Renee Rapp

One Liner:  Pop bubblegum from an actress-turned-belter

Wikipedia Genre:  pop, pop rock, R&B

Home: Huntersville, NC

Poster Position: 2
Both Weekends.
Saturday at 7:20.

T-Mobile Stage.

Thoughts:  I have definitely heard this name before, but am a completely blank slate as far as her music goes.  She is apparently also an actor, appearing in the stage production of Mean Girls and then the new (awful) movie/musical.  She was born and raised in a suburb of Charlotte, NC, and raised doing a lot of theater, and her big break came with the Mean Girls show.  Unfortunately, the pandemic shut that down a few months after she scored the role.  But, soon thereafter the was cast as a lead in a show I've never heard of called the Sex Lives of College Girls.  

After a few years, she released her first EP in 2022, and then went on a short tour, which sold out in all eight cities.  Her debut album was 2023's Snow Angel.  Sad to say, I just hit play on her top single, and after about a minute, my body just involuntarily said "yuuuuck."  So, this is going to be lots of fun to listen to.

I say that, and then "Poison Poison" actually made me look up from work and take note.  That is a pretty good set of lyrics to me.  "Snow Angel" has some ridiculously powerful belting in there.  She's definitely got a strong voice!  Her top track is from that first EP, "Too Well" has 95.6 million streams.

I get that this is likely a good, cathartic song for some folks after a bad relationship, but it just sounds too saccharine and unmemorable to me from where I sit.  Her other big track features Megan Thee Stallion, so I won't pass that one along (since that may be why it is a big one, and also that is the one I said "yuck" to), so we'll go with the top track off of the new album - "Pretty Girls" - with 62 million streams.

Has the sound of a Taylor Swift song that I can't grasp, except with lots of ladies making out with each other.  I am honestly a little surprised at how few streams these songs have.  Not that I think they are so great and need more streams, more that I figured this gal was insanely popular just because of seeing her name on all the festival posters and whatnot.

Not interested.  I'm sure lots of other folks will be, and maybe this will be a ridiculously fun show, but right now I am remembering the painfulness of that Camilla Cabello show a few years ago and expecting something similar.  Another semi-headliner type who ends up being a black hole on the poster for me.  I also have to note how happy it makes me that last night, when I told my sixteen year old girl that I had not enjoyed this, she fully agreed with that take and said she hated Rapp.  The kids are alright, y'all!