[Album Review] Lucas Review’s Eternal Sunshine by Ariana Grande

Eternal Sunshine is an album featuring many different music genres and warning styles including contemporary R&B and pop that surprises me by the approach she took in combination with the vocals and tricks, it’s very original. It’s very flowy, reminds me of How to Pretend: Lucy Bedroque. Listening to this album is very calming, introspective, her approach to harmonizing with different notes is mysterious. In a few of her songs, she harmonizes with herself in different lyrics or repeating lines in the background.

With new albums that she’s made and that have been published, Ariana is evolving her lyrics to be more vulnerable. I think it’s Ariana coming to terms with her emotions. She’s living through mourning, and healing. This album specifically is evident of that. Ariana’s dating history and relationship with Mac Miller has a big influence, even now in her more emotional shift in more previous work compared to older work. The Manchester bombing also had a huge impact on her music. Regardless of when you start, you can start now. This album can definitely be appreciated by anyone even if it’s your first. It is still true that to fully understand it you should have followed Ariana for years. How does someone heal while in mourning?

When I listen to this album, I imagine a quiet, reflective environment that feels almost suspended in time. I’m physically alone in a hallway. I hear the laughter of the people I love, I walk towards the door at the end of the hallway to join those who are important to me, I enthusiastically open it. It’s a journey of self acceptance. You feel the echo of everything that’s happened before. I feel that I’m moving on. I’m on the road of self acceptance and moving into the next phase. I have clarity and I know what I need to do to keep going.

I think these lyrics reflect a mindset of trying to distance yourself from pain and change it into something you can understand and move past. There’s a strong sense of wanting to take control of memories and emotions that feel overwhelming, and turning them into something that no longer holds power over you. Based on the ideas already mentioned, it feels like the message is about accepting that the past shapes you, but doesn’t have to define where you go next. The ephemeral existence of the past shouldn’t hold you back from the future. At the end of the album, I feel a sense of release and distance, like I’m watching everything fade behind me as I move forward into something clearer and more open. I am escaping. I will go so far that no one can hope to see my slip that vanishes from the horizon. People don’t move on. At least the people I know. They can’t look at the past and have it change you in the future. Acknowledge it, hurt from it, accept it, and finally move on from it.