Sound the “Renegade†alarm. The pop genre was given mouth to mouth, taught a TikTok dance, and revived on August 18 when Addison Rae released new music for the first time in over two years. It’s a five-track album without a single song that runs for longer than three minutes, but still. The 22-year-old TikTok star turned aspiring actress and musician tweeted (X-ed?) album art of herself blowing bubble gum on August 14 with the caption “dug up a few of the leaks from the lost album 💗 AR 8.18.†Her album was unceremoniously leaked last August, and now the bad bleep has reclaimed her ticket to the kingdom of pop princesses.
After all, the way that she teased song titles on her website showed that Ms. Rae has taken more than a few classes at the Taylor Swift School of Announcements and Easter Egging. Ahead of the release, her website featured a singular floating bubble of gum surrounded by scribbled phrases, presumably song titles: “I Didn’t See It Coming,†“It Could’ve Been U,†“Ruin My Life,†and more. But she kept her fans on their toes, because some of those phrases turned out to be lyrics within her songs. One reads “If I Lost You I’d Still Have Me — I Can’t Lose,†a reference to a lyric from her debut single released on March 18, 2021, “Obsessed,†which serves everything Jocelyn from The Idol wished she could’ve, but didn’t. Fans correctly suspected that Charli (XCX, not D’Amelio) would have a feature on the album, after Rae told Variety that she had collaborated with Charli in 2021. The “Speed Drive†singer did respond to Rae’s tweet announcing the songs, saying “cult classic.†They ended up collaborating on “2 die 4,†the track that mentions a poom poom boom-boom to, well, die for. With the pending release of Animal Friends and Thanksgiving, both of which Rae will star in as part of her ongoing movie deal with Netflix, a pop hit is just what she needs to make this a banner year for Rae Nation. And she’s made it clear that she loves a silly little tune.
This post has been updated.