off a few laugh-out-loud shots. Unfortunately, the track's vocal layering is a complete mess and the weird voices Doja uses make all of it impossible to take seriously.
So is the album a complete wash? No, not really. Tracks like "Cards," "Acts Of Service," and "Happy" actually have interesting things to say. Unfortunately, they don't provide much instrumentally that make them worth committing to memory. I like SZA's irresistible appearance on "Take Me Dancing," and the rap verse on the second half of "Lipstain" is by far the record's best moment. The best all-around song here is probably "All Mine," not a deep cut I've seen many people pencil down but one I enjoy every time. I also think the way the record deploys vintage basslines is consistently really satisfying and helps some of these songs feel WAY less boring than they would otherwise. But by and large, this album just feels so uninspired. Even the consistent catchy hooks it feel like I've always been able to expect from Doja are missing, and what results is a far more difficult listen without them. 3.5/1p
SWAG - Justin Bieber
If you had asked me in advance which of these records would be a surprising relief from the slog, I would have never guessed Swag. Part of that is because I had already heard the record through once, alongside its second part SWAG II, which combine for an obnoxious amount of forgettable material. That isn't because the record has no pitfalls. "First Place" has the kind of annoyingly sentimental songwriting that you can find all over a bad Taylor Swift song. It also doesn't have too many songs, making me completely rethink my opinion on Justin Bieber. What it does have is a decently soulful demeanor that's refreshingly uplifting in its gentle demeanor and halfway catchy hooks.
I'll start with the singles that have broken through as big hits because I think they're actually a decent example of what the album does well. "DAISIES" is a breezy, gentle piece of guitar pop that doesn't try to do too much except for be exceedingly pleasant while it's on. I'm not quite as fond of "YUKON" with its pitched-up vocals, but if you've been listening to the Hot 100 much recently, you'll understand why I still find it to be kind of a breath of fresh air. Some of the collaborations on the record also give way to refreshing moments. I've never loved Gunna, but his appearance on "WAY IT IS" switches up the style of the track into a bit of a trap flavor that's pretty welcome. "DEVOTION" has gotten a lot of attention for its Dijon feature, and he's great on the song even if the mix of the two artists' styles isn't always seamless.
My favorite track on the entire album is honestly the under-two-minute "THINGS YOU DO." It's a surprisingly strong deep cut that manages to be both sentimental in a positive way and genuinely catchy. While I'm not as in love with Justin Bieber's soulfulness as Druski is during one of his absolutely unbearable interludes on the album, it's still decent. Comparing it to the other records in this set is absolutely the best light. For all the places where it falls short in a similar way, it never feels anywhere near as difficult to listen to. 5.5/10
Tha Carter VI - Lil Wayne
Every time I listen to this album there's a point where I think, "hey actually this isn't so bad after all." Despite its senseless intro track, the much better "Welcome To Tha Carter" actually does a decent job of building excitement. Even though the hook on "Sharks" is the worst thing I've ever heard Jelly Roll do, it's squished in between two of the record's best tracks. "Hip-Hop" has one of my favorite hooks on the record courtesy of BigXThaPlug. "Banned From NO" is legitimately one of the best songs Wayne has put out in years. But from around that point on, every single idea the album tries is a complete disaster.
You can't really fault Tha Carter VI for being unambitious. In fact, it takes way more risks than much of what Wayne has put out in recent years. The problem? Every single thing he attempts blows up in his face immediately. "Cotton Candy" is the least chemistry that Wayne and 2 Chainz have ever had on a song. "Island Holiday" for some reason chooses to nightmarishly interpolate Weezer's "Island In The Sun," I wish I were joking. In fact, it's not even the worst interpolation on the album as "Maria" uses, and I swear I didn't make this up, "Ave Maria." On "If I Played Guitar," Wayne tries his hand at an instrument he publicly flopped disastrously at using 15 years ago. And finally, there's the viral, and uniquely awful, Lin-Manuel Miranda-produced "Peanuts 2 N Elephant." It's one of the horrors on the record that really can't be described, only heard.
So yes, I won't be contrarian here. I hated this album just as much as everyone else, and a few spare highlights I'm willing to give credit to won't stop that. There's an angle through which it's actually impressive that Lil Wayne continues to work outside the box. But when the ideas are all so bad and end up so poorly executed, it undermines any goodwill he may have earned in the process. 2/10
The Life Of A Showgirl - Taylor Swift
What the fuck.
Last year, in my Worst Hits Of The Year video, I wrote out a whole bit about The Tortured Poets Department being such a legendary flop that I almost appreciated it as a pop culture moment. There goes that, I guess. The Life Of A Showgirl is 10 times the flop and 100 times less enjoyable. Compared to the fact that I had to begrudgingly admit I liked the title track of that album last year, it's 10 million times more embarrassing to say that there is one song on this album I like, "Elizabeth Taylor." Even then, the song reuses a metaphor Taylor had already put on "Ready For It?" 8 years ago. I can get behind the opener and bit hit "The Fate Of Ophelia" as long as I don't pay attention to the lyrics. "Opalite" is pretty inoffensive, which completes a mildly decent start to the album. I also don't hate the title track that closes the record off, though that might just be because it's so refreshing to hear Sabrina Carpenter's voice, or anyone else's voice for that matter.
In between is a genuine disaster. I don't even know where to start. This may be the most embarrassing album ever released by an artist this popular. Let's get right to the heart of the disaster, "Actually Romantic." This horrible diss track is aimed at Charli XCX, who wrote a pretty poignant song on her feelings of being adjacent to Taylor Swift on her critical darling album Brat last year. In response, apparently, Taylor chose to take childish and witless shots at her on the biggest critical bomb of the year. That's the only reason that "Wood," the song that's literally about Travis Kelce's cock, isn't the worst song on the album.
That's even before you get to "CANCELLED," where Taylor brags, for some reason, about her canceled friends. There's "Eldest Daughter," which is literally Taylor getting upset over internet comments like she's not a billionaire. Not to mention lyrical minefields like "Wi$h Li$t" and "Father Figure." The latter of which literally features Taylor comparing dick sizes with the devil. "Ruin The Friendship" is a mediocre version of the Folklore cut "betty," and it's genuinely the best song in the entire middle section. This fucking album. Flops like Reputation and The Tortured Poets Department make me want to write essays about the ways they failed. The Life Of A Showgirl is actually just the worst album of 2025. It's the opposite of fun to listen to. 1/10
