Following a whirlwind of a year spent opening up for Taylor Swift’s the Eras Tour and releasing two record breaking singles, pop singer-songwriter Sabrina Carpenter announced the release of her fourth studio album in June 2024. After two months of anticipation, “Short n’ Sweet” was released on Aug. 23 and was well worth the wait.
Carpenter’s “Short n’ Sweet” left quite an impression on fans, proving as successful as her past album “emails i can’t send,” which included viral songs like “Feather” and “Nonsense.”
The success of “Nonsense” on “emails i can’t send” can mostly be credited to Carpenter’s iconic “Nonsense” outros, in which she alters the final three lyrics of the song to be new cheeky lines that represent the location of her performance. For example, while opening for Taylor Swift in Singapore, her outro included the line “You cleared all my Singa-pores.”
Taking advantage of her ever-growing popularity, on May 17 she released the first single “Espresso” from her album “Short n’ Sweet.” Overnight, “Espresso” became what was declared to be the song of the summer and remained number one on the Billboard Global charts throughout June 2024. Two months after “Espresso,” she released the song “Please Please Please,” which, to no one’s surprise, was another massive hit.
Carpenter has worked in the music industry for nearly 10 years. Starting out as an actor for Disney Channel, she soon embarked on her musical journey at the age of 15. She has had a lot of time to experiment with her music, which propelled her into the pop queen she is today. The bubbly sounds found on “Short n’ Sweet” create a unique feel which separates Carpenter from others in the industry.
Carpenter is known to have no filter. She is unapologetic and unafraid to put her true thoughts and emotions into her music. When writing music, her quirky comedic personality comes across in every song, with many one-liners and playful banter such as, “Please, please, please / Don’t bring me to tears when I just did my makeup so nice,” on her hit song “Please Please Please.”
Her sass and sarcasm is emphasized in many other lyrics on “Short n’ Sweet.” On the track “Coincidence,” Carpenter sings, “Oh, wow, you just broke up again, what a coincidence.” Her sass also comes through on “Good Graces” with the lyric, “Don’t mistake my nice for naïve.”
On “Short n’ Sweet,” breakup anthems are heavily present, a notable mention being the album’s eighth track, “Dumb and Poetic.” The two-minute song is packed with emotional lines and soft chords playing in the background that leave an impact on listeners.
A lot of brilliant musical minds worked on “Short n’ Sweet,” including prominent producer and songwriter Jack Antonoff, who produced the songs “Slim Pickins” and “Sharpest Tool.” Antonoff, who has worked with major artists including Taylor Swift, Lorde and Lana Del Rey, is known for his synth-y, 80’s pop style. Songs produced by Antonoff contain his signature style, including very prominent string assortments.
Other co-writers that worked on “Short n’ Sweet” are Julia Micheals and Amy Allen. The two of them have written some of the biggest songs of this generation; Micheals co-wrote the song “Sorry” by Justin Bieber, and Allen worked on “Greedy” by Tate McRae, “Adore You” by Harry Styles and many more.
While listening to “Short n’ Sweet,” listeners feel like they are flipping through pages of Carpenter’s diary that are filled with clever lines and jokes. Given the ever-growing success of “Short n’ Sweet,” Carpenter’s career may not be short, but it will definitely be sweet.
