H ave you heard the Sabrina Carpenter song Espresso? Even if you don’t know it by name, you will have done. It’s honeyed but arch (“That’s that me, espresso”). Frothy, hooky, with a lyrical sting (“My ‘give a fucks’ are on vacation”).
The coquettish hyper-real video has the US singer draped over speedboats and surfboards like a Superdry Bardot (glossy subterfuge; mainstream with a wink). Carpenter was the opening act on the Australian leg of Taylor Swift’s Eras tour, but her Espresso knocked Swift’s Fortnight off the top spot on Global Spotify and it has been streamed more than 434m times. Creeping into the zeitgeist through the back door, it’s perfectly poised to grab the sought-after trophy: the Song of the Summer.
While there are other contenders (Benson Boone’s Beautiful Things; Tommy Richman’s Million Dollar Baby; Kendrick Lamar’s Not Like Us; Eminem’s Houdini – which knocked Carpenter off the UK No 1 slot this weekend), behemoths such as Swift, Beyoncé, and Billie Eilish seem (hmm, interesting) a little shoved to the side. A case of: sorry, my queens, you don’t always get to stroll in and take what you want. What is the Song of the Summer (SOTS)? Short answer: many things.
It’s an all-engulfing seasonal mega-hit that defines the cultural moment and transcends categorisation and market demographics. It’s an irresistible earworm with sand dusted between its toes and wind ruffling its hair. It’s unstoppably ubiquitous, swirling a.
