The build-up to ‘Bass Persuades’ pointed towards a pivotal moment in Miley Cyrus‘ career. Following the underperformance of last year’s visual album ‘Something Beautiful’, she ditched her longtime label, signed with Atlantic Records and dropped her last name. When Miley announced her 10th studio album just over two weeks before its release, people took notice.
Clocking in at nine tracks and a remix of the title song, tallying at a neat 40 minutes, ‘Bass Persuades’ is more succinct and less experimental than its predecessor. On paper, its more in line with what casual fans might expect from the multi-hyphenate, who has always carried through a pop streak while exploring various facets of rock, country, dance and hip-hop. But somehow, the result is a muted body of work that never quite lives up to its ambition.
‘The kids don’t wanna dance / We can’t stay like this forever / Let’s surrender to the night, put our bodies close together,’ she sings on the title track and lead single. It’s packed with infectious synths and heavy beats, but what sets out to be a rallying call to put down your phone and surrender to the music is instead one of just a few uptempo moments on a record that leaves little room for dancing.
The transition to ‘Different Religion’, featuring Model/Actriz’s Cole Haden, is a jarring segue into glam-rock, which in turn leads into ‘Let’s Get Married’, which could be mistaken for a Bruno Mars album track. Neither are bad, but sequentially it makes for a confused opening run that’s indicative of the overarching issues with ‘Bass Persuades’.
A tribute to Miley’s relationship with financé Maxx Morando, the latter track kickstarts a double-hit of nods to her man, who also appears as a co-writer and -producer across much of the record. She aspires to live in his orbit on another ballad of the same name, by which point the album is almost at its halfway mark already.
The latter half of ‘Bass Persuades’ has some of its stronger moments; ‘REDLIGHTS’ is as sun-soaked as it is disco-influenced, while the throbbing ‘Innocent Ways’ sees Miley explore her relationship with her sister, fame and its effect on her family. ‘Aftermath’, which touches upon past relationships, is lyrically captivating (‘I miss the future like a face I forgot…’), even if its production seems a decade out of date.
The problem with ‘Bass Persuades’ isn’t in the quality of the material. Sure, there are dips, but there are enough tracks strong enough to warrant their spot on an album. On the same album, however, they come over less as a cohesive body of work and more as a collection of disparate songs crying out for cohesion.
In the two decades since her debut, Miley has more-than-proven herself capable of pulling off whatever she turns her hand to, but cramming it all onto one album is a misstep that ultimately ends up being more messy than daring.
