Katy Perry

[Speed Driving Coconuts 637]

Lifetimes is mindlessly boppy enough for it to be a moderate hit. Idk why they aren't pushing it as hard as they did for Woman's World (which is a hot pile of trash)? She needs a new team. I know she's not the best at decision making but I also blame a huge portion of this fiasco to her team and their inability to actually influence Katy in making better decisions. 

[konnichiwalski 1,759]

4 hours ago, Speed Driving Coconuts said:

Lifetimes is mindlessly boppy enough for it to be a moderate hit. Idk why they aren't pushing it as hard as they did for Woman's World (which is a hot pile of trash)? She needs a new team. I know she's not the best at decision making but I also blame a huge portion of this fiasco to her team and their inability to actually influence Katy in making better decisions. 

 

!! honestly, this era should warrant the firing of everyone who greenlit everything, both from her imediate team and her label team. I can't remember an era being dead before arrival like this one.

[Lasso 12,294]

 

[blameitonme 15,457]

absolutely obsessed with her having 3 flop eras  

[manicpixxxie 69]

13 minutes ago, blameitonme said:

absolutely obsessed with her having 3 flop eras  

That's what you get when you're trying to be relatable with out giving a gram of introspection or artistic substance. 

Katy & her team should pick a side because these past era's felt like a "let's try something new" instead of "I know what I'm doing".

I actually think witness could have been something if she kept on the world conspiracy theatre kid act, cuz it felt genuine. 

I guess she's just constantly compared to her Teenage Dream success but the music feels like she wants nothing to do with that era and comes off as trying really hard. 

[lakeemmahottie 1,269]

Listening to Roar in a fish and chip bar... we lost a legend

[Candy Necklace 5,756]

the hype was there for her comeback and she killed it before even fully launching the era  I can't even feel bad for her anymore because this is 3 in a row that she/her team messes up. someone had to have told her that working with that guy wasn't a good idea + the type of music the people wanted isn't the empowerment stuff that is so 2010s. if anything, she should've taken notes from Harley's in Hawaii, that song goes viral like every 6 months 

[malifruit 139]

OK now that we know Lifetimes tanked I have to say this somewhere... I don't really understand the claim that "Katy gets more shit for working with Luke than anyone else." Rant incoming.

Spoiler

We all remember the viral article from when Slut Pop released, and Say So got one too. When I look up "Latto Dr. Luke" the first result is an article covering the controversy. I remember seeing dozens (if not hundreds) of disappointed comments in just one thread when Nicki worked with Luke on Super Freaky Girl. So it's not actually new to talk about Luke's involvement in someone's hit song, or to pressure them not to work with him, and it's not surprising that pressure is building with each new artist people slam for it, or with Kesha finally getting free. More eyes are on Luke (& his collaborators) than ever.

 

IMO, there are two major reasons people are giving Katy more shit than other artists.

 

1) Katy Perry stopped working with Dr. Luke. There has never been Kim Petras without Luke. Doja Cat signed to him before the case (and dumped him ASAP). Nicki Minaj is married to a sex offender and therefore free of any expectation to be a good person. Latto has been coming up for about five seconds. None of these people are Katy Perry: one of the most famous, successful, and wealthy women alive, whose entire careers were credited to Luke, who then chose to stop working with him in light of the suit. Technically, Katy went on the record as making the call due to fears of backlash, but when she continued not to work with him on Smile, there was room for fans to hope she made a moral decision.

 

Today, there are dozens of other successful producers in the business, including people she's worked with before. Jack Antonoff. A. G. Cook. Easyfun. George Daniel. Kid Harpoon. Cirkut. Cashmere Cat. Dan Nigro. Ryan Tedder. Benny Blanco. Tame Impala. Jon Bellion. Zedd. Alesso. Fuck it, Max Martin is still kicking! I'm sure if I spent five more minutes researching I could find 20 more names with recent well-received tracks who would've been happy to work with legendary artist Katy Perry to make any kind of music she wanted.

 

Katy has options. Kim, Doja, and arguably even Latto had reason to feel like they didn't. Katy has made some attempt since the Kesha case to look like she has morals (see: Witness promo). Nicki Minaj hasn't. Even Kim, arguably, has drawn her line in the sand. Nobody expects Kim not to work with Luke anymore, whether it's because she's desperate or doesn't care. Meanwhile, Katy Perry has all the options in the world, coincidentally stopped working with Luke during her #feminist era, and is now back with him. I guarantee you if Doja tried to get back with Luke the feedback would be swift there too. (And, FTR, I think people should continue to pressure every artist who works with Luke to stop doing so. I also think they should pressure Beyonce not to work with The-Dream. I'm pretty sure this is the majority opinion of people criticizing Katy? All support of abusers is bad.)

