In this Alessia Cara album review, discover how the rounded production and Alessia Cara’s light touch make Love & Hyperbole a surprising hit.
I have no idea what to expect from a new Alessia Cara album nowadays. When I reviewed The Pains of Growing over six years ago, I remarked how Alessia Cara seemed like an outsider in the modern pop landscape. A good songwriter without question, but it always seemed like she was lacking the flare or character to elevate her to greatness, not helped by the fact that her albums were more concerned with the possibility of growing up rather than confronting it.
That script is firmly flipped on Love & Hyperbole, an album that feels like a sigh of relief; a much needed reset that has allowed her to reorient herself and charge on forward to whatever might come next, and it’s all the better for it.
The baselines are firmer and more grounded, especially on the earlier songs like ‘Go Outside!’ and ‘Left Alone’, but what struck me most was the diversity in the instrumentation. From the fluttery keyboard solo on ‘Go Outside!’, the brighter plaintive guitar that plays off the hazy opulence on ‘Drive’, to the heavier percussion lending a distinct gallop to ‘Run Run’, it finally seems as though Alessia Cara has solved the issue of her albums running together, my primary issue with 2021’s In The Meantime.
Some of the most unexpected instrumental shifts end up among this album’s best moments! I love how the electric guitar roars forth off the more minimalist arrangement on ‘Get To You’, and how the choppier percussion adds a ton of cathartic swell to the tender pianos on the bridge of ‘Fire’. ‘Dead Man’ is another great example. The kiss off to this guy who she can’t get through to could have so easily come across as bitter or dejected, but with the eclectic horn arrangement, it feels much more burnished and sophisticated.
My only criticism of the music is that a lot of this album feels very melodically muted, favouring hazy keyboards over more defined tune, but that’s always worked for Alessia Cara to some extent because it plays into her introverted personality. This musical approach is all the more flattering because Alessia Cara spends much of the early songs sounding exhausted either amid feelings of disconnection with reality on ‘Go Outside!’ or shutting down a guy’s advances on ‘Left Alone’.
But after that, this album bursts into life. ‘Subside’ is a brilliant catchy song about the wounds time can’t heal, ‘Nighttime Thing’ is a very sweet love song about wanting to take a relationship further with Alessia Cara at her chirpiest and most upbeat, and all the songs that she spends trying to unpick her emotions about love like ‘Get To You’ and ‘Feels Right’ feel remarkably fresh in that lane, especially the latter song, all about not falling for the trap of over-defining relationships.
‘Drive’ is the real standout. One of the breezier songs on the album, it makes it clear that Alessia Cara is going to get where she’s going, even if she needs to steal a car and drive off in the rain to get there. It beautifully captures the determined underdog quality this album has. What a great surprise.
