Tate McRae Hits the Nostalgic Sweet Spot on ‘So Close to What’: Album Review
Tate McRae looks to inspiration from Britney Spears and Nelly Furtado on her nostalgia-indebted third album 'So Close to What.'
On “Cut My Hair,” the opening declaration of her 2023 sophomore album “Think Later,” Tate McRae cast off the gloomy clouds that hung over her oft-downbeat catalog: “Sad girl bit got a little boring,” she proclaimed. Indeed, up until that point, the Canadian pop star was prone to teenage navel-gazing — “Feel Like Shit” and “Don’t Be Sad” had about the subtlety of a “Keep Out” sign hanging on her bedroom door. And so she sized up to big girl pop with “Greedy” and “Exes,” two whip-cracking hits that reupholstered the Y2K serve of her foremothers.
That all-in “TRL” aesthetic — Britney Spears’ dance moves, Nelly Furtado’s hip-pop savvy, Christina Aguilera’s attitude — is the crucial force behind McRae’s third album “So Close to What,” out today. It’s the same sound and approach that leveled her up with “Think Later,” only expanded and refined across a palette that trades introspection for saucy exultation. It’s one thing to cash in on an artistic rubric popularized before you were born — many have tried, many have failed — but to do it convincingly is one of McRae’s bona fides, and throughout “So Close,” she largely clears the path she’s been setting closer to main pop girl.
At 21, McRae conveys an understanding of what it took for this century’s early pop stars to achieve superstardom. She’s got the presentational trifecta — songwriting, singing, performance — and has adjusted it in real time as her unexpected hits and show-stopping live performances put her in the mainstream running. Only, she’s managed to set herself apart from contemporaries on parallel paths: She isn’t Sabrina Carpenter, all bombshell and sarcasm, nor is she Chappell Roan, all theatrics and confessionals. McRae stands alone as a pop allegiant, one with deference to the artists that came before her and a proclivity for their brand of spectacle. (“Greedy,” she told Variety in 2023, was admittedly inspired by Furtado’s “Promiscuous,” a song that looms large over “So Close.”)
Popular on VarietyThus, “So Close” invokes the charm and execution of Spears’ “Britney,” or more specifically Furtado’s “Loose.” It’s sharp and well-toned. Despite a relatively robust 15-track length, it never loses focus. And what McRae can sometimes lack in persona she makes up for in precision. Single “2 Hands,” for instance, is a tightly shuffled gallop of drums and sirens. As the chorus strikes, her vocals scale the octave in exasperation, as if she’s parroting the bubbling desire for intimacy: “I just want your two hands on me / Like my life needs saving.”
McRae collaborated with OneRepublic’s Ryan Tedder for “So Close” — yes, he produced the biggest hits off of “Think Later” — as well as Amy Allen, Lostboy, Emile Haynie, Ilya, Blake Slatkin and more. It’s an embarrassment of riches that coalesces in the right ways: “Sports Car” is like a seance for a lost Timbaland beat, while “Bloodonmyhands” featuring Flo Milli is a pitch-perfect homage to Miami Bass. The technicality of “So Close” is its strong suit; on its face, it’s enough to satisfy nostalgists while competently introducing past sounds to the present.
As a vessel, Mcrae has the raw talents to sell it. Anyone who witnessed her performance on “Saturday Night Live” or at last year’s Madison Square Garden headlining show (she has another coming up in September) knows she’s ready to meet the moment. And she does, for the most part, on a record largely staked on sizzling romance and regret. Only that dichotomy is often skin deep; relationships at that age largely feel bigger than they are, and McRae struggles to invoke the depth that those experiences can bring. She can certainly carry the tune — “I Know Love” featuring her boyfriend Kid Laroi has hit stamped all over it — yet as she drills deeper on the record’s most forthcoming tracks (“Purple Lace Bra,” “Nostalgia”), she lands on one note and often stays there.
But does that even matter? “So Close” leaked in an almost identical iteration of the final album a month ahead of schedule, once a slash on the Achilles’ heel of major label marketing. But contemporary pop stardom is much like a social media following: It’s not always about the product, but rather the personality attached to it. McRae started on YouTube and staked her name on TikTok before her slick pop tunes launched her into orbit. Her audience knows her, and she knows what her audience wants. “So Close” serves it up in spades: Isn’t that what being Miss American Dream is all about?
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