Fancy That by PinkPantheress | Album Review

The British songstress enhances her Y2K inspirations on her second mixtape

Listen to Fancy That: Apple Music | Spotify

Since her breakthrough with her debut mixtape To Hell with It, PinkPantheress has been slowly making her rise in the music world. Eventually gaining worldwide recognition in 2023 with the “Boy’s a Liar” remix featuring Ice Spice. Later that year, Pink would drop her first full-length album heaven knows, which saw her embrace a heavy Y2K aesthetic with production drawing from bedroom pop and UK garage music.

The work she’s given us over the last few years has been a breath of fresh air in pop music, in my opinion. There’s something quite retro yet very “Gen Z” about her music, possibly harkening to this generation’s love for the early 2000s era. Pink sees this as her niche, and doubles down on it with her latest project, Fancy That.

Having production credits on every single track on here, PinkPantheress is an amazing producer, as she is a singer. Fancy That sees her flex her instrumental muscles (alongside Askel Arvid and Mura Masa, among others) in a way that shows off her growth in musical styles. Whether that’s tapping into that “H&M/Zara” type of house music on “Stars”, or breaking into dance pop on the Panic! At The Disco samples of “Tonight”.

Pink’s influences, ranging from Basement Jaxx and Fatboy Slim show off throughout Fancy That. Never does it feel more apparent than on “Nice to Know You”. Utilizing that classic UK drum n bass style and mixing it with string samples felt so retro coded. There’s also the myriad of interpolations on the mixtape that anybody like me who grew up in the early/mid 2000s is going to recognize immediately. Such as the nod to Estelle’s “American Boy” on the chorus of “Stateside”.

It should go without saying that the production and just overall aesthetics are astounding, and Pink matches that energy with simple yet earnest lyricism. She’s not shedding layers to her personality or anything, but simply having fun and occasionally talking about love and the odd heartbreak on Fancy That.

Pink kicks things off with a secret affair on the opener “Illegal” where she playfully describes the risk of getting caught. She teases her new muse with some of her most mature lyricism on “Tonight” with its catchy chorus (“You want sex with me? Uh-huh, Come talk to me, come on.”). She delves into anxiety-induced paranoia on “Noises”, which again goes back to that being caught in the act of doing something wrong, like “Illegal”.

She loses contact with a close friend on “Nice to Know You” and dives into her feelings of the Sugababes-laden track, sampling the chorus of their song “Spiral” to express her emotions. Fancy That ends with the boppy “Romeo”, where she showcases her undying love for her partner, despite all the noise from others. The track ends the mixtape on a relatively high note in the same vein as how it initially starts.

Despite this, the issues with Fancy That mainly rely on the mixtape’s length. It’s way too damn short! While the debate on song lengths has been an ongoing thing regarding PinkPantheress, I feel as if her dedication to keeping things short and sweet will never fully allow her to embrace her production style to the fullest. While I adore the production and Pink’s performance, the whole mixtape is quite fleeting and finishes as soon as it starts.

Overall though, I was quite pleased with Fancy That. I’m glad we finally got another PinkPantheress project after heaven knows, and I appreciate how she dove deeper into that Y2K vibe while also pulling a lot of inspiration from several artists from that era. The lyrics are simple and nothing to gloss over, but they fit the production of each song perfectly. My only gripe (and major if I’m being honest) is the mixtape’s runtime. Clocking in at a lean 20 minutes, the whole thing comes and goes before you know it, never allowing you to fully immerse yourself in the project as I had hoped.

I’m feeling a solid 7/10 on PinkPantheress’ Fancy That. It was a fun albeit short listen, and there are quite a few bops on here I will be returning to time and time again.

Final Rating: 7/10

Favourite Tracks: Illegal, Tonight, Stars, Nice to Know You, Stateside