Ariana Grande’s brighter days ahead review: A fitting place to pause by one of our most accomplished pop stars

brighter days ahead is a curious title for the deluxe edition of Ariana Grande’s seventh studio album eternal sunshine because, as her fans are all too aware, the days ahead aren’t looking so bright for those who value new music from the star.

The singer has made it clear she intends to step away from music for the foreseeable, to focus on her burgeoning career as an A-list actress following being embraced by Hollywood after her stellar performance in the blockbuster musical Wicked. Thankfully, before she prepares to resume the madness of promotion for the film’s upcoming sequel Wicked: For Good, she has made the time to grace fans with one last outing from Ariana Grande, the pop star, before she goes fully dormant.

To recap, Grande released eternal sunshine in March 2024, her first full length effort since 2021’s R&B-leaning Positions. The LP saw Grande work almost exclusively with pop empressario Max Martin, with whom she’d previously crafted many of her signature hits including ‘Problem’, ‘Break Free’, ‘Side to Side’ and ‘No Tears Left To Cry’. Out of the picture were Victoria Monet and Tayla Parx, two longtime collaborators who had become known as Grande whisperers, responsible for helping the songstress establish her distinct tone of voice, recognisable for its use of therapy speak terminology and its casual, and often horny, vernacular. Instead Grande penned most of the eternal sunshine lyrics either entirely by herself or with some assistance from Martin.

Despite racking up two consecutive number one hits in the form of lead single ‘yes, and?’ and follow up ‘we can’t be friends (wait for your love)’, and dropping remixes with pal Troye Sivan as well as Mariah Carey, Brandy and Monica, legends of the 90s pop Grande was raised on, it felt like the album sort of came and went. It was not acknowledged in any of the main categories at this year’s GRAMMY Awards and, though critically well received, the album did not manage to capture the zeitgeist in the same way her commercial peak thank u, next had done in 2019.

And with the singer gearing up for what she’s since said she sees as the defining moment of her career so far, the release of Wicked, it seemed she was content for the album to fade into the background of what was an unusually stacked year for major pop releases, including mammoth releases from Grande’s peers, Taylor Swift, Beyoncé and Billie Eilish, and noisy upstarts like Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan.

Which brings us up to the present day, as Grande has made good on her promise of a deluxe edition of the LP, which features an extended version of the album’s intro, plus five entirely new songs. Also on the menu is a short film, co-directed by the star, which sees the singer return to the character of Peaches, who we were first introduced to in the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind-inspired video for ‘we can’t be friends’. So what does this parting gift actually sound like?

On the extended version of ‘intro (end of the world), we are greeted by Grande’s signature buttery smooth vocals, a testament to her talent as virtuosic vocal producer. “So me, I am the bad guy cause I’d already grieved you, and you started to realize I do need ya,” she coos to an ex-lover, widely believed to be her now-ex-husband, real estate broker Dalton Gomez, who we are to assume is the subject of most of the material on both brighter days ahead and eternal sunshine, which is, at its heart, a break up album.

Next up is ‘twilight zone’, a slice of shimmering 80s pop that evokes a similar feeling of driving at night as you might find on an album by Grande’s repeat collaborator The Weeknd. Here, the pop princess is contemplating the process of moving on from a relationship: “It’s not that I miss you, I don’t. Sometimes I just can’t believe you happened,” she remuninates, before the music fades out to leave only the sounds of Grande’s stacked, acapella vocals.

The crown jewel is ‘warm’, a wistful mid-tempo that feels like the more chilled, restrained cousin of another Grande and Martin classic, ‘One Last Time’. Here she returns to Oscar Görres, the man behind much of Troye Sivan’s best music, with whom she collaborated on eternal sunshine highlight ‘supernatural’. On this lilting self-empowerment anthem, Grande acknowledges the joy of “unravelling” in a lover’s arms but resolves that she’s “cool on my own” – a far cry from the woman who once sang proudly of being needy on thank u, next. And, in what surely must be a wink to meme lovers everywhere, she even asks her lover: “Can you hold the space I require?”

Thanks to ‘dandelion’s sweet saxophone opening, complete sounds of a fire crackling in the background, you would be forgiven for thinking you’re in for another moment of melancholy. Instead, however, we’re treated to the welcome return of the star in full blown sex kitten mode, ala ‘Positions’ and ‘break up with your girlfriend, i’m bored’. The instrumental swiftly descends into the darker, urban sonic landscape we once knew and loved her for, one which was sorely absent on the largely saccharine parent album. “I got what you need, I’m thinking you should plant this seed,” she purrs, reminding us that few can do a sex jam quite like Ariana.

‘past life’ brings the return of another Grande-signature – big, belting vocals. Although perhaps the least essential of these new songs, it’s wonderful to hear the artist sing with her chest again after practising much restraint on this front for most of eternal sunshine.

Perhaps the most anticipated song from this new set is ‘Hampstead’. Its title sent fans into spin as it suggests it relates to the singer’s time residing in the London suburb whilst she filmed Wicked, during which time it is thought her marriage fell apart (and her dalliance with current beau Ethan Slater began). She meets expectations, and then some, here, singing: “I left my heart in a pub in Hampstead, and I misplaced my mind in a good way.” The song is a devastating kiss off to a lover with whom you feel utterly exasperated. You can’t help but wince for the subject of her subtle evisceration: “You think you’ve read the book I’m still writing, I can’t imagine wanting so badly to be right,” she sighs, before adding, “Guess I’m forever on your mind, I wonder why?”

All in all, it seems like a fitting place to press pause on what has been a remarkable run from one of our most accomplished pop stars. The five new songs on brighter days ahead have managed to more than justify the deluxe edition’s existence, adding depth to the original album and serving as a brilliant showcase for Grande’s greatest strengths.

The accompanying film, however, feels a little surplus to requirement. Grande stars, primarily as an old-ified version of herself, complete with prosthetic wrinkles and a wheelchair, in what is always a cheesy trope from a pop star (Katy Perry, we’re looking at you). She then uses the simultaneously futuristic and oddly analogue technology at the ‘Brighter Days Inc.’ clinic to rewatch four memories from her youth, the first being just a montage of home video footage from Grande’s childhood set to the album’s intro, the second a fairly standard supercut of Grande performing ‘eternal sunshine’ and ‘dandelion’ in front of a mic stand. Both feel completely inessential and manage to make what was surely a very expensive production feel a little low budget.

Conversely, the budget is then blown to create a folklore-esque old house set for ‘twilight zone’ which Grande wanders around before exiting into some sort of post-apocolypse world where she is beamed into the sky by a ray of light whilst singing ‘supernatural’, as per the album artwork. The final memory is consistent with the others only in the fact there seems to be zero connective thread between any of these set ups. It sees Grande as the star of a Poor Things-esque film in which she is the daughter of a mad scientist who has accidentally sacrificed his daughter in the name of a mad experiment – a story and visual which feels totally at odds with the soundtrack of ‘Hampstead’.

Still, the uneven visual component cannot distract from the overall feeling we are left with, which is of how much we will miss Ariana Grande, the pop star, if she does in fact leave pop music behind for the bright lights of tinsel town. However, listening to her tell her story, as a mature and wise woman who has already survived a lot of life, we can’t help but agree that she deserves her own brighter days ahead, wherever she may find them. In the meantime, we’ll be sure to hold space for her.