'luck... or something' | Every Single Album: Hilary Duff

So, you have to give it a day to you.

Tamara is. This feeling can be done now. Tamara is a man. She is a school for all life moments.

“You find you on Tamara's.com and go out.”

With the code Spotify 10, you get 10% of her school on Tamara's.com. Perfect for you. And now, for me. Tamara is.

But what I want to do is not to be a student. The master of the laptop is called SoftBand, the internet. It's a master's. I'm really sorry. I'm sorry, you can say that you're a school. You're a school student, right?

But you don't understand. Exactly. It's just a challenge. Make you feel like a school student. And if you work, you'll be able to do it. - That's right. - Safe.

Like a school student. You're going to school. Now, let's try it out. (upbeat music) Hello and welcome to every single album.

I'm Nora Princeyati.

And as always, I am joined by my friend, Nathan Hubbard.

Though not in person this week, hello Nathan and your little square on Zoom. How are you doing? - Terrified for this episode of every single album. (laughing)

- Yeah, you want to tell everybody why that is? - I really am. Well, first of all, when we talk about doing the Hillary Duff album, which is the first time in history,

it's so ominous. - Of the episodes that we have done together, the hundreds of episodes that we have done together. I think that's the first time I have broken the news of what we're doing today.

We're doing the Hillary Duff album, everybody. And when I originally agreed to do the Hillary Duff album, before all of you like-- - Agreed. - Rans act us on like--

- Like I tried a weapon to his head. - Before we all of you just attacked us on social being like, "Do Hillary Duff album." So fine, we're doing the Hillary Duff album, but originally the idea was,

and we still may come back to this idea. The idea was, you give me an album that I have to listen to and we have to talk about, we get to talk about.

“And then I give you an album that you have to listen to.”

And we talk about, and that half the episode is talking about what I made you listen to and the other half is about what you made me listen to. And the idea is, I would give you something that you did not understand the lore of,

or had not really spent any time with. And vice versa. - I would have framed it a little bit more like-- - Oh, I'm surprised you would have framed it differently. - Like a gift, like something that we were choosing

to share a piece of ourselves culture that resonates with us with each other. - Oh no. - Letting each other in on something, you are describing it in terms that make it sound like when you need to get your dog to take a pill

and you sort of have to hold the jaw open. - Or should they like wrap it in like a piece of bread or a piece of meat so that they eat it. It's a little bit like the holiday gift giving white elephant thing where you just try to get the most outrageous gift.

And then everybody is passing. Nobody wants the shitty, whatever the awful gift is that people wrap up. Well, you gave me Hilary Duff is the answer. - Don't you dare compare this to fruit cake?

- I did not get to give you anything, but we'll do an episode in the future where my, I had a whole plan was gonna be great. - That's how you learned of. - Yeah, let's go.

I mean-- - Can I ask you an honest question though? - Okay. - Were you surprised by how many people reached out to you in various capacities

“and said you need to do the Hilary Duff album?”

- A lot of fucking people are like, you gotta do this album. And so, go ahead. - Where I am coming from is that I am not surprised one bit. - Okay, but I need you to explain it to me

'cause my overarching question is, why are we doing the Hilary Duff album? - Okay, so first of all, let me give, I think you know this, but let me give my own personal context. - Metamorphosis by Hilary Duff was the first album

that I purchased with my own money. And if you are in a particular kind of zelenial age band,

there is no more powerful nostalgia,

but then the Lizzy McGuire movie. - It's about the movie. Sort of, but the movie was about the songs. Like, but it's about so yesterday, like so yesterday, kicks ass.

♪ Let's see, let's see, let's see ♪

♪ How much you are that I'm gonna be okay ♪

“- So yesterday kicks ass, but it's about come clean.”

♪ Let the rain fall down ♪ ♪ And wake my dreams ♪ ♪ Let it rush away ♪ ♪ My sanity ♪ - Why not, and what dreams are made of,

before it's about, so yesterday is what I would say. ♪ Why not ♪ ♪ Take a crazy chance ♪ ♪ Why not ♪ ♪ And do a crazy dance ♪

♪ Hey now, hey now ♪ ♪ This is what dreams are made of ♪ - Ah, I would say that it is about number one come clean

and that is in part because of Laguna Beach.

Then I would say that it is about what dreams are made of. Then I guess I would say it's kind of about like, why not, and so yesterday tied. - Okay, well, come clean's a lot more popular than what dreams are made of.

- I think that's pretty, so yesterday and sparks are like tied. ♪ 'Cause when you're touching me, baby, you see my ♪ - But they're like, that's interesting. I would not have thought that about sparks. - Listen, in terms of regular listening that's happening now,

it's definitely outside of this album, come clean as number one, and then so yesterday and what dreams are made of is tied. And then there's like, I mean, there's a pretty big fall off.

I mean, wake up and why not seem to be more popular

than sparks, but okay, so Lizzy McGuire, what do I need to know about Lizzy? - I did not watch the movie, okay.

