Plastic Hearts

AlbumNov 27 / 202015 songs, 50m 26s
Pop Rock
Popular

“I am not the person I was yesterday,” Miley Cyrus tells Apple Music. “Cutting with Stevie Nicks on the phone, that changed me forever. Everything changes me forever. Every night before I go to sleep, I say goodbye to myself, in a way, because that person is done.” The shape-shifting pop icon has worn many hats throughout her action-packed career—Disney idol, pop/rap dynamo, down-home hippie torn between Nashville and Malibu—but there’s something about her rock-star chapter, realized in her glamorous seventh album *Plastic Hearts*, that feels the most like her destiny. It isn’t just that Cyrus has the pipes to carry these pummeling, heavyweight songs, which funnel \'80s glam and punk into anthemic, electric pop—it’s how downright convincing she is in the role. Rock’s leading ladies are on board: After Cyrus turned Blondie’s “Heart of Glass” into a raw, rough-edged revelation, Debbie Harry called her a “force to be reckoned with.” On “Bad Karma,” Joan Jett brings “I don’t give a damn” attitude to a song that raises a glass to bad decisions. And Nicks, clearly a major influence, bellows magnificently on the remix to “Midnight Sky,” a tantalizing riff on “Edge of Seventeen” that feels like a woman set free. Much of the album was shaped by Cyrus’ divorce from actor Liam Hemsworth, which was finalized in early 2020, as well as the loss of her house in a California wildfire and her struggles with addiction. But on *Plastic Hearts*, she channels all that real pain, guilt, and suffering—and occasionally, the jaded frustration of someone who’s been up and down before—into glossy yet vigorous expressions of inner tension and heat. “I have the artist torture thing going on, too, where I’m a little conflict-seeking because it’s creative,” she says. “I like to feel sad sometimes. And I like to feel happy. I really like to *feel*. It’s inspiring to me.”

6.4 / 10

Stepping confidently into her “rock era,” Miley offers a genuinely pleasing, though sometimes hamfisted record that staves off the awkwardness and missteps that plagued her previous albums.

6 / 10

Enlisting Joan Jett and channelling Stevie Nicks, the singer has drawn deep from her recent rock cover songs and done an Ashley O

8 / 10

Plastic Hearts is Miley Cyrus as a fiercely independent woman with a musical attitude

Miley’s journey deep into the Eighties is a sound that suits her well, says David Smyth

Miley Cyrus' glam throwback 'Plastic Hearts' pays homage to her New Wave heroes and channels classic country. Rolling Stone album review.

Miley is stepping into her most fitting musical form yet.

The former Disney star is offering punk attitudes on the dancefloor. Funk delivered with a roar, not a pout. Notes delivered with maximum bawl and full extension

Billy Idol, Joan Jett, Stevie Nicks, and Dua Lipa come along for the ride – but Miley stays at the wheel.

After all the stylistic shifts that have defined Miley Cyrus' career, on Plastic Hearts she reaches a balance -- but not a compromise.

7 / 10

Thanks to her incredible vocal range, fans have been challenging Miley Cyrus for years to release a full-length rock album. She recently cov...

As such, it wasn’t a lie when Miley announced she would be releasing a rock’n’roll album with her new full-length Plastic Hearts, so much as an exaggeration.

6.0 / 10

Out of all the pop stars that have been riding the airwaves for the past decade, Miley Cyrus seems to be the most consistent in her defiance of playing by the rules.

8 / 10

Miley Cyrus packs some serious punch with her seventh studio album 'Plastic Hearts'. Cyrus rolls seamlessly into her new era of pop infused,

The punky sneer of this post-divorce album feels like an act

The album uses its glam-rock aspirations to underscore another blast of ne’er-do-well energy from the singer.

From floaty synth ballads to punky 80s pop, this album’s middling material doesn’t adequately serve this unusual star<strong><br></strong>

65 %

Album Reviews: Miley Cyrus - Plastic Hearts

32 %

Of all the millennial popstars, Miley Cyrus has to be the weirdest. Where Taylor Swift established herself as robust chameleon, Lana Del Rey as nostalgic chanteuse, Ariana Grande as sensitive thirst-trapper and Lordi as psychedelic urban fey, Miley Cyrus’ musical output has always rotated around one big question: “What am I?” This uncertainty directly relates

After a turbulent journey through pop, country, heartbreak and scandal, Cyrus is back to her rock roots. Why did she ever leave them?

The pop princess borrows from the past and lands on a rocked-up sound that feels totally right

Miley's ever-shifting sound alights on a Big Eighties aesthetic. New music review by Joe Muggs