Having shaken off her Hannah Montana persona with 2013’s dizzying pop and hip-hop melange , the 33-year-old’s career has seen her pivot over and again, building a discography of breadth and ambition, with 2025's cinematic ushering in a new creative peak. On , her tenth album and first for Atlantic, she maintains her commitment to quality, but not to her last name. As the title of the album suggests, it’s all about release and refinement.
Cyrus leads on the songwriting and production, with the finished product possessing a charismatic, dashed off sensibility that fits with how quickly she says it came together. This time around, the pool of talent around her includes Kid Harpoon, Michael Pollack, Griff Clawson, Gregory ‘Aldae’ Hein, post-punk outfit Model/Actriz, writing and production clique Monsterz & Strangers, and her fiancé Maxx Morando, whose presence is felt throughout this more romantic-leaning record.
Central to overall is its cooler tempo. Of the nine songs (plus a Model/Actriz remix of “Bass Persuades”), five fall into the pop ballad space. “Let’s Get Married”, “Orbit”, and “REDLIGHTS” are the standouts in this category, laced with hints of classic soul, adult contemporary pop, and Ennio Morricone flavoured art-rock – sounds that she’s touched on before, with and 2023’s , and still fit her like a glove.
On the groovier side of things, Cyrus has always been good at finding a floor-filling pocket – trap, nu disco, new wave – and occupying it comfortably. finds her taking up harder-edged electronics and a more thickly alternative sheen on “Aftermath”, “Innocent Ways”, “Different Religion”, and the title song. “Different Religion” is a delicious team-up with Model/Actriz that’s all twitchy, dance-punk excess, whereas “Bass Persuades” feels like a love letter to early Lady Gaga, but with a cheeky Cyrusian twist that’s only amplified by the spikier “remixx.”
Powdering the fresh yet familiar music are lyrics of inward curiosity, sensuality, and unfettered passion, exemplified most by “Snow” and “Neon Signs”, a duet with Andrew Wyatt of indie-pop trio Miike Snow. Cyrus’s voice is at its dusky, soulful best throughout the whole of , but the way she pours herself into these two songs is especially compelling.
Still an id woman at heart, she's been sharpened by experience, and luxuriates in both her hard-won wisdom and confidently polished taste, nothing more or less. It may not be as progressive as its predecessor, but it’s fascinating all the same.