Plus: how to find the bra that is right for you…
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[5.14]
Alex Clifton: In terms of Nicole Kidman characters, I am less a Satine (vivacious, romantic, charming) and more a Virginia Woolf (depressed, bisexual, prominent nose). But Adéla shows us that being Nicole Kidman is a state of mind. Of course, it helps if you are a talented, hot twenty-something rather than a dowdy cat person, but you don’t have to wear corsets or fuck up stages! You can just put this song on super in your car and ride around with the windows down, or do your own karaoke performance in the shower. Adéla is clearly feeling herself, “the world is my buffet” is such a great carpe diem line, and the vibe is infectious. “Nicole Kidman” has also gifted us one of my favourite pop culture moments of the year, which is Pedro Pascal mouthing “my tits are sitting right”. Frankly, that’s all I’ve ever wanted from life.
[8]
Al Varela: If “Ain’t in LA” is “close enough, welcome back ‘We Can’t Stop'”, then “Nicole Kidman” is “close enough, welcome back ‘7 Rings'”. Not sure if I’m thrilled that both of Adéla’s breakout hits are repackaged songs from the 2010s, and I don’t like this nearly as much as I did “7 Rings”. The production is fairly catchy, and those vocal harmonies over the sharp snares are hard to forget, but Adéla doesn’t bring the bad bitch energy needed for this sort of flex song. Her charisma isn’t as effortless as Ariana, and she doesn’t make this particularly sexy or alluring. I think I like her more in “wild and free” mode than “glamorous model.”
[6]
Jonathan Bradley: From the popper headrush of the accelerated gospel sample on up, “Nicole Kidman” is built on Adéla’s pop foremothers from the early 2000s; all she needs is Juelz Santana to pop up with some inappropriate bars on a remix. Her album Prima is deeply indebted to the Britney and bullshit of that era, but while her coquettish affect might recall an age in which every Fergie had a will.i.am watching over her and every Nelly Furtado had a Timbaland ready to flirt, her performance leaves almost no room whatsoever for the male gaze — a stray brag about the theys who can’t look her in the eyes is as close as any voyeur is permitted to peer. Rather, the song is a mist of setting powder and fragrance spray clouding a bathroom mirror that channels the gauze of “Addictive” by Truth Hurts or the glaze of Tweet’s “Oops (Oh My).” Don’t discount Adéla’s very 2026 pop insight, though: “I pray my tits are sitting right” is a rosary for a night out that works as well as a TikTok grab as it does for a repeat stream.
[9]
TA Inskeep: “Every single night / I pray that my tits are sittin’ right”: and we’re done. Yet another generic, albeit in this case hypersexualized, 2026 pop single, because apparently the record industry still believes that this is the only way to launch a new female artist’s career. I suppose it’s memeable — is that the reason for its success? It certainly isn’t a success on its artistic merits, or Adela’s nothing of a voice. Kidman should sue for damages.
[1]
Claire Davidson: In an era where celebrities have sought to cultivate cachet through their knowledge of cinematic esoterica, as defined by the ubiquity of Criterion hauls and Letterboxd top four interviews, I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at the title “Nicole Kidman.” Surely, I thought, if Adéla wanted to flex her movie-buff bona fides, she’d have chosen a more unique muse than the most employed woman in Hollywood. As it turns out, though, the decision to invoke Kidman’s likeness was probably just a ploy to gin up interest for this wan single. “Nicole Kidman” is composed of little more than a flood of bass and a gospel sample that doesn’t imbue the song with soul when it’s spliced in amidst an otherwise barren mix. The song’s content is even thinner—an ironic description given that the track begins with the words, “Every single night / I pray that my tits are sittin’ right,” and proceeds from there as an ode to Adéla’s top-heavy figure. Putting aside the fact that I don’t think Kidman is known for her body in that way, something about Adéla’s self-conception feels faintly regressive. There’s nothing wrong with reveling in one’s own appearance, but much of Adéla’s pride seems to be drawn from the access her body grants her to unforeseen levels of power, a sentiment that feels exclusionary toward those not endowed with such assets. The track might feel more forward-thinking if Adéla were more assertive in this posture, as she was on “SexOnTheBeat,” but her slight falsetto portrays her as a passive observer, ceding authority to the boys who are too spellbound by her chest to meet her at eye level. Perhaps that complacency is the track’s greatest parallel to Kidman’s current image—after all, this is a woman who, for all of her prestigious connections, has spent the last few years biding her time on a streaming series forged by television’s foremost crypto-conservative.
[4]
Wayne Weizhen Zhang: I’ve only ever seen Nicole Kidman in Big Little Lies and that AMC cult classic ad. Those—and this—are all delightfully camp.
[7]
Alfred Soto: I would write a song about Nicole Kidman. Her industriousness makes one pause if industriousness were the only point in her favor (have you seen Kidman in Portrait of a Lady? Birth? Hemingway & Gelhorn?). She deserves more than wan trap-house.
[2]
Hannah Jocelyn: There’s a lot I love here: the way three different kicks rotate in the beat (a distorted kick, a clean kick, the 808 bass) in the chorus, the way the crash cymbal ‘clicks’ every four bars, the opening line that intentionally deflates the braggadocio that follows. But it’s just ear candy in search of a song; if I’m not listening on headphones, and I’m hearing this on the radio, there is nothing to latch onto. It’s tuneless and rhythmless, with virtually no vocal presence from Adéla. Somehow, it makes a Dylan Brady production feel bland.
[4]
Nortey Dowuona: Wild to hear Blake and Dylan try their hand at being BIG KRIT but only reveal that neither of them can lay down solid low end. Their percussion and snare are just as flat, and the synths are thick but not plush, often threatening to cover up the lead vocal. The glitter effect is a dull, limp flip between pre-chorus and chorus, revealing that being even half KRIT (or Doja) is so much harder than they make it look. As for Adéla, Katseye are still down a member or two; maybe make that call.
