From Frank Sinatra’s In The Wee Small Hours to Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors, history has witnessed countless classic albums coming from… divorces.

To this day, from Shakira to Adele, every time they break up with someone, fans wait: When will they release a new album? And the same goes for Ariana Grande.

The “impeachment” of the old man

In 2021, Ariana Grande got married, and since then has not released another studio album, until this year, right after leaving her marriage with Dalton Gomez, the female singer immediately “took advantage” to release it. Eternal Sunshine, just released, immediately became a phenomenon, becoming the best-selling album of 2024 to date.

The title is clearly influenced by director Michel Gondry’s classic breakup movie, Eternal Sunshine of Spotless Mind, about a couple who, after breaking up, buy a service that erases all memories of their love.

Eternal Sunshine – on the contrary – is the way Ariana Grande decides to preserve the bitter aftertaste of marriage, sometimes even using her music as an “impeachment” of her ex.

There are all the stages of a breakup in Eternal Sunshine, from sleepless nights, unsuccessful communication with the other person, the pain of realizing you have been betrayed, to the feeling of pity when seeing the couple. The ex’s shoes are still in the box.

Or even more so, the anger at the media’s speculations about the reason for their breakup was as if they were lying under their bed.

Even though the lyrics often quickly become cliché and superficial, the perfect belting and Ariana Grande’s “eternal sunshine” voice make the album rich in sound and expression. just fits the constant pain after a breakup.

Whether or not there is free will

After the post-breakup phase is the… post-breakup phase. Released not long after Ariana Grande’s Eternal Sunshine, the album Deeper Well by Kacey Musgraves, a country music singer who won 7 Grammy awards, was released 3 years after she ended her married life.

No longer marked by loneliness or regret like during the Star-crossed album, the present Kacey Musgraves has learned to love and find the meaning of life in simple truths.

Throughout the album, as smooth as the flow of a dream, without climax, without gossip, without aggression, Kacey Musgraves plays the acoustic guitar and sings to us about what she found after returning to balance. equal. More than once she spoke about the meaninglessness of money and fame:

“You can wear a gold watch on your wrist but it won’t give you back the lost minutes.”

No, where she found paradise was in a meal with friends in a strange city, in a purple rose placed in a vase, in a cloudy Monday breakfast, in a song. of dense trees, or sometimes a small apple.

“Even something as small as an apple is both simple and complex, sweet and divine, a perfect design. Can I talk to the architect who created it?”, Musgraves written in The Architect, Deeper Well’s most philosophical song.

A song that questions the arrangements of the stars, the arrangements of the Supreme Being, and whether or not there is human free will.

And all of those confusing categories were explained very clearly and clearly by her, because her mind was completely quiet at this time.

If Eternal Sunshine is a pain reliever for people still traumatized by broken love, then Deeper Well is like a deep well leading us into another world richer than the world of love between couples.

If this world is broken, another world will appear. Breaking up is not the end of the world. Whoever wants to be loved will always find their place.