Bass Persuades by MILEY: An Album That Comes Off As Lackluster Rather Than Persuasive

The iconic Miley Cyrus has just released her brand new album “Bass Persuades” on September 18. This serves as her tenth studio album, and a follow-up to her failed comeback 2025 album “Something Beautiful”. This time around, MILEY has shortened her name, and with that the album length as well. She’s taken a different approach to this album. A darker and more experimental one at that. The lead single from “Bass Persuades”, the title track, has received both commercial and critical success. Of course, this led me to have extremely high expectations going into this album. This review serves as a honest and critical one, all to answer one question: “Is Miley officially back?”

The “Context”

In 2023, you couldn’t escape MILEY’s monstrous hit “Flowers”, and the lyrics: “I can buy myself flowers, write my name in the sand”, off her eighth studio album “Endless Summer Vacation”. ‘Flowers’ became her second number one single, and her first since “Wrecking Ball” from her “Bangerz” album in 2013. “Endless Summer Vacation” earned MILEY several GRAMMY award nominations, including one for Album of the Year. She won her very first two GRAMMY awards for Record of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance in early 2024. However, shortly after her GRAMMY wins, MILEY went on a short hiatus from music, for many personal reasons. Also, in 2024, MILEY and Beyonce released a collaboration titled “II MOST WANTED” for Beyonce’s acclaimed album “COWBOY CARTER”. It was successful on country radio and charts.

The “Something Beautiful” Failure of it All

In early 2025, MILEY began teasing her ninth studio album “Something Beautiful”, by releasing the lead single “End of the World” on April 4, 2025. “End of the World” was received positively, but it failed to maintain its momentum of success for long. The album’s other singles were also received well critically; but again were disregarded as failures, compared to “Flowers”.

“Something Beautiful” was released on May 30, 2025 as a visual and concept album, a first for MILEY. Every single song from the album contained a music video. She did plenty of promotion for the album. The album itself even managed to make it to #2 on the Billboard 200 albums chart. But it quickly fell of the chart entirety. MILEY was severely frustrated by the neglect she was facing from her record label. She stated in an interview for ‘Something Beautiful’: “There are no statistics, numbers, or charts that could convince me that this album wasn’t a success”. A deluxe version of ‘Something Beautiful’ was released in mid-September 2025. By that point, the era and its promotion was officially over.

Rolling Out the ‘Bass Persuades’ Era

On July 27, 2026, MILEY signed with Atlantic Records. Shortly after In August of that year, MILEY hard-launched the “Bass Persuades” era by putting black and red billboards in cities like New York and Los Angeles, However, tragedy struck on August 25 2026, when MILEY’s godmother, the legendary and iconic Dolly Parton passed away. MILEY posted a statement to Instagram the following day, and stated her “Aunt Dolly” would want her to “feel the pain, write a song about it, and stay strong”.

MILEY released the lead single, the title track “Bass Persuades”, as a surprise release on September 3rd. With the song’s release, she additionally announced the name of the album of the same name. A dance-pop song, the choreography-heavy music video for ‘Bass Persuades’ was critically acclaimed, along with the song itself. The dance forwardness of the track was also heavily praised. Her name change received mixed reactions by fans and critics. Some stated the change was “unnecessary” and would ruin her image. MILEY, nonetheless, did not care, and the album was released on the fateful September 18, along with the music video for the second single “Let’s Get Married”. MILEY brought in infamous producer “Kid Harpoon” to help write and produce the album as well.

The “Best”

Going into this album, honestly, I was very excited to see what MILEY had for us, because I really enjoyed the first single. Unfortunately, I still think it’s the best song off the album. ‘Bass Persuades’ is a dance-pop song that repeats the chorus “The kids don’t wanna dance, the kids don’t wanna dance”. Its lyrics describe the want to just dance and not care about a single thing. ‘Bass Persuades’ was practically engineered to be played on pop radio, which is a compliment in my book. It reminds me highly of “I’m a Slave 4 U” by Britney Spears and “Just Dance” by Lady Gaga. Overall, this catchy song was always going to be a standout for me.