[3]
Julian Axelrod: The best pop songs feel like unpredictable inevitabilities, and only the most twisted minds could conjure a Katseye Kastoff’s Moulin Rouge! cosplay over Cam’ron chipmunk soul from the 100 gecs guy. We come to this place (Gen Z pop girlies) for magic (bangers about bra sizes).
[7]
David Allun Jones: In spite of the omnipresence of “Nicole Kidman”’s pouty hook on social media, I’ve yet to tire of its hypnotic porn-chic charm, and good on Adéla and Co. for making sure there are more pleasures beyond that Midas gold chorus. The chipmunk-soul beat (which, if crate-digging sleuths are to be believed, originates from a gospel song) never wavers from a summery lowrider-cool, and Adéla vocally blooming into her own girl group feels at times like a sly middle finger to the future Katseye handlers who quickly dismissed her on Dream Academy. Babygirl still feels a little too anonymous for me, but this is definitely going on my “Now That’s What I Call White Girl R&B” playlist alongside Lisa Stansfield, Teena Marie and Gwen Stefani’s “Luxurious.”
[8]
Charlotte Gaze: Doja Cat is no longer a regular hitmaker, and in her place we got a “Paint the Town Red” soundalike by a white woman about how awesome it is to be a different white woman. Does that not fill anyone else with a deep dread?
[3]
Ian Mathers: Rating this purely on the basis of how thorough and enjoyable an earworm the chorus has become for me.
[9]
James M Errington: It’s great that Slovakia has sent such an effortless pop star out into the world, and I absolutely love the first minute of this, the use of distorted soul samples, and the aggressively confident trap beat. Adéla’s vocals hit a nice spot between Tove Lo and Doja at her most melodic. Unfortunately, after that first minute, the song is completely out of ideas: the verse/middle eight is the dampest of squibs, and the repetitions of the chorus only diminish it.
[6]
Kayla Beardslee: Listening to “Nicole Kidman” and even revisiting “Ain’t in LA” again, I’m mostly struck by how Adéla’s production has gotten noticeably worse since her debut. Her star quality will always be there, but the trap-pop style of “Nicole” is an entire decade out of date at this point. Hey, sometimes you do have to make worse music to be popular.
[5]
Tom Feckerdt: The song’s opening bar (“Every single night…I pray that”) lasts about as long as it takes me to realize that the Instagram Reel it’s soundtracking is not worth my time.
[3]
Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: Unfortunately, this song title and beat feel like they should have been remanded into Jack Harlow’s care. Even more regrettably, he would have done a better job with them, too — to squander this conceit by only referencing two Nicole Kidman movies is a travesty.
[4]
Katherine St. Asaph: “Meg Ryan” > “Drew Barrymore” > “Uma Thurman” > “Demi Moore” > “Nicole Kidman” > “Winona Ryder” >>> “Drew Barrymore“
[6]
Ashton Arbus: When Nicole Kidman sleepwalks her way through some instantly forgettable schlock these days, she probably rests easy knowing she’s still the same woman that did Eyes Wide Shut and Dogville and that everyone will still love her no matter what. I don’t think you need me to tell you that Adéla does not have the same cachet to get away with making music just as lifeless.
[3]
Andrew Karpan: The obvious reading is that Nicole Kidman is the last true celebrity, that fabled final remnant of mass culture, the only Universally Agreed Upon Baddie left standing now that, ummm, Dolly Parton has left the building. Sure, whatever. The nature of all discourse is that everything is dying, and Adéla records operate in that space too, distant hallucinations of the early 2010s, right as the trap drum was awkwardly fumbling through its dominance as pop signifier. Maybe Seth Rogen was right and the world did end in 2013, and here we are still, listening to the second hit record from Adéla, our pop artist of purgatorial doom. All of that is fine. But what does “tits are sitting right” actually mean? That’s what I want to know.
[5]
Jessica Doyle: There are multiple ways for a bra to fit poorly: the band is too small and keeps digging into your rib cage; the band is too big to provide any support; the straps keep falling off your shoulders (my perennial problem); the gore leaves a mark in the center of your chest; the wires dig into your sides; the cups’ seams hit you badly. None of these annoyances will help you build your confidence. So: get properly fitted! I personally am indebted to the advice and size calculator of the A Bra That Fits community, but you may benefit from a consultation at a trusted lingerie shop. Once you’ve got your size squared away, then figure out how much cleavage you want from the cup shape. At the end of this process, your tits should be sitting perfectly fine, and you can use your nightly conversations with God to tackle more complicated problems, such as how being Nicole and feeling like Nicole are two different things. You might take in the image onscreen, and delight in the glamour, and think, “If I were there, I would match the projection, I would be confident, I would admire myself, I would fear nothing.” But the glamour is two-dimensional: it fails to account the sweat that comes from posing under hot lights for hours on end, and the wait to have the perfect eyeliner wing drawn on, leaving space for your mind to throw up whatever it wants, turn against you… but who am I lecturing here? When I was 17, someone asked me who I’d trade places with, and I said Lauren Bacall. Three decades later, I know all the ways that fate has treated me more gently than it did her, and that doesn’t stop me from looking in the mirror and thinking, frizzy hair, paunch, what have you done with your life? Perhaps Adéla, last seen cheering on the image of her mom as an anonymous Madonna-loving teen in Czechoslovakia and declaring, “I’d rather be a nobody than to be like everyone,” already has all this figured out. Perhaps she knows how to make being Adéla feel like Nicole even in the midst of chafing costumes, long shoots, and uncertainty over how her work will be received. I hope so.
[5]