“- I think you need to, so I don't know that all of this”

will be backed up perfectly in data. And you just need to go with me on this a little bit. - No, no, I am going with you by virtue of having my ass in this chair, and having listened to this album, about a hundred times in preparation for this podcast.

- Okay, okay, the way that people feel about Hannah Montana and the way that people feel about high school musical, I'm not saying that the fervor for Hillary Dough, for Lizzy McGuire for some of these songs, matches it in a perfect one-to-one manner,

but it is more than of a piece with that era. And it is more than of a piece. It belongs in the same conversation that we've had several times about that sort of mid-2000s pre-tailer surge of

Disney adjacent pop music for young people. - Okay. - That if you cared about it

“when you were the age that it was initially targeted to,”

you're gonna care about it for life. - And so have you followed the trajectory of this woman from then on, almost not at all? - Okay, so that's the thing, 'cause I, what I feel is missing from, I mean, God.

Don't get me started on what's missing from my understanding of the world. But a thing that I feel like is missing from my understanding of the world is, I'm not, I don't really understand the Hillary Duff lore.

Like I feel like I understand the Miley lore. I feel like I understand most of the high school musical lore. For whatever reason, I just did not understand the Hillary Duff lore. And so when we get to categories today,

like peak Hillary, I'm gonna be like, I don't know, man. - Well, so what is it? So when you say that you understand the Miley lore or the, let's take Miley out of it

because it's a little different because she's just been a much more consistent presence in people's lives. But when you say you understand the high school musical lore, what do you mean?

- Like tracking Zac Efron's career after that. And maybe seeing a couple of his movies and some of the other people and how that connected into Olivia branching out. I just like sort of understand the thread

of some of the characters in those movies and a little bit about the fan base around them. Like is there a, if you were to give me the psychographic and demographic details of the Lizzy McGuire fan,

does it look substantively different than those other two shows? Or is it all just young girls consuming

- So right now, it's me. Like it's the people who've loved it.

“It's the people who've consumed Lizzy McGuire.”

It's just me. It's literally just me. It's the people who consumed Lizzy McGuire in its day. Because, and now like, Hillary dove has actually been on some like pretty,

done some pretty popular television work that I personally just have not paid attention to or consumed. So I don't want to say that like she hasn't been in people's lives because for some people who watched that show,

she absolutely has been. - For me, she made music in the mid-2000s

and then basically disappeared.

But it was a potent enough piece of my adolescence and a lot of my peers adolescence that like, for instance, if I were DJing, like if I had the playlist at a party you're like, "I can't wait for friends to get there."

- Okay. (laughs) - Moja, and I needed to guarantee a song that like gets everybody up. There are two or three Hillary tough songs

where I'm just like, I know that it's dynamite. I know that it will work. There's no question. I have a friend who had a birthday party last November and we had a long conversation about whether it was

come clean or what dreams are made of that she was going to tell her DJ needed to be the last song of the night. - Whoa. - And-- - And-- - Yes.

- So can I tell you something? - Yes. - This album feels like it's that group of people, today, talking about what it was like

when they first consume the Hillary Duff album.

- Can you expand on that a little bit? - Actually, not like talking about the nostalgia, but it feels like a-- - Talking about how much older they are now than they were then.

- Correct. - Because can I actually venture to say something

“that's gonna reveal a little bit about how I feel about this?”

- Yes. - I disagree, because believe it or not, I actually think most of us aren't quite this anxious. - Okay. Well, we're gonna have a conversation about

this feels-- And let me tell you something, this is not bad. - Agreed.

But it does feel like somebody who

is relatively well off socioeconomic class of a human being who has definite, some musical talent who it turns out is indeed in a bunch of text threads with moms. And who has a husband who's a music producer

and who in that text thread of supportive moms, not the unsupportable one that got kicked out. But the supportive moms in the husband were all like, "Hunt, you gotta make a record." And just be honest.

I know you don't, if you don't know what to write about, just be honest. And we got this album. - Yeah, I think, so I think to some degree, I agree with that, and I think that's fair.

“I don't think that that's why she made this album.”

I think that if you go through the list of the, you know, myli is doing the Hannah Montana reunion special for a reason. High school musical is back in the zeitgeist or has been for a reason.

The Jonas Brothers had Jesse McCartney at their tour, like every piece of that era's pop culture that was targeted to me and my peers when we were that age. All of it has circled back because we're serious with it. - That's fair.

- Right, totally. And so she is jumping on to that just as everybody else is. And that makes total sense to me because here's the way in which, because I'm gonna nitpick this album a little bit

because I have some nits to pick. But here's the way in which I will say that it is a clear and ringing success, which is that it is more than good enough as a platform for Hillary Duff to make the rounds do a bunch of interviews.

- See the talk about Sunday morning. - Totally. - Like she's doing all this stuff. - Okay. - And more importantly than that, go on tour so that me and my free and friends can go listen to

so yesterday and why not and come clean and what dreams are made of at Madison Square Garden.

- Tell me.

“- You're also gonna have to listen to growing up.”

- Okay, actually I'm so glad to hear that we're aligned.

