Bops, Body, and Belonging: Addison Rae’s Pop Debut Speaks to the Girls, Gays, and Theys
Photo: Ethan James Green / Courtesy of Sony Music
Addison Rae did what the pop girlies rarely do anymore. She dropped a debut album that’s camp, cohesive, deeply referential, and undeniably her own. And we are here for it.
Addison isn’t trying to be revolutionary. It’s not an album about pain or protest. But for the gender-diverse and pop-literate, it lands right in the heart of what we crave in 2025: an unapologetically femme, emotionally complex, aesthetically maximalist body of work. This is the girlhood of digital natives and dissociative daydreamers, set to breathy vocals, glittering synths, and just enough lyrical chaos to keep it relatable.
From the Charli XCX and Arca co-signs to the Lana-core interludes and Jersey club opener, Addison isn’t just vibing, she’s studying the queer-pop canon and remixing it for the TikTok-to-Tumblr pipeline. It’s not queer music, but it understands why queer people need music like this.
Because when the world feels hostile, sometimes all you want is to throw on headphones and dance your way through a soft apocalypse.
Hyperfemme, Hyperonline, Hyperreal: Why Listeners Feel Seen
What makes Addison hit so hard isn’t just the production (which slaps) or the visuals (which serve). It’s the way the album feels fluid, constructed, messy, and euphoric.
From the very first glitch of “New York,” we’re dropped into Addison’s fantasy: a digital dreamspace filled with glossy lips, cigarette smoke, and feelings too big to say plainly. The soundscape references 2000s pop—In the Zone, Nocturnes, Confessions on a Dance Floor—but filters it through a Gen Z lens of Instagram-core aesthetics, Tumblr melancholia, and TikTok irony. This isn’t retro. It’s meta-nostalgic.
And for gender-diverse listeners? That’s everything.
Addison’s vocals are breathy, buried, and controlled, not because she can’t belt, but because that isn’t the point. She’s giving vibes first, catharsis later. Songs like “Fame Is a Gun” and “Aquamarine” sound like emotional regulation with a synth beat. “High Fashion” is a gender performance in club form, couture, curated, and just a bit unhinged. This is pop made for pre-gaming before crying in the bathroom mirror and texting your ex from the smoking area.
The femininity Addison performs isn’t for the male gaze, it’s for the mirrorball. It’s femme with teeth. It’s self-aware camp. It’s “I’m the richest girl in the world” followed by “Am I too old to blame my dad?” It’s queering the bimbo archetype and letting her cry in the rain.
This is not music that explains itself. It’s music that feels like survival with lip gloss on.
She’s Not Queer—But She Gets It
Let’s get one thing out of the way: Addison Rae isn’t publicly queer—at least not as far as we know. But she’s listening, and it shows.
In a year where pop allyship often feels like a brand collab, Addison’s connection to the queer community isn’t just lip service. She’s worked with Arca, collaborated closely with women producers Luka Kloser and Elvira Anderfjärd, and shouted out Charli XCX, Gaga, Lana, and Madonna in the lyrics of “Money Is Everything” like a gay rosary. She’s not here to co-opt the culture, she’s in community with the ones who shaped it.
And the queer fanbase? We feel it. Scroll through Reddit’s popheads thread, and you’ll see it over and over again: “This could be a gaybie’s inner awakening.” “I’ve been an unironic fan since ‘2 Die 4.’” “It’s modern girlhood — it’s pearls and powdered-sugar rage.”
Even The Cut called her “unknowable in the right way,” and they’re right. Addison doesn’t pretend to offer raw confessions or identity politics. Instead, she gives us emotional landscapes that are glittering, moody, and unfinished. Which, ironically, is more honest than half the faux-vulnerability pop acts out there right now.
There’s something quietly radical about a debut that doesn’t centre the artist’s trauma, but still invites you into it. “Times Like These” references body dysphoria and parental wounds with a shrug, not a scream. “In the Rain” feels like a rainy-night FaceTime that ends with “Anyway, I’m fine.” This is femme resilience, digitised. And it’s exactly the kind of music queer and trans listeners often build identity around—even if it wasn’t made for us.
Because Addison Rae knows where she comes from. And more importantly, she knows who’s listening.
Pop in 2025 Is Queer, Even When It’s Not
Addison Rae’s Addison isn’t just a debut album, it’s a cultural litmus test. Not because it breaks boundaries, but because it understands that pop doesn’t need to. In an era where the line between satire, sincerity, and stan culture is paper-thin, Addison’s offering is deliciously self-aware and earnestly unserious. That balance? It’s queer as hell.
She’s not the most vocally powerful pop star. She’s not the most lyrically complex. But she’s tapped into something deeper: the emotional architecture of queer fandom. The longing, the fantasy, the mess, the looped confession you dance to while trying not to fall apart. It’s performative girlhood, built for those of us who’ve always seen gender as a costume anyway.
This is an album made for people who:
Still remember LimeWire and Tumblr gifs
Think crying in club bathrooms counts as community care
Quote Ray of Light in one breath and Charli leaks in the next
And Addison gets that. Not because she’s been through it, but because she respects those who have. Her album doesn’t exploit queer aesthetics, it honours them. One Redditor called it “a soundtrack for a film where you’re the main character,” and that’s the entire point. Addison is the sonic equivalent of staring into a glittery compact mirror and asking: Who do I want to be today?
We’re living in a time where authenticity is overrated and curation is queer survival. Addison Rae, knowingly or not, has given us a debut that lives in that exact tension. And that’s what makes it matter.
Pop Isn’t Dead—It Just Put Its Headphones On
Addison Rae’s, Addison, isn’t the future of pop: it’s the now of it. And it’s queer, glittery, sad, unserious, and absolutely tuned in.
This album isn’t flawless. The lyrics wander. The interludes drift. But for so many of us, especially queer listeners, perfection was never the point. Addison succeeds because it knows how to set a vibe and hold a mirror up to it, one covered in rhinestones and smudged eyeliner. It’s about the mood, the movement, the moment. It's about finding yourself somewhere between a beat drop and a breakdown.
Addison isn’t trying to be Madonna or Britney or Charli or Gaga, but she’s a student of all of them. She’s filtered their iconography through a Y2K-core, TikTok-warped, emotionally literate lens and made something that’s less about storytelling and more about emotional immersion. That’s why the girls, gays, and theys are gagged.
Because in a world that often demands our pain be palatable, and our joy be marketable, Addison is a reminder that sometimes the most radical thing you can do is make a sad little dance album, put your headphones on, and vibe your way into becoming.
Addison Rae didn’t give us a manifesto. She gave us a mirrorball. And we saw ourselves in it.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️☆ (4/5 stars)
Album cover: Addison Rae’s ‘Addison’ (2025). Photo by Ethan James Green. Courtesy of Sandlot Records.
Addison isn’t just a solid debut, it’s a full-bodied, glitter-drenched love letter to pop music, digital girlhood, and becoming. While not without its missteps, it’s vulnerable, stylish, and knowingly referential in a way that hits home for the girls, gays, and theys. If this is Addison’s only album, she’s going out with a wink, and a legacy.
Fave Tracks: Times Like These, Aquamarine, Headphones On, Diet Peps, Fame is a Gun
Best For: Cry-dancing in your bedroom with lip gloss on and nothing figured out
Queer Core Takeaway: Gender is a moodboard, healing is nonlinear, and pop doesn’t need to explain itself to be real. Sometimes the most affirming thing is a beat that gets you through the week.
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