Demi Lovato released her 19-track album, “Dancing with the Devil… The Art of Starting Over” on April 2, featuring various artists such as Ariana Grande, Noah Cyrus and Saweetie. Each song on the album takes the listener on a journey of her tragic story of overdose and how she recovered from her hardships.

The second track on the album “Dancing with the Devil,” was released with a music video portraying the events of Lovato’s near-fatal overdose incident in 2018. The raw and emotional lyrics in the song show how she really is not afraid of her past, and is proud to be a survivor. By exposing all of her vulnerabilities and reliving the most traumatic night of her life in the music video, Lovato showed just how courageous she is. 

The 13th track on the album, featuring Noah Cyrus, “Easy,” explains Lovato’s story of being attached to the past and the process of losing someone important in your life. Cyrus and Lovato’s voices compliment each other amazingly throughout the entire song, making it a fan favorite.

Track 10, “What Other People Say,” featuring Sam Fischer, explains Lovato’s and Fischer’s struggles with society. The song takes both of their stories and explains the process of how they lost themselves to please others. They share how they felt as they were forced to conform to societal standards to get approval from the world. Fischer and Lovato convey that their rise to fame was detrimental to their lives, and they share personal experiences of the pressures of society.

My favorite song would have to be track three, “ICU (Madison’s Lullabye),” which is about Lovato’s heartbreaking story of not being able to see her sister Madison after she woke up from a coma because she was legally blind for some time. Lovato also shares how a few years ago, before the overdose incident, her parents would not let her see Madison until she got help for her addiction. This song shows how pure Lovatos’s love for Madison is and how strong their bond is after everything that has happened. The beautiful meaning behind this song was about Lovato’s vision physically coming back, but also metaphorically seeing hope for the future again.

Overall, I thought Lovato’s album was emotionally powerful. She was able to take her tragic incident and turn it into an album to inspire people who may have dealt with or still be dealing with addiction. She poured her soul into this album and created several inspiring songs that are definitely worth listening to.