- Everybody needs to have to listen to growing up. - Everybody needs to be break, Nathan. - You are gonna have to listen to her say, "Bonyvar." ♪ Some bitch out of bar ♪

♪ Saying she loves Bonyvar ♪ ♪ Causing Bonyvar ♪ ♪ And none ♪ (laughs) - You are gonna have to listen to her say,

touching myself looking at porn. ♪ And touch myself with the platform ♪ ♪ 'Cause you don't even look more in the world ♪ (laughs) - You're gonna have to listen to her beat to shit

out of Leo de Caprio like it is 2015.

♪ Just a few years younger and new haircut ♪ ♪ Very little while you would just go beyond touch ♪ - Okay, one of those things I'm completely seated for, by the way. And actually, the Bonyvar line sometimes I can't stand it and sometimes I think it's funny.

I go back and forth. - You're gonna have to listen to her step in the same complete, just mangling bear trap, the Taylor Swift did, in using the phrase, "I'm a bad bitch."

♪ It's my little without you ♪ ♪ I'm literally repeating I'm a bad bitch, please ♪ (laughs) - Well, she calls somebody else. No, no, she calls somebody else a bitch,

but then she says "bad bitch" about herself.

- So, - All of that is true. - On the other hand, you also get to listen to her talk wistfully about her relationship with her sister and tell you that she wished her father loved her

and say something insane like in my head, you live in another life where you fuck all my friends and wish you had another wife. ♪ Where you fuck all my friends and wish someone else could have been your life ♪ - Yeah, yeah.

So my question is, this is a little bit like life of a show girl to me. Which is to say the subject matter and the material,

“I think deeply resonates with a segment of women”

who are at a stage in their life. And it is extremely not for others and that's okay because I think this is digestible pop music. I do think there are so many roots in other stuff through these songs that like--

- I agree with that. - Oh, whoa. But it is a serviceable platform for reintroduction. My question to you is like, is this how women of this age talk?

- So this is, yeah, okay, I'm glad that you said this. Like, the answer to that is yes and no. Because when you say does this resonate or do I? Because I certainly, I mean, I don't have kids. So I'm maybe not quite in her demo,

but I'm close to it. And like everything that she's writing about and talking about, in a weird way, it's almost like too relatable. It's sort of these ideas about future tripping and the fear of time passing too quickly.

Like, they're almost so understandable than it's a bit dull.

“So yesterday is that what you think this album should have been called?”

- That's my next album, appetizer. - I found it to be like, I get what you're saying and I think you're right in the sentence that, yes, there is-- - I don't get what I'm saying.

- Well, so there's a thread of this where there's a lot of lyrical language that feels like it comes from people who go to a lot of therapy and who spend a lot of time talking about not just their feelings, but the reasons for their feelings.

And the ways that their minds and their anxieties work and manifest. - And then some of it is tri-hard. I mean, she uses that word. That phrase in the last song, but it's to me,

it feels a little not the whole thing, but there's times where it just feels like she's trying hard to make a moment or that somebody just pushed her just be like so honest. - Yeah, I guess I just like,

it doesn't feel particularly revealing because it's so typical. Like, there are-- - Okay. - Because this is a way that people talk.

years ago was making music that was sparking conversations

“about the ways in which the language of therapy”

have warmed their way kind of wholesale into so many elements of culture, but particularly pop music. And so it's not novel. There are times when I actually found it kind of

unrelatable in the sense that, like, have you ever had the experience of, I don't know if you're like, out to dinner with someone or getting drinks with somebody or whatever, and maybe they have kind of like one to many. And you're, you're kind of having a heart to heart,

but then all of a sudden the other person gets like, a little too dark, and you're kind of like, "Oh God, what do I do now?" Like, - Yeah, do they realize? - And inhibitions are gone, yeah.

- That part that you mentioned from holiday party where she's like, in my head, you live another life where you fuck all my friends and which someone else could have been your wife.

“- Yeah. - That's what that felt like to me.”

- Yeah. - We're like, you have these chipper production packages. And like, I would say that the lyrical content of this album, I, like, honestly, don't find it that relatable. I mostly find it to be pretty depressing.

Like, it's a pretty huge bummer. The optimist is a pretty big bummer. (upbeat music) - There's a lot of this that's a pretty big bummer. - Like, maybe my dad would tell me that he loves,

so it's interesting in that way, but it, like, I see a lot of others. - It doesn't feel like she's packaging it in a way where she thinks it's that much of a bummer. I mean, the title of the album is luck or something.

- Yeah, that's why that's where there's a little bit, that's a little bit of cringe about it. It's like, somebody told her to be honest,

“but nobody, like, everybody around her just was like,”

yeah, sure, just go for, like, I see, I would say I see a lot of cover letters and right now way too many people are just having chatGPT write their cover letters. And what ends up happening is that when you get,

like, a hundred cover letters for a job, like, chatGPT writes them fairly similarly. And so you start to, like, see, oh, God, this person didn't actually put in the effort, or they did, you know, they used,

there's some of these songs that feel like a chatGPT written Hilary Duff song where she gave some inputs of, like, casual smoking in the Japanese house or Boni-Var and makes song, that is like that, but, but I hear you,

there's also this moment where it's like, oh, man,

the second martini was just a bad idea.

