I felt good about you 'til I didn't

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts

28/06/24 : The Secret Of Us - Gracie Abrams

I saw this was in with a shout of #1 this week, so decided I'd take the risk and listen to it early - but I didn't really know anything about her other than she supported Taylor on some leg of the Eras tour, so I suspect she's not a million miles away.

And no, she certainly isn't a million miles away. It's not obviously my thang, but I do like a female singer and every so often these things cut through with me - and I think this nearly does. It's odd though because it's so close to Taylor and I'm so "meh" about her that I don't really know why I'd like Gracie - my only conclusion is that my expectations aren't so ridiculously over-inflated. I do feel Gracie makes some more interesting noises though - I particularly liked "Felt Good About You" (a very intriguing opener), "Gave You I Gave You I" and "Normal Thing". It's also worth pointing out that "Us" also features one Ms T Swift - obviously we've not seen enough of her recently.

And not only was she in with a shout of #1, she made it! And the rest of the top five is a young female heavy mix of Taylor, Billie, Charli (hanging in there well) and, er, The Weeknd - I also feel the need to point out Chappell Roan (#6) and Taylor again (#7) continuing the dominance of the ladies. The chart is a bit light on new entries this week - The Mysterines (#11 - I was expecting some fey indie-pop, but it is in fact pretty strong indie-pop reminiscent of Siouxsie or The Throwing Muses - I liked it), Avril Lavigne (#33 - a best-of which I felt perfectly happy ignoring), Kygo (#62 - I assumed this was going to be rap or R&B, but it's more Clean Bandit style pop), Kate Nash (#78 - she's trying so hard to be Lily Allen here) and Joe Bonamassa (#92 - I'm sure this is fine if you like that sort of thing, but it doesn't really do anything for me).

Last week I said that Sea Girls would drop to #57 and I have to report that, for the third week in a row, I'm completely wrong because it's dropped out of the chart entirely - how am I supposed to guess that?!? I don't think Gracie will be dropping out of the chart but I'm second guessing myself here after my terrible run - I'm going for #12 and would like to be close this week, please. And how do we think Taylor is doing this week? OK, I guess - three in the top ten, six in the top twenty and eleven in the whole chart - I wonder if she's doing anything to keep that going at the minute?

Wikipedia gives us yet another link to Taylor - Aaron Dessner (of The National) wrote and produced a lot of it, as he did on Folklore, Evermore and The Tortured Poets Department. And Jack Antonoff is involved as well - the whole gang is here! The critics were very nice about it and also offered up comparisons with Phoebe Bridgers and Lorde - I can certainly get the Lorde thang, but not on all the tracks. Gracie has certainly done well commercially as well, also getting to #1 in Australia and The Netherlands. I then learned from her entry that she's the daughter of JJ Abrams - I imagine that hasn't exactly held her back in life, but for a 24 year old, I think this is a very mature album.

"Customers also listened to" Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, Lizzie McAlpine and, oh lock, Taylor Swift. I can't say I'll be rushing back to it but I really quite liked this - it's certainly up towards the top end amongst the multitude of other such things that are out there!

21/06/24 - Yeah, I didn't mind this
05/07/24 - A bit messy, but not a bad mess