Miley Cyrus elbows onto a crowded dance floor with new album

On “Bass Persuades,” Miley Cyrus tests whether the dance floor still has room for her, ERR music critic Neit-Eerik Nestor writes in a review that rates the album five out of 10. The record is released under the singer’s first name alone.

The title track seems to embody Charli XCX’s provocative suggestion this spring that “the dance floor is dead,” Nestor writes. Cyrus has changed musical direction repeatedly, and her shape-shifting has helped keep her in pop’s top ranks, on streaming platforms and in the headlines.

Her provocative performances in the 2010s, including her break from the Hannah Montana image, became some of the decade’s most memorable pop culture moments. They also helped bring trap music into the mainstream, the review says. At the time, Cyrus’s bravado could seem excessive or awkward, and it took considerable effort to break free of her Disney-era image.

Six years ago, Cyrus released “Plastic Hearts,” her most rock-oriented and retro album. It opened with her saying she and her music were too wild for radio. Three of its songs have since amassed a combined three billion Spotify streams, including a collaboration with Dua Lipa that Nestor describes as the wildest moment of Lipa’s career.

“Flowers,” released in 2023 on Cyrus’s seventh solo album, “Endless Summer Vacation,” became her biggest hit. The song won Grammy Awards for Record of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance, while Cyrus’s appearance at the ceremony helped cement her standing as a pop star.

In 2025, she followed with “Something Beautiful,” an album that at times ventured into progressive rock. Some dismissed the ambition, while others called it the strongest record of her career. Nestor says the album conveyed Cyrus’s desire to be taken seriously as an artist. It also mixed heavy beats with synths and glam.