But the first one was fun, but the second one, I should have taken half of it for myself because then we'd still be having an adult conversation. And now what we're having is a meltdown therapy conversation, I've got to get you an Uber

and make sure you get home safe. - Yeah, yeah. I don't feel that way about the music. Like, I would say that, I would say that the majority of my criticisms of this album are lyrical.

- I feel like chatGPT made some of the music though. Like, roommates, if you do not hear anti-hero in that beat, I don't know what to tell you. ♪ You touch my self, look at that door ♪ ♪ But you don't need another way, no more ♪

♪ I'll stand directly at the sun ♪

♪ But never in the mirror ♪

♪ It must be exhausting always rooting for the end to you, bro ♪ - We don't talk, if you don't hear "got ye" somebody that I used to know in that, I don't know what to tell you. ♪ You touch my self, look at that door ♪ ♪ You touch my self, look at that door ♪

- Well, so that felt intentional to me. I still found it kind of distracting mostly just because, like, we are doing this in the year after the year of Dochi's anxiety, and I just sort of couldn't think about anything else.

♪ Anxiety, keep on trying me, I feel it quietly ♪ ♪ Trying to silence me ♪ - But I do think that that was an intentional interpolation that just didn't come. - Tell us that won't happen.

It is a 1975 song. It's girls, yes. ♪ I'm worried that I found everything ♪ ♪ I'll ever feel that I wanna get ♪ - It does feel to me like the...

- The optimist, I don't think is like quite as much of a copy-paced situation, but that just screamed

- Sure, and they literally interpolated Blink 182 song

and growing up. ♪ I'm feeling I don't wanna get this is wrong ♪ - And so, there's a lot of these songs that, again, feel like, okay, it's a small group of people. Okay, we gotta be honest, let's make Taylor Swift song.

Okay, let's make 1975 song. Let's make a, and that's okay, but it does, that's the part for me that felt the most chatGPS and then let's overlay inadvertently overlay a little too much, a little TMI sprinkled through these songs.

“- I think that there is a form in here somewhere”

that feels true to both her and her husband, Matthew Koma, who, um, produced the whole album, that I hear the most on, I would say, weather for tennis.

♪ And now, in any of the weather,

♪ tennis, let's guess we can't argue until ten and time ♪ - I would say, you from the honeymoon. ♪ But tonight, it's on me turned to the path ♪ - And I would say, maybe even a little bit of adult-sized medium where, like, you do hear, so, he's worked with Carly Ray Jepson,

a fair bit, and I think you hear a little bit of that come through, I think you hear, like, some of the parts that I found interesting 'cause we're talking about how, at least for me, and I think most people, you don't have a, like, this is someone who feels,

sort of, etched and stone from a particular time, and then most of us have lost touch with.

“But there are, there are these moments where, like,”

there's a part of adult-sized medium,

where, yes, like, you have that kind of

antinophie and fuzziness that's very midnight's aratailer, but there's also a part where the sense, kind of, do this thing that really feels like an old chain-smoker song. ♪ It's hard for you to be in a relationship ♪

♪ It's synchronizing for me to see you ♪ - Oh, yeah, for sure. - And, like, I kind of enjoyed that because I felt, like, she was almost, like, putting me back into some of the moments that she would have experienced,

but we wouldn't have experienced together. And so, like, I do think that there are ideas of what, of, like, who Hilary Duff wants to be, as a pop star right now, but I agree that they appear kind of sporadically

“and sandwiched between songs that are very much,”

let's do a 1975 song, let's do a midnight song. - So, can I pause you there for a sec? - Go. - And just tell you something. I've watched a few of the TV bits that she's done.

I love her. - Like, I think her relationship with her husband seems super cool. They were, like, so supportive of each other and, like, cut together, talking about this album

and the way that they work together. Like, she seems awesome. - I would also say that this is, like, from what I normally feel like we've had this conversation with, like, duly, but making her dad be her manager

and stuff like that. If you tell me, if you tell me, artist ex, unless they have a track record of it, is turning, is making a mid-career turn to their partner, as their production partner

or, like, a serious co-worker, I'm scared. - Okay, is that your Michael's gonna go well? - Does that count? - I mean, they're the exception that proves the role. - Well, Taylor in house team,

Taylor Travis, the whole family. - Yes, if you tell me that this problem is producing the next Taylor slipped album, I'm afraid. - No, but, you know what? I actually feel better for Travis's career

of Taylor's managing it. - Maybe in fact, she's gonna make a decision. - I'm not the other way around. - No, the other direction, it's a nightmare. - Well, that's what I say.

So I'm saying that within that context, I actually think this is sort of shockingly good and I agree, I think they're very cute. - Yeah, so, so, the video content for me was interesting and appealing.

And they felt authentic. It didn't feel like they were putting anything on. I don't know, maybe it's just 'cause she's good actress, but through these songs that we all charm. - Well, so, okay, but will you talk to me

- I think that I like roommates the best.

