Death becomes Sabrina Carpenter. The pint-sized pop star’s brand of cheeky lyricism and sexy fun has swept the nation this summer, starting with the addictive “Espresso” and popping off with “Please Please Please.” On Friday, Carpenter released her highly anticipated new record Short N’ Sweet, accompanied by a new video for the album opener, “Taste.” In it, Carpenter finds herself in yet another love triangle—this time with Jenna Ortega—and this time she’s not going out without a fight. To the death.
The “Taste” video is over-the-top gory, like, needs-a-parental-advisory-warning-before-the-video-starts gory. This perfectly suits scream queen Ortega’s macabre sensibility, but also surprisingly suits Carpenter, who clearly delights in getting a little subversive with her work. The two go after each other in increasingly upsetting ways, involving machetes, shotguns, and voodoo dolls, until finally Ortega accidentally murders their nondescript boyfriend with a chainsaw. That’s ’cause she was imagining kissing Carpenter, literalizing the lyric: “I heard you’re back together and if that’s true/You’ll just have to taste me when he’s kissin’ you/If you want forever, I bet you do/Just know you’ll taste me too.” Of course, the video ends with the two ladies leaving their man’s funeral together, giggling: he was “Very insecure,” they agree. Laughing, Carpenter tells Ortega, “You kill me! ”
The psychosexual transference of obsession from the man to his new girlfriend in “Taste” is a classic, previously explored by Little Big Town in their Grammy winning hit “Girl Crush,” where they sing about wanting to “taste her lips” because they “taste like you.” It’s also the subject of “Obsessed” by Olivia Rodrigo, who sings, “I’m so obsessed with your ex/I know she’s been asleep on my side of your bed/And I can feel it”—not unlike Carpenter noting in “Taste” that “Now I’m gone, but you’re still layin’/Next to me, one degree of separation.”
Rodrigo and Carpenter have long been linked ever since the latter was pegged as the “blonde girl who always made me doubt” in Rodrigo’s breakout hit “Drivers License.” Interestingly, “Taste” also has parallels to another of Rodrigo’s songs about their alleged love triangle. “Hе’s funny, now all his jokes hit different/Guеss who he learned that from?” Carpenter sings, just as Rodrigo once claimed “I made the jokes you tell to her when she’s with you” on her track “Deja Vu.” Now Carpenter is the one in Rodrigo’s position of the love triangle, but it’s the same old story. As the singer herself admits, “I’ve been there, done that once or twice/And singin’ ’bout it don’t mean I care/Yeah, I know I’ve been known to share.”
The “graphic violence” warning that appears at the beginning of Sabrina Carpenter‘s video for her brand-new single “Taste — from her just-released sixth album “Short n’ Sweet” — has one thinking at first that the playful revenge fantasies of the two previous videos have gotten serious. But strange as it might sound, the murder weapons, amputations and buckets of blood that she and Jenna Ortega spill in the hilariously Tarantino-ish clip are more like a cartoon. As they fight over a boyfriend (played by fellow “Halloween” actor Rohan Campbell), Ortega sets Carpenter on fire, cuts her arm off, throws her out of a window and impales her on a white picket fence, and electrocutes her — and it’s actually hilarious, and of course Carpenter gives as good as she gets. Spoiler alert: The pair end up comparing notes on the boyfriend as they walk away from his funeral together, sipping coffees.
Carpenter is credited as a songwriter for “Taste” alongside Julia Michaels and Amy Allen, while John Ryan and Ian Kirkpatrick are credited as producers. The tracklist for “Short n’ Sweet” (out Friday) also includes top five singles “Please Please Please” and “Espresso,” along with unreleased songs “Sharpest Tools,” “Coincidence,” “Good Graces,” “Slim Pickins,” “Juno,” “Lie to Girls,” “Bed Chem,” “Dumb & Poetic,” and “Don’t Smile.”
Carpenter recently teased the album to Variety, describing the album as “the hot older sister” of “Emails.” “It’s my second ‘big girl’ album,” she said. “It’s a companion but it’s not the same. When it comes to having full creative control and being a full-fledged adult, I would consider this a sophomore album.”
The “Sweet n’ Sour” tour will begin with a North American leg on Sept. 23 in Columbus, Ohio, before moving through the UK and Europe in 2025. Carpenter has already sold out a run of 33 arena shows in North America, including dates in New York’s Madison Square Garden and the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles. Amaarae, Griff and Declan McKenna will be supporting Carpenter on the North American tour, while Rachel Chinouriri will be joining her as the support act on the new run of international dates.
Watch the “Taste” music video below.
After making a big splash this year with “Espresso” and “Please Please Please,” Sabrina Carpenter released her anticipated new album Short n’ Sweet today, which turns out to sound a lot more like “Please Please Please” than “Espresso” in general. (I love both songs, but the album’s strong resemblance to Kacey Musgraves is not a bad thing.) Along with the new LP comes a wildly entertaining music video for opening track “Taste.”
The “Taste” video reunites Carpenter with veteran music video director Dave Meyers, who also helmed the clip for “Espresso.” It also casts her opposite rising star Jenna Ortega of Wednesday/Scream fame, which proves to be an electric combination. “Taste” is built around the concept of Carpenter telling her ex-boyfriend’s new lover, “You’ll just have to taste me when he’s kissin’ you.” In the video, which is inspired by Death Becomes Her, Ortega plays the new love interest of Carpenter’s ex. The two women spend the whole video attacking each other in bouts of grisly cartoon violence. Lots of blood is spilled on all those nice outfits, and at one point Carpenter and Ortega share a kiss. It’s full of highly memorable visuals, and you can watch it below.
Short n’ Sweet is out now on Island.
