Why Carly Rae Jepsen Won’t Ever Be As Big As Taylor Swift

Carly Rae Jepsen is all grown up. The 29-year-old singer released her new album, Emotion, last week. Carly managed to make a 80s-inspired album that competes with Taylor Swift’s 1989 and breaks her away from the one-hit wonder status.

Carly Rae Jepsen admitted that she no longer wanted to be known as the “Call Me Maybe” singer. Much like Ms. Swift, Jepsen says that she felt she needed to shake off that title.

“It’s normal for people to define you by one thing. The trick is not to believe that yourself. None of us are just one thing — how boring would that be? So I’m really excited to feel like I have shaken that off for myself.”

Carly Rae Jepsen’s third studio album was whittled down from over 200 songs that she has written in the past three years. Yes, like Taylor Swift, Carly also writes her own music. She even wrote the songs on her debut album, Kiss, which she admits wasn’t something she was proud of.

“I wanted to be able to take my time making an album that felt like every song was there for a reason and had a vital place.”

After attempting to record her follow-up in Los Angeles, she wanted go in a different direction. Taylor Swift revealed to Rolling Stone that her scary decision to move to New York helped inspire 1989. Carly also moved there, but not for a lifestyle change. She wanted to star in the Broadway production of Cinderella, watch Cyndi Lauper perform, and jog while listening to Prince.

Jepsen may not have released an album that will receive critically acclaim success, but she did release one that will receive critical acclaim and interest in the next years to come. Since its release, it’s already received its share of rave reviews, as previously reported via the Inquisitr.

The writers over at the Verge love Carly Rae Jepsen’s new album so much that they’ve been publishing several articles about the singer-songwriter, even one that jokingly questions if she’s an actual vampire. Emily Yoshida’s review even called Carly’s new album “perfect, narrative-free pop music.”

As good as Jepsen’s latest release is the Canadian export still won’t achieve the same success that Taylor Swift has in the U.S. It could be due to the fact that fans know nothing about Jepsen, as previously noted in Yoshida’s review on the Verge.

“Bluntly speaking, we don’t know anything about Carly Rae Jepsen. She hasn’t shared her life with us in the same way that Lovato, Rihanna, or even Beyoncé, that master of strict self-curation, has. And when it comes to selling your story as a product, all those artists are eating the dust of Taylor Swift, whose preplanned “candid” paparazzi shoots and carefully leaked gossip tidbits keep her personal saga in business even between album cycles.”

In fact, Carly Rae Jepsen prefers it that way. She previously confessed that she doesn’t like to be recognized in public. Jepsen would rather have her music speak for itself by impressing people with her ability to change the scope of the music world; and quite possibility, the music business. As noted in a feature article on Vulture, she wants to reinvent the “modern pop star.”

“Jepsen is perceived as out of synch with the aspirational meme-ability of Rihanna, Katy Perry, and Taylor Swift. Female pop stars are expected to cultivate, via curated-to-look-casual social media and over-the-top personas that come to life live, fantasy versions of themselves. One look at Jepsen’s promotion-oriented Twitter feed affirms that she’s not interested in playing that game.”

Carly Rae is a breath of fresh air compared to her pop peers. She says that she’s no longer afraid to speak her mind and do what she wants, especially in the recording studio and in photo shoots.

The singer who already has one of the best pop albums of 2015 admitted, “I’m a little less afraid to p*ss some people off. I can just be like: Here’s the album, this is the sound, this is my age, this is what I’m going for, this is way more me, and do you mind if I don’t wear the fuzzy pink sweater?”

Blood Orange’s singer and composer, Dev Hynes, revealed that Carly’s Emotion album is all her own work, saying, “What you’re hearing is what she wants people to hear, she even produced her own vocals.”

Even Carly even admitted that she vaped for an entire week so that she can sound raspy on the Hynes produced track “All That.”

Sure, Carly Rae Jepsen won’t receive the same amount of success that Taylor Swift has and continues to receive, but she will receive praise for producing a pop album that’s a cut above the rest.

[Image: Promotional Photo via CarlyRaeMusic.com]