- But 'cause the dad won't give in your head and sneak only wake up your real mates. - Oh, even though, for me, it is anti-hero. I just, melodically like it, a lot. I do like the chorus on adult-sized medium quite a bit.

(singing in foreign language) - Yep. - And a lot of the rest of it, I like to, okay, like, it was fine, I just found myself hearing other stuff in it. And yes, to your point, occasionally a line being like,

oh, God, oh, God, oh, God, we got to get in her an Uber. We got to get her home. Like, before too many people hear this, like we got to get her home. - So, I do, this isn't quite in that category.

And I agree with you.

I like the melody of roommates.

I like, especially the melody of that little post-chorus hook. When she says, "But life is life thing." - Yeah. ♪ But life is life ♪ ♪ And pressure is pressure ♪

♪ In me ♪ - It's my moment like that in every song. That's what I'm trying, like,

“that's why I'm like, do people really talk this way?”

Or was this like, did Chatchy PT just fuck up with 30-ish women say? - Are the context of this? - I think there are, I think some people talk like this. I find it unbecoming.

And I do think that that's a little bit of a difference.

That's a different thing from the, like,

when she's suddenly, she's talking about touching herself, looking at porn. Like, that's a kind of, there are moments that feel like overshares - Right.

- That hit me a little funny. That's not, like, life is lifeing is not one of those. One, I just think that if you're using the written word, we got to get a little further than using the same word to describe an earlier instance of that word.

And also, it has the same ring of, like, a particular genre of millennial who talks about, quote, "adulting." - Yeah. - And I do think that that's something that hopefully culture has moved beyond.

- I, yeah, there's just, there is a lot of 38-year-old four-kid wine mom in this album. And that's cool, but that's, - Yeah, I'm like, oh, we're in a group chat now. - I mean, I like this more than it's coming across,

as though I do, I have a little bit of reluctance to sort of handwave it all as, this is what wine moms are like, because knowing several mothers who drink wine, they don't all talk like this.

- Okay. - Like, this is what I'm asking you. Who talks like that? - It's like a caricature. It's a caricature of something that exists, but she doesn't mean it as a caricature.

- Right.

“- And that's what I'm having trouble with.”

Like, there's, and she's cooler than this. That's my point from the video stuff. - Yeah. - She's cooler than this. - I agree. - I agree. - I agree.

- I agree. - So the caricature of somebody being honest comes through, and again, ironically, it, I guess it's trying hard is, is what I'd say, but I, I think she's cooler than this.

- I wonder if it's a little bit of like, you know, how many times we've talked about the post-Disney kind of cycle, where quite often there's a moment when someone is trying to prove someone who's been a child star

and been in that machine, tries to prove that they can't be told what to do, and there, to borrow a word, mature, and grown up.

“And that's not something that she ever really did, right?”

Like, because she mostly had this big moment, and then at least, musically. - Managed your shit, yeah. - Receited and had a sort of normal, ish life, and focused on TV work.

And I guess sometimes I wonder if she is almost like fast cycling, bad whole process of rebelling against the kitty stuff, and then sort of coming to terms with it, and accepting it, and it's almost like she put it all

into one, and she was able to bypass

but the way that it came out is, let me really turn the dial up on the kind of, like not adult subject matter in terms of it being particularly ex-rated certainly, but in terms of talking about relationships

that feel like something that happens at a later point in life, and all of that stuff, and maybe this is kind of, in a weird way, maybe this is her way of doing the Myli Cyrus Reckengball performance, this is Hilary Duff with the little

“buns on her head swinging naked on the Reckengball, right?”

That's a little bit of my theory of what happened here. I also will say that actually there's some weird

cool moments that I like, she was never a songwriter,

like she wasn't a songwriter, and now she exists in a pop moment where not everybody is expected to be a songwriter, but it's a difference, it's more of an open question of how people are gonna respond to somebody who isn't.

So, you know, we are talking about someone who doesn't have much of a track record in this area. - Well, so what's your favorite song? - Okay, I think mature is the best song. (upbeat music)

- Yeah, I think they absolutely chose the right single. - I like mature. - I also will say that like,

yeah, sure, like, we're slapping Leo around a little bit.

I'm fine with that, it's kind of at least depressing. Like, it's one where the perspective has some of the benefits of growing up, incorporated into it, where she can look back on this thing that happened and kind of understand it

in a different way, and there are really nice things about that, even if she's talking about realizing that certain things were all after up at the time, I appreciate that there is something positive to be taken from that as opposed to growing up equals

being really scared about all of these things and not being as fulfilled in your relationships as you thought you might be,

“which is honestly what I get from most of the rest of it.”

- Yeah, the lyrical thing for me

is just sort of like the oldest meme on the internet at this point is like making a joke about anytime anything turns 25 that Leo won't date it anymore. - Yeah, well, I had a conversation with a friend about the song when just the single is out.

And like, I would say that she said something that struck me is very true, at least as I hear it, which is that it feels to me a little bit less like this is a song about Leonardo DiCaprio and more like this is the song about a thing that happens.

