Lucia Thomas | Managing Illustration Editor

A lead single is an opportunity: It can usher in a new sound! It can refamiliarize listeners with an artist’s strengths! It can take an exciting aesthetic swing! It should, at the very least, be good. Tate McRae doesn’t bog herself down with these rules. On her new song “Housewife,” over what could be the instrumental to a dusty Nelly Furtado B-side, McRae turns her attention to monetary goods, singing “I just wanna make a lot of money, be my own housewife.” It’s not particularly clever and it’s not particularly empowering, which is to say it slots in nicely with the rest of McRae’s discography. Past greats have successfully pulled off a similar superficial aesthetic, but McRae can’t tap into the charm of a “Material Girl,” the silliness of a “Glamorous,” or the groove of “Rich Girl.” She’s no Madonna, or Fergie, or even Gwen Stefani — specifically, she lacks the juice that cements those singers in pop culture stardom. She has no distinct voice, no plan, no vision. Even the wealth of resources at her disposal seems to go to waste — the big expensive music video can make an artist’s unique perspective clear, but the “Housewife” video has the creative intention of a hotel ad between Jeopardy segments. “This industry will try to kill you, kill you / But not before they try to bill you, bill you,” she sings with the subtlety of, well, a sports car. McRae is an incredible dancer, conventionally gorgeous, and seems like a fun hang, but these are all moot points when the songs are so offensively whatever. 

Despite all my gripes, I want to root for her; when she’s onstage performing, it’s clear McRae is hungry for excellence. But performance is only half the battle. Her music remains two steps behind, continuing to tiptoe at the edge of something more interesting, more vulnerable, and more cutting. After almost a decade into her career, “Housewife” is only another piece of evidence amounting to the disappointing conclusion that she’ll never make the jump.