Former Disney Channel-turned-pop star, Dove Cameron, is “singing it loud” on her debut album, “Alchemical: Volume One.” A lot of former child actors, especially from Disney, tend to go on and release their own music; however, her album is very different sounding, at least compared to people who did this in the past.
It is no surprise that her album is sonically good considering her background in acting and music, but most of the tracks are pretty generic sounding. Her voice is pretty great, but everyone in the world knows that after watching her sing on television as children.
Her lyrical content is pretty good when she is not doing what other actors did when they left Disney, talking exclusively about sex, drugs, and violence… for some reason.
There are some songs in the album that are even tear-jerking. Tracks like “Sand” and “FRAGILE THINGS” have a lot of substance to them, whereas tracks like “Boyfriend” and “White Glove” are just generic pop songs about sex and partying. Songs about sex and partying can be fantastic and fun for sure but not when they have nothing to them and are just meant to tarnish your past reputation as a “kid-friendly” actor. A song’s meaning is really important, it is what makes art important. A song without meaning is just noise really, and a lot of her album just ended up being more noise for the radio to play or to blow up on TikTok.
Her singles, “Boyfriend” and “Breakfast,” had huge success on TikTok a full year before the album debuted. As the “Boyfriend” hype died down, the “Breakfast” hype started to rise. Still, these songs have insane amounts of streams and even more coming in due to the release of the album. All of the tracks on the album sound the same though, so if you are a fan of those songs then you will most likely enjoy the rest of the album.
The songs go from ballad-like to nearly techno between tracks. Her ballad-like tracks have the most striking lyrics and her vocals throughout the album are genuinely great. Instrumentally though, the album is basic, very generic and it is kind of painful. The seeming ingenuity of most of the album kind of ruins it, even though immense talent is being displayed.
Dove is already posting on her social media about the release of “Alchemical: Volume Two” and hopefully this album will make up for the first. It sucks that former child stars always have a weird pressure to kill who they were in the past before they are actually able to dive into their passion. Dove Cameron is insanely talented vocally and lyrically, and hopefully, this isn’t just a cash grab for her and genuinely is her passion. There are high hopes for the next album, but the expectations are low.