Like I hear it much more generally than that, even though of course there are those details. - But I think there are a lot of details, carbon beach. - Yeah. - The is his art, yeah.

- Yeah, no, it's not, it's not like the Easter egging

“is particularly subtle, but I think because, again,”

this is a thing that happens. It comes across as something that's more worth talking about with the specificity lending it's some potency as opposed to, let me just take a whack at this guy that the internet takes plenty of wax at.

Also, like, I don't know, I guess I'm not all that worried about that. I think Leo seems fine. - Have you ever heard the song strawberry letter 23 by the brother's Johnson?

(upbeat music) - I have, and in fact, I was listening to it this afternoon because of this lyric, which I do, I really like that moment. I think that is, that is a moment when there's when detail enhances a song on this record

as opposed to, detracting from it. (upbeat music) - You think Leo's big into that song? - Well, the only other song that I've ever heard about Leo having alleged

particular affection for is God, it's like the M83 song that there are rumors that he listens to while forticating. So I don't know, that's really all I got for you

we into that song.

“- I really, probably are not going to believe you.”

- Yeah, yes, yes, yes, yes, yeah.

Can I tell you about the other songs that I quite like? - Bring it. - Okay, I like weather for tennis a lot. (upbeat music) - Okay, I can tell.

I like the melody a lot. I know that we're gonna get there. It sounds like you and I have some problems songs in common here, but there is a middle part of this album where some of the melodies get very like

they're made up of two or three notes. - Yeah. - And that was tough for me. I think that weather for tennis is a really good example of a song that moves melodically in a way

that I think is great.

- Does it all like harkin' back to the Lily Allen?

Tennis song. (upbeat music)

“- Yeah, oh yeah, that's what that means.”

- Oh shit. - I think musically, I get it, like there's a little bit of, I got more Carly Ray from this, but I think that there is some Lily Allen

on this album as well. - Yeah. - I don't think that Lily Allen owns Tennis as a concept. - She doesn't, it just like that's a real, I mean, of the songs about Country Club sports,

golf on TV by Lenin Stella, I love. Lily Allen Tennis, I love. I don't know, it's hard to put Tennis in a song title and have it actually work. - Well, I didn't quite, I get, like the idea is that,

okay, so these people are like Tennis. - Got it, I am fucking on one today. - So you are a little bit on one. I'm kind of enjoying it. - Sorry, everybody.

- Because they like Tennis, but they can't play Tennis, so instead they're gonna fight. Is I guess what's going on? There are some moments in the storytelling that I don't understand, like I really like the melody

and the production of the bridge, but it's where she goes into that part about like going over to the neighbors to have cocktails with your pinky out. (upbeat music)

- And I was just like, what's happening? Who are you? - Yeah, well, I say the weather for Tennis, it feels like we're going back and forth. I say something you say something, think, don't think, don't think.

- Yeah. Like that's, it feels like a metaphor for the debate that's happening. - Yeah, no, that part I'm on board with, but I don't understand the neighbor thing.

- You calling me "Batschitz" and... - Well, for it, it's a surprise surprise, drink some wine. - Yeah. - That, lime, you calling me "Batschitz" the fastest antibiotic to think like different this time.

I kind of like, I don't think that was cool. - Yes, in. ♪ You calling me "Batschitz" ♪

♪ First is an antibiotic to think it's different this time ♪

- Yeah, no, there are a lot of words in this album as a whole, and I would say that it clunks too often, but that one, which I've seen, called out some places as an example of that,

“I don't agree with that, I think that's fun.”

- One of the things that's abundantly clear that men should really understand about their partners is that you don't call them crazy. It doesn't go well, ever. And saying you're calling me "Batschitz"

is the fastest antibiotic, yeah, it's gonna come on. - Yeah, you don't do that. - That's a good, it's a good one for us. - It's a good one for us. - It's a good one for us.

- I also like you from Monty Moon. ♪ Let's drink too much food on my Japanese hands ♪ ♪ Do you help us make it for me a picture of us ♪ - Okay, let's talk about that. - This is another one where I really like the melody.

- Okay, I like the melody too. I get thrown a little bit by lines, like casual smokers, spiritual feathers. I get thrown by, let's drink too much, put on the Japanese house, it'll help us forget

what we were bitching about. - Oh, I, so, okay, there are things in this that I'm thrown by, but it's not those. I actually, like the Japanese house reference for me felt true in a way that sometimes she's

bringing up things like orange, wine, and it just sort of, it felt a little, those are moments where it felt like trying too hard for me. This one actually didn't.

about most of the people, do you think she smokes?

(laughs) - Yeah, probably.

“- I think she's a casual smoker, but I think she used to be.”

(upbeat music) - Yeah, I think, I also, I couldn't, I assumed that this is a reference to cigarettes, but it could go either way. - No, no, I did too, I did too.

- Okay. - The moments on this song that take me out of it a little bit are your kind of freak matched my kind of freak. - 100% what are we doing? - And you're so the lyric about the slap in the face.

- Oh, yeah. (upbeat music) - Where again, I'm like, okay, now are we suddenly having a conversation about domestic violence? - Like, because that's domestic violence, yeah.