 

2) The music is bad. When the music is good, people have something to talk about other than Dr. Luke's involvement. In Katy's case, the music is dull and uninspired, and it's relevant that she got back with the producer who made her great in the '10s only to not be able to make even a single good song with him today. Years and years and years of people claiming this was the brains behind the Katy Perry boom, and even he can't make her succeed in 2024. His involvement is relevant even if you don't consider him a terrible person. And if you do, for better or for worse, it stings even more because "she worked with him and she couldn't even get a good song out of it." It's not like it would be ethically justified if she was making good music or getting bank, but because she's not, it's even more pathetic. She threw away her morals for nothing.

 

Aaaaaaaaand I'm done. Not saying this about everyone here because it seems like we're on the same page, but it's annoying as hell to have to field this in every other discussion about Katy as if there isn't good (or at least obvious) reason for how people are acting.

 

inb4 comment on my icon/signature... yeah I know I suffer more than Jesus

[Dark City 2,818]

Idc about anyone, I’ll just be enjoying the new era and the new album when it drops 

[Speed Driving Coconuts 637]

8 hours ago, malifruit said:

OK now that we know Lifetimes tanked I have to say this somewhere... I don't really understand the claim that "Katy gets more shit for working with Luke than anyone else." Rant incoming.

  Hide contents

We all remember the viral article from when Slut Pop released, and Say So got one too. When I look up "Latto Dr. Luke" the first result is an article covering the controversy. I remember seeing dozens (if not hundreds) of disappointed comments in just one thread when Nicki worked with Luke on Super Freaky Girl. So it's not actually new to talk about Luke's involvement in someone's hit song, or to pressure them not to work with him, and it's not surprising that pressure is building with each new artist people slam for it, or with Kesha finally getting free. More eyes are on Luke (& his collaborators) than ever.

 

IMO, there are two major reasons people are giving Katy more shit than other artists.

 

1) Katy Perry stopped working with Dr. Luke. There has never been Kim Petras without Luke. Doja Cat signed to him before the case (and dumped him ASAP). Nicki Minaj is married to a sex offender and therefore free of any expectation to be a good person. Latto has been coming up for about five seconds. None of these people are Katy Perry: one of the most famous, successful, and wealthy women alive, whose entire careers were credited to Luke, who then chose to stop working with him in light of the suit. Technically, Katy went on the record as making the call due to fears of backlash, but when she continued not to work with him on Smile, there was room for fans to hope she made a moral decision.

 

Today, there are dozens of other successful producers in the business, including people she's worked with before. Jack Antonoff. A. G. Cook. Easyfun. George Daniel. Kid Harpoon. Cirkut. Cashmere Cat. Dan Nigro. Ryan Tedder. Benny Blanco. Tame Impala. Jon Bellion. Zedd. Alesso. Fuck it, Max Martin is still kicking! I'm sure if I spent five more minutes researching I could find 20 more names with recent well-received tracks who would've been happy to work with legendary artist Katy Perry to make any kind of music she wanted.

 

Katy has options. Kim, Doja, and arguably even Latto had reason to feel like they didn't. Katy has made some attempt since the Kesha case to look like she has morals (see: Witness promo). Nicki Minaj hasn't. Even Kim, arguably, has drawn her line in the sand. Nobody expects Kim not to work with Luke anymore, whether it's because she's desperate or doesn't care. Meanwhile, Katy Perry has all the options in the world, coincidentally stopped working with Luke during her #feminist era, and is now back with him. I guarantee you if Doja tried to get back with Luke the feedback would be swift there too. (And, FTR, I think people should continue to pressure every artist who works with Luke to stop doing so. I also think they should pressure Beyonce not to work with The-Dream. I'm pretty sure this is the majority opinion of people criticizing Katy? All support of abusers is bad.)

 

2) The music is bad. When the music is good, people have something to talk about other than Dr. Luke's involvement. In Katy's case, the music is dull and uninspired, and it's relevant that she got back with the producer who made her great in the '10s only to not be able to make even a single good song with him today. Years and years and years of people claiming this was the brains behind the Katy Perry boom, and even he can't make her succeed in 2024. His involvement is relevant even if you don't consider him a terrible person. And if you do, for better or for worse, it stings even more because "she worked with him and she couldn't even get a good song out of it." It's not like it would be ethically justified if she was making good music or getting bank, but because she's not, it's even more pathetic. She threw away her morals for nothing.

 

Aaaaaaaaand I'm done. Not saying this about everyone here because it seems like we're on the same page, but it's annoying as hell to have to field this in every other discussion about Katy as if there isn't good (or at least obvious) reason for how people are acting.

 

inb4 comment on my icon/signature... yeah I know I suffer more than Jesus

 

You make good points. I'll just have to add that I think Woman's World being the lead single and the song being a hot pile of garbage while also being produced by Luke really killed all the momentum this era could have had. It's one thing to work with him, but it's another to work with him and get something much worse than anything you've produced without him. It just doesn't make sense why she thought this was a good idea. As you've said, she has options. Her most successful post-Chain to the Rhythm era was Never Really Over, a song produced by Zedd and was beloved by fans (and is often cited as something that should have been bigger if pushed better). Not to mention Harley's in Hawaii keeps randomly getting picked up by the tiktok algorithm. That proves she still has it even post-Witness! She just got too desperate and her team blindly followed her. I sincerely think she needs to fire her entire team, change labels, and start anew after this album cycle. 

