Kim Petras Clears the Rubble with ‘Detour’

Halfway through Kim Petras’ latest album, there’s a song about buildings that turns out to be about her father, an architect who drove her to psychiatry appointments as a kid. On “Brutalist,” she sings about structures being torn down and directly links that image to other people’s perception of her transition. “Again and again, didn’t come back a man,” she states flatly. “I guess I ruined it.” Petras hasn’t offered this kind of personal entry point on her previous projects, not on her actual debut Feed the Beast and not on the leaked-then-released Problématique. She spent a decade tethered creatively to Dr. Luke, a partnership that generated more scrutiny than hits, and the one song that broke through, the Sam Smith collaboration “Unholy,” won a Grammy but landed as one of the weakest tracks either artist put their name on. Earlier this year, Petras asked to be released from her major label deal with Republic Records. She didn’t try to fix a cracked foundation, she bulldozed it.

Detour builds something steadier from the ground up. The opening three tracks act as a quick reset: the title song declares “everything before is just pretend,” then “DTLA” hits with a thudding pulse, and “I Like Ur Look” channels the scrappy energy of an early MySpace pop track. The production credits tell the rest of the story. She brought in hyperpop duo Frost Children for that early internet nostalgia, Margo XS fresh off Zara Larsson’s Midnight Sun, and Nightfeelings, the electronic project of Nick Weiss. The collaborative instinct feels revived rather than focus-grouped. A little later, “Bitch Ball Out” squeaks and skitters while Petras promises a performance you can’t ignore. It arrives after “Jeep” and “Basketball,” two songs that don’t quite fit the album’s shape, but the track yanks the energy right back. For the first time, Petras sounds like an act you can depend on for clear-eyed pop, not whatever scaffolding was holding her up before.