Eternal Sunshine (album)

produced eleven of the thirteen tracks on Eternal Sunshine. On May 12, 2022, 19 months after the release of her sixth studio album, Positions (2020), Ariana Grande clarified that she would not be recording another album until she is done filming Wicked (2024) and Wicked: For Good (2025), the two-part film adaptation of the Broadway musical of the same name, in which she portrays the character Glinda. In October 2023, she first jokingly hinted at a forthcoming album by posting "ag7: goat mother" as an Instagram caption. A set of pictures included a photo of her with Swedish producer and long-time collaborator Max Martin at Jungle City Studios in New York City. On December 7 and December 17, 2023, Grande shared a series of pictures and video clips working in recording studios and her editing audio files. As opposed to previous eras, she specifically stated that there would be no song snippets for the upcoming record. On December 27, 2023, the singer confirmed a 2024 album release via her social media. She posted a carousel of videos on her Instagram that show her crying in a recording studio and her mother Joan dancing to a new song of hers, amongst others. She captioned the post "See you next year" and tagged several accounts, including Swedish musician Ilya Salmanzadeh, music video director Christian Breslauer, and Republic Records. She referred to the picture of her crying and another one which depicts her dancing as the "two moods of the album". ==Conception==

Grande described Eternal Sunshine as "kind of a concept album" comprising "different heightened pieces of the same story, of the same experience". She explained that the record spans from "really vulnerable" songs to playful tracks which see her emulating "what people kind of expect me to be sometimes and having fun with it". The title of the album alludes to the 2004 Michel Gondry film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. == Recording and production ==

In a video shared to her social media of her previewing some songs of the album to Republic Records personnel, Grande revealed that after the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike forced the filming of Wicked and Wicked: For Good to be paused temporarily, she "came [to the studio]" and begun work on the record that September. She further revealed that she worked with Max Martin for a few weeks, and handled production on her own as well. "Proper" vocal recordings and orchestrations were arranged in November. Work on the album concluded in late December 2023. Referring to the period of making Eternal Sunshine, Grande stated that "things [were] kind of just pouring out and happening very quickly". == Music and lyrics ==

Eternal Sunshine is a pop and R&B album that features elements of dance music, especially synth-pop and house music. Helen Brown of The Independent described it as a "slow-fizz pop" album, consisting of mid-tempo synths, strings and muted guitar. Jem Aswad of Variety felt that Martin and Salmanzadeh imbued the album with a "very Swedish vibe and structure to the tracks" inspired by classic pop, a style atypical of Anglo-American musicians. Lyrically, the album is a combination of both "ultra-confident and entirely self-deprecating" themes, inspired by Grande's personal relationships. Billboard described it as an introspective record—one in which Grande reflects on herself as she enters her thirties. The second song, "Bye", was described by Grande as the hardest song on the album for her to write, saying "It was hard for the reason that I desperately didn't want it to sound like a 'fuck you.' I wanted it to sound like, 'I need to leave, so bye'". Grande wanted the song to have a sense of self-awareness and accountability, rather than being completely dismissive. It is an uptempo dance-pop number with influences of disco and Philadelphia soul. The third track, "Don't Wanna Break Up Again", is a gloomy, '90s influenced pop and R&B song that discusses conflicting feelings Grande has towards the end of her relationship with her partner. The album's interlude, "Saturn Returns", prominently samples a YouTube video of astrologer Diana Garland, as she discusses the importance of the age of 29 in a person's life. She urges the listener to "wake up" and "sort out who you really are" before the album's fifth and title track. The interlude fades directly into "Eternal Sunshine", during which Grande seems to come to terms with the faults of her partner and their relationship. In the track, she hints that her ex-husband, Dalton Gomez, may have cheated during their marriage and displays an uncertainty towards their relationship over an "R&B-pop" beat. "Supernatural", the sixth track on the album, has a low-tempo beat. The lyrics are about how Grande is in love with someone and is inseparable. Grande lets this love take over her entire state of mind. The lyrics also show that Grande is healing from heartbreak and is ready to love again. Billboard ranked "Supernatural" number eight out of Eternal Sunshine's tracks and compared it to "Breathin'" from Sweetener, as both songs are "undeniable home runs and surefire pure-pop smashes."