Among the most prevalent and gratifying cultural trends in 2020s music has been the slow-burning rise of the pop star. Exclusively known by the public for a viral song or two, or mainly supported by a smaller yet committed fanbase, their artistry hadn’t received the popular recognition their careers had often flirted with. Yet, these colloquially labeled flop eras allowed said musicians to find their specific, unique points of view, resulting in their most authentic and successful releases to date. As the likes of Charli xcx, Sabrina Carpenter and Zara Larsson have graduated to this bigger stage, another not-so-new artist has entered a similar conversation.
Since debuting in 2018, Slayyyter has bottled various archetypes of American show business into playful electro-pop confections. Initially garnering attention alongside the likes of Ayesha Erotica and SOPHIE right as the hyperpop genre expanded in the late 2010s — although she doesn’t associate her music with said label — the Missouri-born artist’s early releases embraced a tabloid bad girl image at a time when the music scene was plagued with pop stars seeking to be relatable. Her follow-up releases showed her disillusionment with the Los Angeles life she had once glamorized, yet her status remained closer to that of an underground pop artist than a mainstream hitmaker.
Then came WOR$T GIRL IN AMERICA. Offering a completely different visual identity — a violent midwestern fable equally inspired by Harmony Korine and Crystal Castles — the album built upon her tongue-in-cheek pop sensibilities while offering a previously unseen level of introspection. It made her one of Coachella’s most talked-about performers, turned her into a likely Best New Artist Grammy nominee and led to the sold-out Worst Girl in the World Tour.
With bunny ears, ripped t-shirts and cowboy boots galore, Slayyyter’s stop at Oakland’s Fox Theater showcased an artist equally ready and worthy of joining her contemporaries in pop star heaven.
Walking through a suburban home door into a set featuring much of her WOR$T GIRL era’s key visuals — spray-painted shirts, splashes of dirt, blood and crosses — Slayyyter opened the night with her sensually hostile hit “DANCE…” The crowd thankfully followed the song’s command and erupted with energy that lasted through the night. It was a refreshing reaction compared to the sea of recording that trending artists often face.
As celebratory of WOR$T GIRL IN AMERICA as the tour may be, it’s been equally useful in building excitement towards her next project, a companion album featuring inversions of every song off WOR$T GIRL, titled Wor$t Man in America. This concept is best represented by “brand new chanel$,” the first single from the album that turns WOR$T GIRL’s bad-b—- lead single “BEAT UP CHANEL$” into a stadium-sized anthem about Slayyyter discovering her boyfriend’s infidelity days before her Coachella set. Undeniably a peak of the setlist, the song was made to be experienced in a crowd and yelled from the bottom of one’s lungs.
She presented an additional four songs, unreleased at the time of performance, each providing further context into the sound and themes to be expected from the upcoming album: “I Think He’s Got a Girl” (likely the “flip” of “UNKNOWN LOVERZ”), “*demonic prayer*” (the inverse of instrumental interlude “*PRAYER*”), “nekromantik” (the flip of “CANNIBALISM!”) and “crank 2” (the flip of “CRANK”).
“I Think He’s Got a Girl” is the sonic equivalent of getting stood up at an 80’s prom, a heartbreaking ballad capturing what happens when a love spell starts wearing off. “Crank 2” turns one of the most quoted songs on the album into an even louder, angrier threat to the man who wronged her. Hearing these songs live first further highlighted Slayyyter’s vocal flexibility, equally gripping in the growly attitude-driven tracks as in those requiring more high-register emotion.
The most successful pop music packages the ultraspecific and deeply personal into universally understood concepts and references that entice its consumption. On stage, Slayyyter further proves she’s more than a student of the artists who have mastered the pop tool kit; she herself strongly manipulates the marriage between celebrity, identity and other art media to capture her truest, least restrained self. A testament to the pure quality of WOR$T GIRL IN AMERICA, Slayyyter’s night at the Fox was the ultimate victory lap.