This summer was a dazzling one for pop, with artists achieving long awaited breakout moments. It was brat summer, the era of neon green and 365 party girls. It was Sabrina Carpenter’s tongue-in-cheek “That’s that me, espresso!” that sky-rocketed her towards the highest echelons of fame, and in the words of Vox, “the summer Chappell Roan became impossible to ignore” with her irresistibly dreamy voice and colorful aesthetic that pays homage to the queer community. The major question is why were so many behind-the-scenes artists finally crowned pop it girls this summer? According to the LA Times, it is arguably in part due to audiences’ insatiable craving for a new artist. I would argue that while this is true, the primary reasons behind these three female artists’ wild success is their refreshing and unfiltered femininity and female sexuality.
Let’s take Brat for example. Columnist Zoe Williams’ Brat summer: is the long era of clean living finally over?, defines a brat as an “annoying, dirty, hedonistic, bra-less” girl with a pack of cigarettes in hand. Williams argues that Brat is “a backlash to the clean girl” Tiktok aesthetic. We have all been subjected to clean girl ads on social media. She wears minimal makeup yet has clear, glowing skin and her hair is always in a slicked back bun. As Williams points out, she carries a yoga mat and journal, striving to be physically and spiritually balanced. Her lifestyle feels inherently performative, emphasizing emotional and aesthetic minimalism.
Brat embraces the opposite, portraying a messy, confident, even angry girl. Charli XCX declares in “360” that “the city sewer slut is the vibe,” and she “doesn’t fucking care what you think.” It is an ode to girls who don’t fit into the mold society pressures women to squeeze themselves into: a perfect, beautiful yet asexual, sweet girl who is always polite. The 365 party girl does not minimize her anger, insecurities, anxieties, or physical flaws. She loves alcohol and partying even though people will gossip, and she lets her selfish, annoying, and undesirable parts show sometimes. The song “Mean Girls” describes girls who are misunderstood as being “kind of fucked up” because of their self-confidence, love affairs, and financial success. She sings, “This one’s for all my mean girls/This one’s for all my break-your-boyfriend’s-heart girls/ all my tearing-shit-apart girls.” Â
Brat brazenly addresses female friendship and body image challenges. Charli XCX explores the complex dynamics of female friendship in “Girl, So Confusing,” where she worries her friend secretly hates her and views her as competition, with Lorde and Charli singing the respective parts of two women who are working out the nuances of being female friends in a society that constantly pits women against each other. Lorde addresses the societal stereotype of women always having to be nice and effortlessly beautiful, singing that when she was ten, someone told her “You walk like a b*tch.” She details her struggles to remain positive, singing “For the last couple years/I’ve been at war in my body […]/ I was trapped in the hatred.”
In short, Brat defies the societal definition of femininity. It is messy, confident, and over-the-top while also being 100% vulnerable. It is also fluid, as demonstrated by A Guide to Brat Summer, which shows anything, including non-tangible emotions and experiences, can be Brat. You don’t have to love partying to love Brat. You don’t even have to be like the girl the album details. Brat is about being unabashedly yourself. The album’s portrayal of femininity is so powerful and popular that when Kamala Harris was announced as a U.S. presidential nominee, Gen Z proclaimed that Kamala, who defies gender norms and is pro-choice, was Brat. Charli XCX tweeted, “kamala IS brat,” and the Kamala campaign stood behind the viral tweet, updating her Twitter profile to match the Brat aesthetic.Â
Like Charli XCX’s Brat, Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet asserts its own unique portrayal of femininity, embracing and celebrating all that is hyper feminine with its 1950s vintage aesthetic, pastel short skirts, bouncy curls, red-lipstick kiss stains, and glittery dresses. She states this herself in her Time interview, stating: “Feminity is something that I’ve always embraced. And if right now that means corsets and garter belts and fuzzy robes or whatever the fuck, then that’s what that means.” The album reclaims feminine aesthetics from the 1950s, contrasting it with brash displays of feminine sexuality uncharacteristic of the time through its clever sexual innuendos and its unserious, flirty nature.Â
The album’s singles “Please Please Please” and “Espresso,” topped the Hot 100. These songs captivated audiences with their satirical approaches to romance, with “Please Please Please” depicting Sabrina Carpenter begging her new boyfriend not to embarrass her, saying “Heartbreak is one thing, my ego’s another/I beg you don’t embarrass me, motherfucker.” The song stands out amongst other love songs because it both decenters and parodies the boyfriend figure while also being candid about the anxiety a new relationship can induce.
“Espresso,” similarly decenters men while celebrating the innate power of female sexuality. Female sexuality, particularly depictions of women utilizing their sexuality to gain influence over a man, have long been taboo. Yet “Espresso,” depicts how her sexuality causes her lover to develop insomnia, keeping him awake with an electric buzz like caffeine. Her nonchalance revelation in sexual power is expressed in lyrics like “oh he looks so cute wrapped round my finger” and “I can’t relate to desperation/my give a fucks are on vacation.” The song demonstrates that sexuality can be an incredible source of positivity and confidence for women. Yet, as she describes in Time, she has received backlash for dancing sexually and singing graphic sexual lyrics. Her response: “And to that I say, just don’t come to the show and that’s okay.” Â
Chappell Roan, described by Rolling Stone as “a pop supernova,” grew up in a Missouri trailer park in a conservative community. According to Vox, she later moved to Los Angeles, a city she was told was “demonic,” where she released her first songs depicting queer experiences and evolved into the fully-fledged persona of Chappell Roan shown in The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess. This persona is defined by authenticity, self-discovery, and joy. As Daze examines, Roan’s music and her aesthetic “comment on issues of gender, identity, and the nature of beauty itself. As an openly queer lesbian pop star, her beauty choices challenge conventional beauty ideals and patriarchal standards- rejecting the male gaze and the typically fetished image of female fame.” Roan’s refusal to conform can be seen not only in her fierce and maximalist, drag-inspired makeup, but also her lyrics.Â
Her songs fearlessly delve into her discovery of her true self and her sexuality. The opener of The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess is “Femininomenon,” a word she invented which according to Genius, celebrates femininity and rejects masculinity, depicting how no man “could get her off.” After depicting her dissatisfaction with online love and a failed relationship with a woman, she joyfully sings, “what we really need is a femininomenon!” The rest of the album follows suit, with Roan describing the joy of self-discovery, the beauty of the queer community, and detailing both the good and bad elements of her sapphic relationships. A woman who chooses a man over her “Good Luck Babe!” and she kisses girls in “Naked in Manhattan.” As one of my friends described it, “She just really encapsulates queer discovery, and it’s so exciting to see music made for women specifically because I feel like a lot of music by gay women can be very depressing. Also, her drag makeup and clothes just really show how much this is for the queer community, and I love it.”Â
While it is true that the music industry evolves rapidly and is constantly in search of new artists and output, all three of these artists’ charting hits offer refreshing perspectives on femininity and sexuality that speak to female audiences. The music industry has long been overdue for bold rejections of stereotypes, an embrace of hyper-femininity and sexuality defined by the female gaze, as well as a celebration of self-discovery and authenticity. In the words of Chappell Roan, perhaps what the music industry has needed all along is a femininonmenon.