Thank You

She's smart to keep things light and positive--it's a deliberately youthful sound in an era that yearns for maturity--but by working the same territory so carefully, the seams in her construction are difficult to ignore.

Self-empowerment can shade into self-aggrandizement when it isn’t delivered in a convincing way, and Thank You only periodically rises to the challenge.

Thank You is an interesting album in that it shows musical growth for Meghan Trainor while simultaneously moving her closer to the more homogenous sound of mainstream pop. It’s not great by any means, but it is definitely catchy and easy to sing along with.

The self-infatuation on this album is less attempted-clever and more ambient, a body-posi constant that gives the plethora of tasty palm-muted figures and colorful production settings a semblance of gravity even if it becomes the favorite of the “Yaaas queen”-abusing straight Facebook friend you had to unfollow.

Trainor continues the self-esteem party on Thank You, and the cracks that were already forming on her debut grow a little wider and deeper on its followup.

She has a round and slightly stodgy voice that’s most effective when it aims lowest, as on the winning novelty song “Dance Like Yo Daddy,” full of quizzical dance instructions (“Can you overbite? Can you old man overbite?”) and doo-wop harmonies over a skronking sax and sock-hop swing. Elsewhere on this spotty album, Ms. Trainor grinds her way through tough-stand songs like “Watch Me Do,” a homage to Destiny’s Child’s “Independent Women (Part 1),” and “Me Too,” where she awkwardly proclaims self-love.

Ultimately, much of Thank You is a bit of a hotchpotch, after her initial efforts were rejected and main producer Ricky Reed called on to conjure up some hits.

One or two of these songs might scan as tongue-in-cheek; nearly half an album's worth is a form of caricature, paying lip service to a millennial generation raised on hollow self-affirmations.