- Yeah, that was, that's weird for me. I will be honest, she doesn't enunciate all that well on that line, so I can kind of squint and pretend it's not there and get back to what I do really like about this, which is there's a sweetness to the overall sound

of the song that I think matters her voice really well. Again, I really like the melody. There are vignettes like the Japanese house part of it that I actually, I respond well too, but I do kind of have to pretend

that there isn't a line about hitting your partner on the soul. - But you didn't think it was like a sexual reference, slipping out of dress like our wedding day. But it's not quite in, like it's not in that stanza. - That's not how I took it.

I guess it's, I guess, maybe that's possible, and that's the kind of freak that is being matched. I would certainly, you know what? That's my new way of listening to this song, because it's gonna help me.

“- That's how you should deal with it, yeah.”

- Totally, thank you. - I think it's better if you think about it that way. - Totally. And then let's see, those are definitely my two favorites.

- Okay. - Actually, I like to-- - You don't like to make? - I like roommates, okay. I don't love roommates, but it is mostly because of but life is life.

I just like, I really struggle with life is life. - You could handle the sex act in the back of the dive bar, but life is life thing is what turned you off? - Yes. That's just, I'm not saying that's the right answer,

but I am saying that it's the right answer for me. - You could handle the porn part, you could handle. - I can handle, I'm not sure that there's a line on this album, which includes repeated,

"Father Never Loveder," everybody's leaving,

you know, slap in the face. I'm not sure that there is a lyrical moment on this album that I have a tougher time with than but life is life. - Okay, so is there any lore around the haily-duff situation

'cause you said you like we don't talk? ♪ Don't know what I always enough saying is how we don't talk ♪ ♪ We don't talk about it ♪ - I mean, just that I know that they're not friends, but they're not, we do too, from this song.

- Right, there's, I don't know any specifics, there's not Easter egg stuff, and even in the song, she kind of intimates that she doesn't even really know what happened or where their tension began. So other than it being a situation that, I mean,

it's also, it's not something that she,

“I think she's pretty honest about the fact”

that they don't really have much of a relationship.

- And the bridge is basically an invitation

to talk it out, which I thought was actually kind of cool. - Yeah. ♪ I bet I'll hear you out ♪ ♪ You hear me out on the couch ♪ ♪ Get back to how we would ask you ♪

- Like, let's have it out, I'll hear you out. You hear me out on the couch, get back to how we were as kids. Like, great. - Yeah. - I hope it works for her.

- Yeah. And I didn't mind that gotcha interpolation because again, to me that was one of those other little touch points, kind of in the time between the Lizzie McGuire years, and now where it just sort of makes me feel like,

oh, yeah, she experienced that. And so did I, and it just establishes a little bit more of a shared record. So I like that one. I'll tell you the ones that I really struggle with

and it is the three songs that come after we don't talk.

growing up, and the optimist.

And that is my fire into the sun section. - Okay.

“What is it about future tripping that you struggle with?”

- It's the fact that the majority of the melody is three notes. ♪ Future tripping up, the future tripping me out ♪ - It's the, (sings) Like it sounds like an insect in my ear. - That's how I feel about growing up.

- Yeah, I also like, I just really didn't need a lot of Master's in to be invoked on this album. Like, that's crazy. - Yes. - Okay.

- That's a crazy choice. - Yeah, they just lost a little bit of it's,

a lot of canvas and I suppose.

- Yes, I think that's a good way of putting it. I was like, yeah. Weaponizing Blink 1802, damn it for, if I had to choose one, it would be growing up. - Yeah, that's where I am.

- We agree on that, we will shoot that one into the sun. The optimist, I learned the most about her from the optimist. - Let's show, let's show. - And I think it's, you know,

but it's like, you get into a course. I wish I could sleep on planes. Oh, okay. And that my father would really love me. What?

♪ I wish I could sleep on planes ♪ ♪ And my father would really love me ♪ - Yeah, it's too, again, I don't want to fault anyone for sharing, but it's too startling. - Yeah, yeah, it's just, it's,

and you don't get sense that she thinks she's pulling the rug out from underneath you on purpose. Like, you don't get the sense that she's like,

oh, they're never gonna see this coming.

And that's where I'm really, I'm really in the bar with the person who shouldn't have finished the second martini going. - Right. - Right. - How does that sound like?

- We can't have a two martini launch Hillary. How many times have I told you just once? - Usually they say that three is that, you know, 'cause the martini's are like boobs. Once not enough to his perfect three, too many.

- Oh, thank God, I learned something today. - Anything else you want to say about that?

“- No, no, I mean, I think that there's a lot of”

honest discussion of her sex life or sort of sexual fantasy stuff sprinkled across this record in a bunch of places. - Yeah. - Tell me that, which is kind of brave, you know,

tell me that won't happen. She says I'm not complaining the sex could be hotter, but I wanna know that's the way of you're on. ♪ I'm gonna complain and bet the sex could be hotter ♪ ♪ But I wanna know that's the way of you're on ♪

- I sort of receive that as, like, a coin with two sides on the one hand, there were times where I felt like it was part of the tri-hard I'm trying to make a moment. I'm trying to get somebody to talk about the fact that Hillary Duff dot dot dot dot.

