Singer’s new album Dreamsicle is a complicated modern-pop confection
“Feels like the worst year/ is always the one you’re in,” Maren Morris laments at the beginning of the loose-limbed “Carry Me Through,” which pops up near the end of the singer-songwriter’s fourth album. That plaint is tinged with hard-won wisdom — she’s reminding herself that while life’s journey might seem bad in the moment, any bumpy roads will look smooth in the rear-view mirror. It’s an appropriate observation on Dreamsicle, a modern pop confection named after a treat that shrouds its central sweetness in pucker-inducing sherbet.
Dreamsicle flips its namesake’s script: It has the surface trappings of a sun-dappled pop album, but those big hooks are often hiding semi-privately mourned wounds. “Crying In the Car” pairs lyrics about feeling “safe behind the glass” with zig-zagging synths and a strutting beat, while “Cut!,” a punchy duet with pop utility player Julia Michaels, answers the question “how does she do it?” with a portrait of someone who knows exactly when she can let herself fall apart.
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Morris came up in country music, with mid-‘10s hits like the legend-saluting “My Church” and the sumptuous “80s Mercedes” showing off her ability to bridge country’s generation gaps lyrically and vocally. Dreamsicle might be her first full-length project since she announced her decision to “step outside of” the genre in 2023, but it shows how her vision of pop remains rooted in sturdy songwriting. “This Is How A Woman Leaves” is a seething statement of finality that feels lifted from real-life arguments; “I Hope I Never Fall In Love” spins out of the “Be My Baby” beat to fight off fuure heartbreak, Morris’ voice cracking open as she wails the song’s title.
Dreamsicle isn’t entirely riding the bummer wave, even if, as Morris admits on the cloud-borne title track, “I overthink the moment/ right down to the minute.” The swaying “Bed No Breakfast” shoos a one-night stand out the door with a winking grace; “People Still Show Up” is a serpentine soft-rocker with a rueful message: The world might seem filled with horrors, but there just might be enough good folks out there to make life a bit nicer — even if that reprieve only lasts about as long as a pop song.
