My Roommates and I Lost 33 minutes of our Lives Listening to Katy Perry’s '143'

I turned to my roommate one night when we were sitting in the living room; “I need to listen to the new Katy Perry album for a review I’m about to write, did you wanna listen with me?” The waves of emotions we experienced in the next 33 minutes were of utter shock, dumbfounded confusion and the joy that you get from hearing something so bad it's astounding. 143 definitely made a befogging impact on it’s listeners, with us wondering “how was this even allowed to leave the studio?”

Far from her global pop-Goliath days in recession pop acclaim, lowest rated metacritic album holder Katy Perry’s 143 is the the nail in the coffin for the once prolific singer’s now third in a series of flop album releases. Through her decision to work with undoubtedly controversial producer Dr. Luke, as well as a plethora of horrible press, the “Hot n Cold” singer has effectively made sure that her career will never reach the heights of smash-hit Teenage Dream, unless there is a serious change in her music and PR team.

If this era had any chance of success, it was all thrown away with the lead single and debatably worst song of 2024 “WOMAN’S WORLD.” Sounding like it was produced and written using ChatGPT, the bland and lifeless “anthem” (that word is used loosely) sparked much contention online with its noticeable lack of quality or listenability. Known for making extremely literal songs that are based off of a simple concept like the ever grating “Firework” or banal “Roar,” the formula did not translate as this track is mystifyingly bare bones.

Many of the tracks on here are either so bad that you can’t forget them, like the elementary “GIMME GIMME,” or they are entirely forgettable (you decide which is worse). The 21 Savage track is particularly mind-blowing, with embarrassing bars like the mistranslated “I’m in Paris, I’m shopping for oui.”  Next track “GORGEOUS” featuring frequent Dr. Luke defender Kim Petras is of the same vein; horribly written, you can tell that this song was Katy’s failed attempt at trying to gag the gays. “Hide your man and daddies” is a particularly dreadful line from Petras herself, who you would think would know how to write cheeky/sexy lyrics given her reluctantly catchy “Slut Pop.”

The review might as well stop here; track after track it becomes the same droning dance/house pop instrumental sounding as robotic as the album cover makes Perry look. Not even cool collaborators like the fire-cracker performer Doechii on track “I’M HIS, HE’S MINE” could save this bashful attempt at a comeback. The Crystal Waters sample (which has been done hundreds of times) could have made this the most salvageable track on here, but the utterly annoying “la da di, da da da” from Perry had me wishing I could just skip.

I’m seeing how artists like Perry are using the BRAT hype to drum up a loyal gay audience by switching to a more dancy to hyperpop sound. I think the best example of this recently has been Camilla Cabello’s C, XOXO, the horrendous attempt at using an “experimental” sound to, frankly, copy the originality of Charli XCX, who’s been a game changer in bringing hyperpop and more experimental electronica to the mainstream.

143 was never going to be the comeback that Katy Perry thought it was; the multi-platinum selling artist will always have her place in popular 2000s/2010s culture for her genuinely amazing pop hits. But the spark has gone away and instead of using her popular place in culture to take time and craft songs that are good, she’s instead chasing the high of her Teenage Dream fame. Something that was never going to be replicated given her plenty of social transgressions over the past decade, as well as for the lack of quality with this new record.