Ariana Grande – ‘yes, and?’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSSUa2qW4tc&pp=ygUVYXJpYW5hIGdyYW5kZSB5ZXMgYW5k
Life is fickle. Sometimes, you’re everybody’s favourite pop star on the planet, and sometimes, you’re pop’s public enemy number one (or, at the very least, in the top 10). It’s a flip that Ariana Grande’s...
Arianators - the wait is over! For just over three patient years, stans have been assembled in hope of a crumb of information on AG7, a sign that their hero would return to her status as one of pop’s...
Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s iconic 2001 release ‘Murder on the Dancefloor’ has always been a certified banger, but since the release of , the Emerald Fennell's raunchy class satire Saltburn, the track has swiftly made its way back into the charts....
Sprints - 'Heavy'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1R7hcVwlQE&t=1s
“Do you ever feel like the room is heavy?” Aiming to capture the itchy, unrelenting vibe of a sudden panic attack, ‘Heavy’ by Sprints is surprisingly cathartic, the mark of a band who know how to find...
There’s an intrinsic irony to the fact that a large portion of the words historically twisted and turned against women – ‘loud’, ‘emotional’, ‘dramatic’ – are the exact qualities that make for a really brilliant pop star. Melodrama, specifically,...
When Olivia Rodrigo appeared on the BBC Live Lounge in October, there were a million and one songs she could have covered. But in the spirit of the changing weather, she opted for ‘Stick Season’, a sensitive, mid-tempo country-folk...
Stefflon Don – 'Deadly'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4PPcvh_F-M
The brand new sultry Afro-R&B love song weaves Stefflon Don's dynamic patois-infused flow with Victony’s unmistakable vocal to create an insatiable love story, which paints another picture of her forthcoming debut album. The track is rooted...
Choosing an album of the year is never an easy task. We are lucky here at The Forty-Five, to have a community of music writers all with disparate tastes and opinions – but sweet lord, does that make compiling...
Abby Roberts – ‘Volatile’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9I9ltfnu0Nc
Abby Roberts might explain the backstory behind ‘Volatile’ as “about getting this pent-up anger and frustration that was caused by the reckless behaviour an ex-friend off of my chest”, but the track doesn’t go for the...
Forget Christmas — it’s already awards season, baby! Hot on the heels of the 2024 Grammys longlist announcement, the BRIT Awards have dropped their nods for their Rising Star award, introduced in 2008 as a glowing prediction of the...