Review Summary: "Bad girl" pop at its absolute worst.
Bebe Rexha, a relative fly on the wall in the pop industry, has spent the better half of her seven year career operating behind the scenes on songwriting teams and getting into flings with Fall Out Boy side-projects. It’s hard to see what qualities Bebe Rexha brings to the table that makes her a worthy choice for mainstream success when listening to
All Your Fault, the first of a two-part full length slated for this year. When looking back at her debut from two years before,
I Don’t Wanna Grow Up, her appeal was well punctuated in her own unique blend of lush, melodic electropop and a honest “even
I have problems and insecurities” approach to lyricism, albeit a bit sappy and trite. Though come two years later - after riding the coattails of G-Eazy’s unprecedented success “Me, Myself, and I”, every last bit of the emotionally inclined, vulnerable girl that Bebe Rexha associated her image with has been replaced by another tepid forray into a “bad girl” personality with double the trite and none of the charm.
Rexha’s complete makeover on
All Your Fault pushes sexual finesse and a “forget the haters, just be you” moral meant to empower… somebody, but the sentiment of both fail to arouse confidence or sensuality thanks to her musical backing operating on the cheapest of phoned-in production jobs. While
I Don’t Wanna to Grow Up was a well polished variety of melodically driven tunes. Produced with the sense to spread its sugary sweet, synth heavy backdrop with plenty of ear pleasing tricks from vocal chops to acoustic guitars,
All Your Fault is the bare minimum. It’s a two course meal of endless rolls of hi-hat heavy trap beats and underpowered electro-riffs. With barely any noticeable qualities to distinguish one blandly produced track from another without the aid of Rexha’s lyric sheet. And with bad production comes even worse lyrics, which are without a doubt the most abysmal quality stemming from Rexha’s new look.
Free of all self awareness over how cheesy she appears despite her constantly nagging desire to be taken seriously, Rexha often is blatant and straight to the point about everything she mulls about. On “F.F.F” Rexha profoundly exclaims between each obnoxious glass snare
“fuck fake friends, we don’t need em” in a flatly presented tone that isn’t exactly friendly to a sing-along session. Later on “Gateway Drug”, she highlights the cycle of sexual encounters with the leading line
“kissing leads to touching, leads to lovin’, leads to fucking” as if she isn’t confident her listeners know how “the sex” works. Without the proper wordplay to dress up the hooks of her songs, any attempt at crafting radio ready anthems are squandered by an overwhelming desire for anything resembling fun. Something you won’t find in her verses, either, as they are equally devoid of any substance or cleverness.
All Your Fault is “bad girl” pop at its absolute worst. Without a solid production backdrop or the songwriting skills needed to craft a solid hook, Bebe Rexha comes across as an empty personality desperately wanting people to see her as a “bad bitch” (her words, not mine) without having any trace of edge to her looks, words, or personality.
The overwhelming lack of self awareness here cannot be better described than by hearing G-Eazy whine about being surrounded by too many fake people in the streets of Hollywood via his guest verse. Sometimes, the punchline truly writes itself.
