It could be argued that Katy Perry is beginning to reaffirm herself as a ‘modern-day’ pop icon. Returning with ‘Never Really Over’ her latest single that is currently thrusting Perry back into the charts and public attention, she has delivered a track that could possibly become one of the crossover tracks of the summer.
The single is an uplifting EDM affair produced by Zedd and Dreamlab and a must listen for EDM/pop lovers – and of course Perry’s self-named fans the Katycats. The track features Perry’s signature belted vocals over an almost ambient sounding build up in the choruses, which, by the time you’ve reached the euphoric post-chorus (and if you are fan of dance-pop) will surely have you smitten back under the spell of this pop titan. Its a release that has propelled Perry into a new sound that she sorely needed in order to keep up with how quickly modern pop music is changing. No longer can the cheesy, but loveable pop hits like ‘Roar’ or ‘Firework’ reach the mainstream audience. Styles of music like EDM, R&B and rap are now the way to fall back into the limelight and we’ve seen this shift in artists like Ariana Grande, who has managed to go from bubble gum pop like ‘Problem’ to the R&B influenced sound of ‘7 Rings’ a transition guaranteeing her continuous success.
Perhaps Katy Perry is following suit and evolving into an EDM star? Although we may find that rather like Madonna – the pop goddess of reinvention before her – there will be a mixture of new genres to come whilst she experiments with her new sound and image to see which new ‘Katy’ suits her best.
This track however is not the first time Zedd and Perry have collaborated. Zedd’s last single ‘365’ featured her but unfortunately had a lukewarm response due mainly to the melody being forgettable in some respects and the production definitely not matching the usual talent of the world renowned producer. The signs are there that the current collaboration will have a more successful fate and in true modern pop single fashion, there is an abundance of nine songwriters on this one track (Anton Zaslavski, Dagny Norvoll Sandvik, Daniel James, Gino Barletta, Harley Warner, Jason Gill, Leah Haywood, Michelle Buzz and Perry herself).
Even former rival Taylor Swift has shown her support by adding it to her Apple Music playlist. Perhaps this is a subtle hint that a collaboration between the two is possible in the future? Swiftys and Katycats all over the world are surely holding their breath hoping for this announcement.
Although ‘Witness’, Perry’s previous album, yielded hits like ‘Bon appetit’ and ‘Swish Swish’ which performed fairly well, some fans were underwhelmed by the album’s content. This is most likely due to the high bar for pop hits that Perry has set herself since ‘Prism’. This new direction looks to have fans hoping that this next era will hit the mark that her last album missed.
With ‘Never Really Over’ no doubt a precursor to a new album it will be interesting to see how this once indisputable queen of pop music will evolve in a bid to reclaim that title. She has certainly started that journey on the right foot with what could very well be one of the smash hits of the summer.
