Carly Rae Jepsen is back.

You might recognize her for her hit songs “Call Me Maybe” or “Good Time” from nearly eleven years ago. Since then, Jepsen has released several other albums, but none quite blew up to the level that these 2012 hits did… until recently.

Released on October 21, 2022, Carly Rae Jepsen’s sixth studio album, The Loneliest Time, puts her back at the top of the pop genre. A snippet from the album’s title track, The Loneliest Time, has since blown up on TikTok. As of November 9th, 2022, the song has been used in 165,800 videos; if you’ve been on the app at all, you have probably already heard Carly Rae Jepsen sing about reaching the moon.

Though it might be easy to think of The Loneliest Time as another album curated specially for TikTok—a common phenomenon in today’s music industry—Jepsen’s new album is well worth a listen. It brings back the unique pop sound and versatility that brought Jepsen to fame yet introduces a mellower, more mature style that will hopefully set a precedent for music to come.

The album starts off powerfully with arguably one of its best songs, “Surrender My Heart”, which sets an upbeat tone for the rest of the album. While similarly fast-paced, powerful songs such as “Beach House” and “Talking to Yourself” preserve the distinct pop sound Jepsen has built over the past decade, what makes this album so special is a mellower disco feel Jepsen incorporates throughout the album in songs such as “Far Away”, “Sideways”, “Bends”, and “So Nice”.

The Loneliest Time explores the topic of loneliness in distinct ways—for instance, “Western Wind” considers loneliness away from family and home, “Beach House” reviews loneliness created by masculine unreliability in the dating world, and “Talking to Yourself” discusses post-breakup loneliness. In The Loneliest Time, Jepsen sings about romantic reconnection after a period of loneliness. The lyricism and visual presentation of this album also do not disappoint.

There is also no bad song on the album—but in terms of personal ranking, the wistful summer song “Western Wind” comes in first place. “Go Find Yourself or Whatever” follows closely as one of the best ballads of Jepsen’s career thus far. It’s hard to say what the next best song on the album might be, but “Surrender My Heart” is catchy and powerful. While I personally found “Far Away” and some of the bonus tracks such as “No Thinking Over The Weekend” to be more forgettable, their low-key disco feel makes them good songs to keep in the background nonetheless.

The Loneliest Time is familiar yet a breath of fresh air; I would give it a rating of 8.5/10. With this album, Carly Rae Jepsen reminds us that she is no longer just the “Call Me Maybe” girl but rather a timeless artist who will influence the pop genre as long as she continues to create, and I am excited to see where she will take us—perhaps beyond the moon.