[Oshawott 83]

Admittedly I did kind of enjoy her floppage during Witness, mostly because I was still sore about the Roar/Applause thing, but I actually thought the album was fine as a whole. CTTR itself was a pretty good lead single in hindsight and arguably the only song on the album that had a good social message that actually resonated imho. Too bad Bone Apple Tea and Swish Swish were generic as hell and sort of ruined the point of "purposeful pop". 

 

Then Smile came and flopped harder, which I thought was actually a shame and I started to feel bad for Katy. NRO was a great pop song and so was HIH, but she was screwed over during the release of the latter because her label was stuck using early-2010s promo methods and not being able to adapt to the current streaming environment. 

 

But I'm back to being annoyed at Katy in this era due to her and her team not learning any lessons from her previous two album rollouts, and her actually taking a major step back by working with Luke again. She had garnered a lot of goodwill over the past couple of years with American Idol and TikTok making HIH go viral at one point, but she completely botched it. I genuinely don't know what her next step should be because she's pretty much dug her own grave. 

[malifruit 139]

On 8/23/2024 at 4:11 PM, Oshawott said:

Admittedly I did kind of enjoy her floppage during Witness, mostly because I was still sore about the Roar/Applause thing, but I actually thought the album was fine as a whole. CTTR itself was a pretty good lead single in hindsight and arguably the only song on the album that had a good social message that actually resonated imho. Too bad Bone Apple Tea and Swish Swish were generic as hell and sort of ruined the point of "purposeful pop". 

 

Then Smile came and flopped harder, which I thought was actually a shame and I started to feel bad for Katy. NRO was a great pop song and so was HIH, but she was screwed over during the release of the latter because her label was stuck using early-2010s promo methods and not being able to adapt to the current streaming environment. 

 

But I'm back to being annoyed at Katy in this era due to her and her team not learning any lessons from her previous two album rollouts, and her actually taking a major step back by working with Luke again. She had garnered a lot of goodwill over the past couple of years with American Idol and TikTok making HIH go viral at one point, but she completely botched it. I genuinely don't know what her next step should be because she's pretty much dug her own grave. 

What's really crazy is the sheer amount of directions she had to go in. I saw at least three different things called for by large groups of fans-- pop rock from her early days (this was me. still grieving the Olivia Rodrigo collab rumor ), big 2010s pop, and the retro direction of NRO/HiH. She chose 2010s pop, which is totally fine, but for some reason she didn't make good music?? That's what really boggles me. There are tons of people doing a good job with the sound right now! Not saying that Bonnie McKee is topping charts or anything, but the music itself is good, and that's all Katy needed. Her name pretty much takes care of promo by itself. Why couldn't KATY PERRY make good 2010s music????? With Dr. Luke? Were they asleep or something? Problematique is a no-skips masterpiece, but somehow with six times the producers Katy still couldn't produce two good songs. I feel fucking crazy

[Dark City 2,818]

I don’t get why everyone is obsessed with her not charting anymore, I mean if you’re a fan you should enjoy the music not her ability to chart. Can’t wait for september 20! 

[bored 7,937]

She should've just went for the acoustic album, played into the whole "being a mom" thing. Give us some more songs like I'm Still Breathing, Daisies and Thinking Of You! Even her cover of Hackensack was amazing!

 

Kinda sad she thought the only way she would be successful was to artistically retreat back to the black hair/pin up aesthetic. And then the ludicrous decision to work with THAT producer in hopes of regaining past glories.

 

I really don't know where she would go from here and thanks to this era's antics, I frankly don't care or empathise for her.

[Let the Light In 18,208]

This was insane 

[details 16,733]

56 minutes ago, Let the Light In said:

This was insane 

the one that got away being the lowest peak here is kinda wild, i remember it being much bigger than teenage dream, part of me and definitely bigger than wide awake

[blameitonme 15,457]

this era crashing and burning before the album is even out is insane

[Embach 35,755]

On 8/31/2024 at 9:22 PM, Let the Light In said:

This was insane 

I remember reading that Wide Awake actually was 1# but Billboard purposely manipulated the results so she wouldn't break Michael Jackson's record or something  

 

I'm also surprised that The One That Got Away was 3#, it was played even more on radios and channels than half of the singles

[Oshawott 83]

On 8/31/2024 at 11:22 AM, Let the Light In said:

This was insane 

 

I like how it goes from 3 kinda/sorta normal looks, to space alien, 80s nerd, walking USMC advertisement and purple witch.

But wow, what a moment.

 

9 hours ago, Embach said:

I remember reading that Wide Awake actually was 1# but Billboard purposely manipulated the results so she wouldn't break Michael Jackson's record or something  

 

I realize that this is a conspiracy theory so it's not meant to make much sense, but she had already technically broken his record with Part of Me since that was the 6th #1 song off the record if we count the re-released Teenage Dream: Complete Confection album as part of that era. A 7th #1 wouldn't have made a difference in that case.
 

[Dark City 2,818]

I’m so seated for 143!