Tyla‘s sophomore album, A*POP had every ingredient for a defining moment. Two years removed from her breakout debut, armed with a Grammy, a sold-out world tour, and a clear artistic point of view about what African pop can be, this was the record where she could’ve redrawn the map. Instead, A*POP mostly plays it safe, retreading the same breathy vocals and mid-tempo amapiano-pop hybrid that made her a star the first time around, without pushing the sound or the songwriting anywhere new.
That’s not to say the album is a failure. It’s polished, hooky in places, and Tyla’s voice remains one of the most distinct in pop right now. But polish isn’t the same as growth, and after all the pre-release talk of stepping into a bolder, more confident version of herself, the album mostly just sounds like more of the same Tyla, dressed in slightly different production.
The bright spots are real, though. “I Don’t Care” is the closest the album comes to a genuine risk, letting Tyla’s attitude carry the track without over-relying on the usual amapiano shuffle. “Right Now” is a highlight too, tighter and more urgent than most of what surrounds it, and a reminder of what she’s capable of when the tempo and the writing actually match her energy. And “She Did It Again,” the Zara Larsson-assisted lead-up single, remains a genuinely fun, well-executed pop moment that still holds up sitting inside the album.
The problem is everything around those songs. Too much of A*POP coasts on the same textures and vocal runs that felt fresh in 2024 and feel repetitive now. There’s a sameness to the pacing too, with too many mid-tempo cuts back to back and not enough variation to keep the back half of the tracklist as engaging as the singles that led us here. For an artist who talked openly about feeling like a different person going into this project, the actual music rarely reflects that shift. Even the South African collaborations, which could’ve been the boldest swing on the record, end up folded into the same sonic palette rather than expanding it. It’s a comfortable record. It just isn’t the leap it had the potential to be, and that gap between ambition and execution is what holds A*POP back the most.
