Look out, world, the music industry has a new pop powerhouse! Sabrina Carpenter first entered public consciousness in the early 2010s, known for playing Maya Hart in the Disney Channel series “Girl Meets World.” Her popularity skyrocketed in 2022 with the release of her hit songs “Nonsense” and “Feather.” This past August, Carpenter dropped her sixth studio album, “Short n’ Sweet,” and in the album’s first week alone it landed itself on the Billboard 200 with 362,000 first-week units. All 10 newly-released tracks joined singles “Espresso” and “Please Please Please” on the top half of Billboard’s Hot 100; Carpenter is definitely having her moment right now, and as a long-time fan, I am here for it.
If I were to summarize the overarching themes of “Short n’ Sweet,” I would say that the album expresses Carpenter’s sexuality and the highs and lows of trying to find love in our time. Like many other former child stars—Miley Cyrus, Olivia Rodrigo and JoJo Siwa, to name a few—Carpenter seems to be making a concerted effort to distance herself from her childhood image and come across as more grown-up, and the raunchiness of her songs “Taste” and “Bed Chem” do just that. The album also includes a great deal of wordplay, which is something that Carpenter became known for while opening for Taylor Swift on “The Eras Tour”; in each city she played, she would change the outro of her song “Nonsense” to include puns about that city.
The album’s first track, “Taste,” serves as a strong opening, with its edgy, almost rock-like qualities and opening line of, “Oh, I leave quite an impression / five feet, to be exact.” Many have speculated that the song is about Carpenter’s fellow musicians Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello, who were in a relationship from 2019 to 2021. In April 2023, the pair were reportedly spotted making out at Coachella, but not before Mendes dated Carpenter earlier that year. Indeed, in “Taste,” Carpenter addresses her ex’s new lover (Cabello, it seems), telling her, “Heard you’re back together, and if that’s true / You’ll just have to taste me when he’s kissing you.” The song’s music video, which is inspired by the 1992 dark comedy “Death Becomes Her,” centers around a bloody battle between Carpenter and the actress Jenna Ortega that ends in them killing the man they were fighting over and getting together in the end. The video has taken the internet by storm, amassing over 60,000,000 views on YouTube.
For most people, the song that has become synonymous with the “Short n’ Sweet” era is the album’s lead single, “Espresso.” Carpenter released “Espresso” last April, and it is now the most listened-to song in her discography with over 1.2 million streams on Spotify. With its catchy beat and clever lyrics, “Espresso” checks all the boxes for a pop hit, which is exactly what it became; for a moment in time, the lyrics “That’s that me espresso” and “I’m working late ’cause I’m a singer” were ubiquitous no matter what social media platform you chose to scroll on. Several people have deemed “Espresso” the song of Summer 2024, and I have to agree.
Of course, though, I cannot talk about the “Short n’ Sweet” singles without also mentioning “Please Please Please,” which Carpenter released in early June. In stark contrast to the upbeat vibe of “Espresso,” “Please Please Please” shows a more vulnerable side of Carpenter; though the song is in a major key, which lends itself to a cheerful sound, the rawness of the lyrics create a completely different feeling. In “Please Please Please,” Carpenter addresses her contentious significant other, urging him not to embarrass her, even going so far as to suggest he stay out of the public eye. It is hard to choose a favorite out of these two songs because they are rather incongruous but both fantastic songs in their own right; for instance, while I do enjoy “Espresso” as a hype song, I find the earnest lyricism and emotional depth of “Please Please Please” very compelling as well. All of this is to say, the duality of these two songs is a testament to Carpenter’s incredible range as a songwriter and artist.
When I listened to “Short n’ Sweet” in full for the first time, I found a clear favorite in “Slim Pickins,” the album’s ninth track. While it fits well with the rest of the album thematically—a lament about how hard it is to find a good guy—its sound skews more towards country rather than pop, complete with a banjo and Carpenter singing in what sounds like a Southern drawl. With the increasing popularity of pop artists performing country music, triggered by Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” album, it is not a surprise that Carpenter opted to go country. While “Slim Pickins” is different from her usual sound, Carpenter’s choice to include a folk-like ballad on this album was a strong one. I did not notice this until I saw an Instagram reel that pointed it out, but after the line, “The Lord forgot my gay awakening,” Carpenter sampled the notification sound from Grindr, a popular dating app within the queer community. This goes to show her cleverness and attention to detail.
Just as “Taste” was the perfect track to open the album with, “Don’t Smile,” the final track, ties a ribbon on the album quite nicely. Compared to the other songs on “Short n’ Sweet,” “Don’t Smile” evokes sadness both with its lyrics and sound, bringing to mind the depression associated with the immediate aftermath of a breakup. In the opening lines, Carpenter tells her ex, “Don’t smile because it happened, baby, cry because it’s over / Oh, you’re supposed to think about me every time you hold her.” Coming full circle, this line alludes to Carpenter’s unforgettable nature, a recurring motif in the album.
All in all, “Short n’ Sweet” is an enjoyable listen from start to finish that conjures a whole slew of emotions in the listener. The themes are clear, and given the album’s popularity, it is safe to say that many of Carpenter’s listeners find them relatable. If I were to levy one criticism, it would just be that the order of the songs does not accurately reflect the cycle of falling in and out of love; for example, I might have put “Juno,” which describes the initial feelings of infatuation, higher in the tracklist than “Coincidence,” a song that falls more towards the end of the love cycle as Carpenter addresses a cheating partner. That being said, that may have been an intentional decision on the part of Carpenter, as the process is not always linear. Either way, though, I would easily rate the album a 10 out of 10 and strongly urge you to give it a listen. One thing is for sure—Carpenter was right in “Taste” when she said that she leaves quite an impression.
[Correction: An earlier version of this article stated that “Espresso” amassed 1.2 million streams on Spotify. “Espresso” has amassed 1.2 billion streams on Spotify.]
Espresso amassed over 1.2 billion plays on Spotify, not just 1.2 million as stated in the article.