Life Listens: Shazza on Music Lab podcast, new music from Sabrina Carpenter, Lee Young-ji, Charli XCX and Eminem

In this monthly column, The Straits Times curates the most buzz-worthy music you need to know about that was released in June.

Singapore Scene: Music Lab podcast – Shazza

The latest episode of ST’s Music Lab podcast features an interview with Singaporean singer-songwriter Shazza.

The 22-year-old is a rising name in the home-grown music scene. Her fusion of pop, R&B and folk has won praise from several high-profile personalities, including Singapore Prime Minister Lawrence Wong and British band Coldplay’s frontman Chris Martin.

She was invited to PM Wong’s swearing-in ceremony in May, but had to turn it down because she was not in Singapore, while Martin gave her a shoutout at the last of Coldplay’s six shows in Singapore in January.

In early 2024, she sang in a video by Canadian pop duo Crash Adams, which went viral on TikTok – garnering more than 21.6 million views and winning her new fans worldwide.

As one of the global ambassadors for Spotify’s Equal campaign, which highlights female musicians, her face was featured on a billboard at Times Square in New York City in 2023.

In the same year, Malay-language daily Berita Harian named her Young Achiever of the Year, an award that recognises the achievements of individuals aged 30 and below.

Shazza released her debut single, Pity Party, in 2020. In July 2023, she put out her debut album Chapter One, a release that includes Right Person, Wrong Time. One of her most popular songs, the single has clocked more than two million streams on Spotify alone.

Listen to the Music Lab podcast, as well as Shazza’s live rendition of her new single, Rain In Manhattan, a duet with home-grown singer-songwriter Umar Sirhan, at

str.sg/pNYi

- Eddino Abdul Hadi

Chart Champ: Sabrina Carpenter – Please Please Please

American pop singer Sabrina Carpenter’s star seems to be getting brighter.

This week, her breezy disco-tinged single Please Please Please became her first to top the US Billboard singles charts.

It is also No. 1 in other countries, including Australia and Britain. In Singapore, it is at the top of both the Apple Music and Spotify charts.

While Carpenter has not said it outright, Please Please Please seems to be inspired by her famous beau Barry Keoghan. The Irish actor starred in psychological horror Saltburn (2023) and won a Bafta award for best supporting actor for the dark comedy The Banshees Of Inisherin (2022).

One line in the song, “I heard that you’re an actor, so act like a stand-up guy”, seems to confirm the fact.

The couple also star in the Please Please Please music video as a Bonnie and Clyde-esque pair who meet in jail. Keoghan then goes on a crime spree as Carpenter tries to rein him in.

Carpenter, who was American pop star Taylor Swift’s opening act at The Eras Tour’s Singapore concerts in March, co-wrote the track with songwriter Amy Allen and producer Jack Antonoff. Antonoff is best known as the hitmaker behind major female artistes such as Swift, Lana Del Rey and Lorde.

Please Please Please, like Carpenter’s previous earworm Espresso (2024), is from her sixth album Short N’ Sweet, which will be released on Aug 23. - Eddino Abdul Hadi

Must-See MV: Lee Young-ji – Small Girl feat. Doh Kyung-soo (D.O. of Exo)

Standing at a statuesque 1.76m tall, South Korean singer-rapper Lee Young-ji bares her dating insecurities in her song Small Girl.

The track, which she performed at her Singapore concert in October 2023, gets a fresh spin with a feature from boy band Exo’s D.O., also known as Doh Kyung-soo.

Its lyrics, which are mostly in English, see her wondering if she can be loved as a tall girl with a “big laugh, big voice and big personality”. She wishes she could be a small girl with a thin waist and long brown hair.

Doh then replies in his verse and tries to reassure her that he loves her, singing: “If I cared about all those things that you care (about)/ Then I’m not yours.”

The MV plays out a similar narrative. With Lee playing a convenience store staff member and Doh a neighbouring petrol kiosk employee, there are scenes of them dating – including a sweet one where Doh takes care of Lee by wrapping a plaster around her injured finger.

But Lee’s belief in their relationship is quickly shattered when she sees Doh interacting with a new co-worker – a “small girl” who triggers her anxieties about her own perceived flaws.

The video then takes a fantastical turn as Lee runs away and turns into a gigantic woman who even towers above clouds during a storm.

When Doh chases after her, the video briefly becomes an animation, and he proves his love to her by wrapping a plaster around her finger – staying as true to her as he was at the beginning of the story. 

It is a cute, well-directed MV that perfectly encapsulates the lyrics of the song. - Jan Lee

Ace Album: Charli XCX – Brat

On the surface, British pop innovator Charli XCX’s sixth album – which is at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Dance/Electronic Albums chart – might come across as a hedonistic, no-holds-barred party record.

An unflinching ode to her roots in rave and club culture, the fast-paced tempos and synth-heavy electronic pop songs of Brat hardly let up.

But delve deeper into the lyrics and one can see that she is no unrelatable pop star. The singer dives into raw, conflicting emotions, all the while balancing the album’s mainstream pop appeal with her trademark experimental streak.

In Sympathy Is A Knife, she goes after an artificial person who dials up her insecurity. This person is not identified, but she does name-check several high-profile personalities in her circle, including fiance George Daniel, a member of British pop-rock band The 1975.

In So I, she opens up about her regret over not connecting more with her long-time collaborator Sophie, the Scottish music producer-DJ who died in 2021 after accidentally falling off a building.

Perhaps the most vulnerable track is I Think About It All The Time, where she contemplates motherhood and the biological clock, a subject rarely broached in an electronic dance pop record.

Still, Brat is bookended by two club-friendly numbers that are very similar. Album opener 360 is heavily sampled in the final song 365, which suggests that Brat is designed as a loop, a never-ending party that goes on 365 days a year. - Eddino Abdul Hadi

Stream This Song: Eminem – Houdini

Houdini, the first single off American rapper Eminem’s upcoming 12th album The Death Of Slim Shady (Coup de Grace), is full of Easter eggs.

Most obvious to fans of classic rock is that it heavily samples Abracadabra, the 1982 hit by American group Steve Miller Band that boasts a memorable, infectious hook.

Houdini also interpolates several of Eminem’s early repertoire, including his breakout 2000 hit The Real Slim Shady, as well as Without Me from 2002.

Houdini’s verses also revisit many characters who have played prominent roles in Eminem’s past, including his daughters and record executive Paul Rosenberg.

While the single has topped the charts in countries like Britain and Australia, one cannot help but sense that the veteran rapper is leaning a little too much into his past glories, even as he takes on contemporary issues like cancel culture.

As suggested by the upcoming album’s title, this might be the final nail in the coffin for his often-unhinged Slim Shady alter ego. - Eddino Abdul Hadi