While “Espresso” singer Sabrina Carpenter has been releasing music since 2014, only a decade and six albums later has she gained international fame alongside the likes of Olivia Rodrigo or Chappell Roan.
So why did it take so long for the twenty-five-year-old pop singer to get her flowers?
Early Life
Carpenter’s passion for singing began at a young age and blossomed with the creation of her own YouTube channel, where she posted covers of songs from artists from Adele to Etta James to Taylor Swift. Carpenter quickly got noticed when she placed third out of over ten thousand contestants in The Next Miley Cyrus Project, a national singing competition that landed her a deal with Hollywood Records at age twelve.
While developing what would be her debut album in April of 2015, “Eyes Wide Open,” Carpenter started acting in guest roles on popular series like NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” and Disney Channel’s “Sofia the First.”
Then she landed the role in 2013 that solidified her rise to fame, Maya Hart in Disney Channel’s “Girl Meets World” (a spinoff of the hit 90’s sitcom “Boy Meets World”).
Disney Girl
While acting full time in “Girl Meets World” and other small projects, Carpenter released her second studio album, “Evolution,” in 2016, and headlined two concert tours. From there, she continued growing steadily in popularity as she starred in shows and movies like the Disney Channel Original Movie “Adventures in Babysitting” and Disney Channel’s “Milo Murphy’s Law,” appeared on talk shows and in festivals, and even opened for popular artists like Ariana Grande on her Dangerous Woman Tour.
After running for three seasons, “Girl Meets World” concluded in 2017, leaving Carpenter to figure out how to break free of the Disney mold.
Moving past Disney
We’ve seen the trials and tribulations of Disney girls before and after her: Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, Debby Ryan, Zendaya. While some have continued to find great success in their careers, it’s often difficult to transition from a sweet, wholesome Disney Channel star to being seen as a grown woman with her own opinions and autonomy.
In a “Seventeen” article from 2018, Sabrina talks about the cautious approach she took to moving into a more mature phase in her life and professional career. By tackling more serious projects like “The Hate U Give” and changing her sound to be more R&B and dance-pop oriented, she hoped to prove herself mature without changing her content to be extremely explicit or fictitious.
Her strategy was proving to be successful with the high praise of her dual-act albums “Singular Act I” and “Singular Act II,” particularly due to singles like “Sue Me” and “Almost Love,” garnering fifty-nine and forty-nine million views, respectively, on YouTube. These new albums dove into a deeper view of Carpenter than ever before, exploring her experiences with anxiety, confidence, and expression of her sexuality. Audiences started to recognize Carpenter for her singing and acting chops, leading her to star in a limited run of the Broadway production of “Mean Girls” as protagonist Cady Heron.
But after only two performances, everything came screeching to a halt with the impact of COVID-19 in March of 2020.
As the world struggled to figure out how to live among masks, vaccines, and working from home, Carpenter released a few projects recorded pre-COVID, like the Netflix film “Work It” and accompanying single “Let Me Move You.” She also got into a relationship that proved to cause quite the drama.
The Love Triangle
In the summer and fall of 2020, Sabrina Carpenter and Joshua Bassett reportedly were in a relationship that ended sometime in 2021. The pair were spotted together at a Black Lives Matter protest, lunch dates, and in TikToks of their coordinating Halloween costumes. While teen celebrity dating lives are always hot gossip, their relationship especially sparked controversy because of the alleged love triangle involving other Disney Channel star Olivia Rodrigo.
Rodrigo and Bassett starred together in the Disney Channel show “High School Musical: The Musical: The Series,” allegedly dating in 2019-2020 during the filming of the show and breaking up sometime shortly before Bassett and Carpenter got together.
When Rodrigo released her debut single “driver’s license” on Jan. 8, 2021, fans quickly jumped at lyrics that possibly alluded to Carpenter, such as “and you’re probably with that blonde girl, who always made me doubt” and “she’s so much older than me, she’s everything I’m insecure about.” Carpenter’s signature blonde hair and four-year age gap from Rodrigo paired with the rumors of both of their relationships with Bassett led people to believe Carpenter might’ve had a role in breaking up “Jolivia.”
Sabrina received a massive wave of hate online and in letters for months, ranging from petty criticizing tweets to death threats. In response, she released the song “Skin” on Jan. 22, 2021, two weeks after “driver’s license” was released. “Skin” was interpreted as Carpenter’s retaliation to the criticism, with lyrics seemingly calling out Rodrigo, like “maybe blonde was the only rhyme” and “don’t drive yourself insane.” Carpenter relayed that she wished her and Rodrigo had the chance to be friends and that one day they could both laugh about the situation. Though this drama was making her into the villain and she couldn’t change people’s negative perceptions, Carpenter stood firmly in her ground, trying to make light and peace out of the situation.
With an abundance of time due to the resounding prevalence of COVID-19 and the popularity of all three subjects involved, this love triangle received a lot of online attention. Lyrics were dissected, social media comments were multiplied, and though a lot of the fame Carpenter received was negative, it did ultimately contribute a lot to her rising status.
Rising Star
As the world started returning to “normal,” Carpenter appeared in more movies like Netflix’s “Tall Girl 2” and Amazon Studios’ “Emergency” while releasing her fifth album in 2022, “emails i can’t send.” This album catapulted her even further up the ladder, especially with the release of the deluxe version, “emails i can’t send fwd:” that debuted hits like “Feather” and “because i liked a boy.” Carpenter also released a signature perfume called Sweet Tooth in the fall of 2022.
All of this led to her performing as an opener for Taylor Swift’s massively popular Eras Tour for several Latin America, Australia, and Singapore shows. The Eras Tour really solidified Carpenter as an international pop star, with fans comparing her to a Barbie or Polly Pocket, hailing her as a pop princess we haven’t had in years.
Part of her virality was due to her “Nonsense” outros, where for each show she’d improv the last lyrics of her song to fit whatever city she was touring in through silly and often sexually suggestive lyrics.
With performances at massive music events and late-night shows like Coachella, SNL, and the VMAs, Carpenter has really established herself as a performer. She’s leaned into a double entendre style of writing, mixing sweet and humorous lyrics with hints of sexual references. Her latest album, “Short n’ Sweet,” released on Aug. 23 of this year, has already been certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America and is the second-longest running number one album of the year on the Billboard 200 behind Taylor Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department.”
Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet tour, her first arena tour ever, kicked off Sept. 23 and with 47 stops, is sure to be a memorable milestone in her flourishing career.
She’s short, she’s sweet, and she’s really successful. Watch out for Sabrina Carpenter.