But on the other hand, I was like, you know, there's an honest opinion. - I'm just thinking, yeah, that's not something you hear every day. - No, and she does it in a different way than would from showgirl, right?

- I agree. - In it, it's much more direct. There's a vulnerability to it when you think about the fact that her husband is producing this album. - Yeah.

- And that was the thing that I caught onto not because of the sex part of it, but because of the actual believable honesty and the bravery that it would take with those people or that person in the room,

and then by the way, others who were involved in this album to just say that out loud and have them deal with that and process that that's a thing, unless it's an entire act, like I found that interesting, that's all.

- I'll be really curious to see if this is a bridge anywhere in particular. - Yeah, what do you think?

“Is there a next album after, like, what happens here?”

Is this just all gearing towards when we were young, type festival for this kind of sort of pop star? We're Carly Ray and Hillary and others come back and play

- Carly? - Carly is doing big things

on Broadway right now. - Carly is, like, having chapter after chapter.

“I think the answer to that, honestly to me is yes”

and I think that is more than fine. I wanna be truthful about the fact that I felt mostly disappointed by this album, but also that I look at it as pretty successful in doing what it needed to do

because I'm thrilled to be going to this tour. I'm thrilled to just like have a moment in culture where we're talking about Hillary Duff. That feels like something that I have really wanted for a long time and probably would have wanted

as a kid without being able to put words to it. And I really do think that there are some fun sounding pop songs on this album. I think mature is very good. And I think that it is more than effective

at what it needs to do, which is be the foundation for all of that, remembering Hillary Duff to happen, which to me is great.

We are always gonna be honest about how we feel about the album.

So if I'm sorry if anyone feels like this is yucking a particular young, just know that I am with you in the Hillary Duff trenches and I think it's okay. But there was quite a bit on here

that I bumped up against. And I do think that it's hard for me to listen to this and say oh, well here are all the doors that this opens up for her beyond servicing nostalgia. Did you give it a grade?

- I gotta hear yours first. - I gotta be. I kind of gave it a B for bummer, but I still gave it a B. - Wow, what a gender, this is our first grade.

Is this our first grade of 26?

- Don't ask me when the year started. I think it might be, I think you're, yes, I think that's correct. - Do you think you're coming out generous because you don't, because you love Hillary?

- No, I actually think I'm being ungenerous because I love Hillary. I think if you listen to this episode, it's gonna make it sound like these songs are kind of un-listenable and they're really...

- You should listen to the record. - Yeah, listen to the album, definitely. - I think that I, no, I actually think that I'm being harsher on it because I care, but I do think that it matters

“that it's doing what it needs to do, I think.”

Like I do think that it matters that it is enough to make the tour feel bigger. And by the way, I don't know if she'll change the set list, but Indy's in the shows that she's done, so far, she did a little mini residency in Las Vegas

and blah, blah, blah, and she's done a few smaller shows. She has really, she's played these songs, but she has centered the back catalog. And in that sense, it kind of seems to me like she knows. - Yeah, I saw some social posts that said something like

that it's crazy that like a C by any other normal evaluation is a minus for Hillary, like, 'cause it's exactly what it needed to be, which is kind of what I think you're saying. Like mission accomplished, got it out,

has some songs that are streaming a little bit, and not gonna set the world on fire, but we'll easily bring people back into the live show, which is inevitably going to happen from here. I imagine, I mean, I don't know, she's, it's not easy.

When you're trying to do that and raise a family and all of the normal things. - But she is tourists. - Super hero women have to do.

“I know, but like it's just, it's super hard, right?”

- Yeah. - So, yeah, that's, I think, - Yeah, so I'm with the person on the internet. But I don't think it's, - You're with the person on the internet

that Simultaneously gave it a C and didn't A minus. - Yes. - That's yes. - Yes. A minus for what it's trying to accomplish

in terms of like whether this will become, I hope this does not affect the play listing, the algorithmic feed that I get from Spotify, which is already completely fucked up because of what we have to listen to.

So, yeah, that's where I am. I will land the plane. Here's what I'll do. I will land the plane on a C plus.

- And that's me being, like, as directly honest as I can be,

“but I would not, if I walk into your house”

and you're playing this, I'm not asking to turn it off.

If you're playing the last Katy Perry album,

I'm walking out. Like, this is a perfectly acceptable album to listen to. - It's fine if you just listen to it. - It's fine if you just listen to it.

“- But not, what if I'm playing peacock by Katy Perry?”

Are you walking out? - The comedic, the comedic value says I have to stay for that. - Okay, well, I'll keep that in mind. - It depends on how many martinis we had at lunch.

“- Well, I'm glad that if nothing else, Nathan,”

we can say that you learned something from this episode. I feel like so much smarter. - This has been every single album.

As always, I'm more Prince Yaddy.

He's Nathan Hubbard. Thank you to Kai. I'm a small one for producing this episode. And to you for listening, we'll talk to you next week. (upbeat music)