KATY PERRY: PART 2 (with Variety's Daniel D'Addario)

Pop Pantheon

Chief Television Critic at Variety Daniel D’Addario is back with DJ Louie for part two of our series on Purposeful Popstress Katy Perry! Louie and Dan kick off this installment by talking about the long tail of Teenage Dream and how Katy's highly-publicized divorce from comedian Russell Brand informed both the deluxe edition's hit singles as well as the setting into which she delivered her much-anticipated fourth album, 2013's Prism. They then parse about Prism's disjointed mix of Dream-styled pure pop confections aimed at uplift and more earnest ruminations on the dissolution of her relationship, as well its mixed commercial reception with certain singles like "Roar" and "Dark Horse" topping the charts while a slew of other songs failed to connect, how her celebrated Super Bowl halftime show represented her last moment of monocultural dominance, the career nadir of her 2017 flop Witness which tried and failed at both deepening Katy's on-record persona and updating her sound for a new era without the help of long-time partner Dr. Luke, and how her career as centrist pop figure never recovered, yet her legacy as an emblem of the most unfettered iteration of Pop Stardom lives on. Finally, Louie and Dan rank Katy Perry in the official Pop Pantheon.

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