The second song I’d like to point out is the second song off the album ‘Different Religion’, a collaboration between MILEY and rock band Model/Actriz. The song describes the feeling of wanting to find someone new to believe and confide in, like a religion. She says in the track: “I want to be saved by a different religion. I crave to believe him”. She has a want for finding a person who can “save” her from another bad relationship, and overall serves as a decent track off ‘Bass Persuades’

The “Songwriting”

Another song that stuck out to me was “Innocent Ways”. The songwriting, I will most certainly give her her tens. She describes in the chorus: “I tried to save all of her innocent ways. Grace comes with age, but don’t tell her”. I think she’s trying to portray the feeling of protectiveness she has for her family and friends. MILEY almost wants to protect their “innocent ways”, but knows that getting older also makes you feel better and learn more. The gritty and grungy sound of this track made it standout to me, and I also genuinely like this one.

The last highlight for me is the single “Let’s Get Married”. In “Let’s Get Married”, she shares the feeling of meeting someone, and immediately, feeling the chemistry and wanting to get married. The lyrics say: “Let’s turn the rest of our lives to a holiday. Anytime, any place, we can run away”. She’s eager to spend the rest of her life with this person. This song particularly stands out because of its sound. I like how hopeful and wistful this song is.

The “Honorable Mentions”

These next songs were not particularly my favorites, but I feel inclined to bring them up. “REDLIGHTS” is a slower dance pop record on the album, and it’s about not caring about anything, and just wanting to let loose with her lover. MILEY says in “REDLIGHTS”: “I won’t fear anything, even enjoy that last goodbye. ‘Cause I have something to believe in, and baby, you’re the reason”. Lyrically similar to “Let’s Get Married”, it’s a decently attention-grabbing song. The one slower, acoustic track on the album is a song titled “Orbit”. In “Orbit”, she explains the feeling of loving someone so much, it starts to feel like you want to “orbit” around them and everything they do, like a planet. She says: “Whenever you’re around, I wanna orbit you”. It’s a cute song, with a cute message, but it falls flat in it’s delivery, personally. That’s a big pattern on this album.

Has MILEY Officially Made Her Much-Anticipated ‘Comeback’?

Honestly, no, MILEY did not make her comeback with “Bass Persuades”, and I feel like that Is okay. I think maybe the lead single will do well charts-wise, as the critics already like the song, and it’s already being put on rotation nationwide on radio stations. MILEY, in particular, was never a critic darling to begin with, so it would make sense that this project hasn’t been received well. This album just felt so boring, and it was almost a task to finish listening to it in full. I really wanted to like it, but I seriously just didn’t. After 2025’s “Something Beautiful”, I kind of lost hope for future MILEY projects in its entirety. On “Bass Persuades”, the album was pretty much only nine songs long, but those nine songs were SO long and at times monotonous. MILEY attempts to bring something new to the table with its new grittier, and edgier aesthetics, but in all, still comes off as simply nothing new.

Not to mention, the aesthetics of this album made everyone, including me, think that “Bass Persuades” was going to be a dark dance-pop album. However when listening to this album, you do not get that same feel that you might’ve gotten based off the visuals.. It felt almost misleading in so many ways. It gave me deja vu to Taylor Swift’s “The Life of a Showgirl”, where the visuals looked like one thing, but the songs sounded completely different. Furthermore, the lead single itself sounded nothing like the rest of the album.

There is so much filler on “Bass Persuades” and even its best songs are at times hard to listen to, and it overall just feels rushed and incomplete. Hence, the shorter album, but longer, and boring, tracks. Overall, MILEY has not made her comeback, and I feel like In 2026, that’s okay to say. MILEY remains an iconic figure in pop culture, and she’ll maintain her status forever. A couple of bad albums, or student reviews, won’t define or rewrite her legacy at all.

The “Overall”

Overall, it was fun reviewing a MILEY album for a change, but, this one was just a very hard listen. I would not listen to this project in full again. My overall question of “Is MILEY officially back?” was answered quickly. On a positive note, I will compliment the songwriting and her vocals on “Bass Persuades”. Her, and the other songwriters, really did a good job at using imagery, and telling stories.

As always, MILEY’s vocals were also stellar on this album too. To wrap up, this album fell very flat to me and was very redundant and dissapointing compared to something like her “Plastics Hearts” (2020) album or even “Bangerz” (2013). I had very high hopes for this, but they weren’t high for very long. This album gets a solid 5/10. Sometimes, experimentation and reinvention isn’t always the best next move, and MILEY, unfortunately, fell into that exact trap on “Bass Persuades”. On the bright side, at least MILEY is clearly happy, so I guess that’s all that matters.