Demi Lovato Reveals Why She Stopped Making Rock Music

Demi Lovato is ready to have some more fun with her music. During a recent interview on the Chicks in the Office podcast, the singer explained why she’s making pop anthems on her upcoming ninth studio album after holding a “funeral” for her pop music back in 2022, saying that the rock sound of her last album “didn’t work” for her.

Lovato returned to her Disney Channel pop-rock roots for her 2022 album HOLY FVCK, but embraced an even harder sound with punk and metal influences. She even reworked classic hits like “Sorry Not Sorry” and “Heart Attack” for the tour. These renditions were received so well by fans that Lovato re-recorded them in the studio for the 2023 remix album, REVAMPED.

However, three years later, Lovato has new thoughts from a business standpoint. “I think as an artist that’s been in the game for as long as I have, you have moments where you take a look back at your career, and you’re like, ‘Okay, what worked for me?’” she explained on the podcast. “The rock stuff didn’t work for me. And that’s okay.”

She described her rock albums as “a passion project” that honored her childhood. “I went back to my roots a little bit with [what] I grew up listening to in my emo days,” she says. But now, she wants to return to the sound she’s found success with. “I realized what worked for me was ‘Cool for the Summer,’ and these other big pop songs, and I’m like, why don’t I just go back to that?” she said.

What Demi’s New Album Will Sound Like

As promised, Lovato is returning to the dancefloor on her next album, with her new dance-pop single “Fast” giving fans a taste of what to expect. While she’s found success with pop music before, Lovato says the sound also “matches my mood,” emphasizing how happy she is after marrying her husband, Jordan Lutes, in May and making her directorial debut with her documentary, Child Star.

This lightheartedness is also reflected in the songwriting, contrasting the “heavy topics” she dealt with on her last two albums. “I was trying to find my sound, and I started writing really emotional songs, and it just wasn’t resonating because I’m not in that place anymore,” she explained. “I’m not in a bad place in my life where I need to write these really intense emotional songs.”

In fact, Lovato decided to approach the more intense moments on this album in a different way, writing from a fictional point of view. “There’s only so many love songs and so many songs about sex you can write,” she quipped. “It was a really cool writing exercise for me. It got me out of my head. Some of the emotional songs on the album are coming from me, but it’s not.”