Cheap Queen

Along with her pop hooks, what makes Straus' music so indelible on Cheap Queen is her strong sense of self. As King Princess, Straus is both the chilled-out R&B loverman and genderqueer lesbian songwriter, a tangible combination that's anything but cheap, and always real.

"The truth is, I'm good at this" she recently told Exclaim!, and Cheap Queen certainly backs that up.

On the whole, this is a record for comfort listening on headphones. Her voice is often intimately close in the mix, brushing up against your ear, unglamorous and unadorned.

It's a strong, seductive set, with the soul-blues burn of "Prophet" and tender "If You Think It's Love" standouts. [Dec 2019, p.29]

At times, things feel in danger of being middle of the road, but that's made up for by heavenly moments and voice-of-a-generation lyrcs already drawing comparisons with Lorde. [Dec 2019, p.110]

Much like Lorde’s ‘Pure Heroine’ before it, ‘Cheap Queen’ possesses the perfect amount of devil-may-care attitude to counter the heaviness with which it feels its emotions.

Maybe this album is a little rough around the edges, and doesn’t quite commit enough to experimentation, but overall it’s an assured debut that suggests a very bright future. If King Princess leans more heavily into gay ballroom culture with the next album, ditching the acoustic guitar for music that’s more urgent and funky, then we might just have another pop great on our hands.

While King Princess writes about 21st-century romance — one new track is “Watching My Phone” — the music places her songs on a longer timeline, full of ghosts from previous pop eras.

Cheap Queen is more melancholy than “1950,” more introspective than her ode to “Talia,” less ebullient than the assured bedroom-romping funk of follow-up single “Pussy Is God,” the latter of which was co-written with Stenberg. Cheap Queen is also more vulnerable.

She isn’t breaking ground in pop by disregarding its supposed borders. But where post-genre stream-baiters pull their numbers by anesthetizing distinctive sounds, King Princess pulls hers by playing up their contrasts.

When honesty and articulation match up, Cheap Queen hits its stride.