Tate McRae: "The Long-Awaited Rise of a Popstar"

Justin Pello

In recent years, Tate McRae has made a name for herself as more than a dancer or YouTube singer/songwriter. Just last year, the Calgary-native pop star stunned the world with the success of her song “Greedy.” But despite her random success, which was seemingly out of nowhere, in 2023, she’s been in the industry much longer than you may think. 

In an interview with Elle, Tate McRae explained that she thought she was going to be a backup dancer for the rest of her life; and she wasn’t entirely wrong. McRae started dancing competitively in 2013 attending Berlin State Ballet, winning awards at the 2015 Dance Awards, performing on The Ellen Show, and finishing as a finalist on So You Think You Can Dance. 

In the interview, McRae said that she discovered a passion for poetry. When she was 6 years old, her grandfather got her a piano, and that’s when she realized she could sing her poetry. At 13, McRae then started uploading original songs on YouTube. 7 years later, it came in clutch for her. 

Tate McRae caught the attention of RCA Records in 2019 after many of her original songs gained attraction on YouTube like her 2017 song “One Day.” After her signing, McRae released her debut EP All the Things I Never Said. A few months after the EP’s release, she released one of her biggest singles for her second EP, Too Young to be Sad, called You Broke Me First. This song broke the record for being the song with the longest stay on the Billboard Hot 100 by a female artist in 2020. To stay consistent on the charts, she performed the song at the 2020 MTV Video Music Awards, 2020 MTV Europe Music Awards, Jimmy Kimmel Live, and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. 

In 2022, Tate McRae released her debut album, I Used to Think I Could Fly. The long-awaited debut album brought the fan’s expectations to reality—however, the rollout was underwhelming. With the success of the second single on the album, She’s All I Wanna Be, fans expected a brand new groundbreaking artist. The album debuted at #13 on the Billboard 200 lasting only 7 weeks on the charts. With how much potential Tate McRae has with her skills in dancing, singing, and songwriting, the expectations for this album were not met. A lot of people blame it on RCA’s reputation with other artists like Flo Milli, but Tate might’ve broken that reputation. 

It’s no surprise that artists use TikTok as a platform to promote upcoming songs. But even with the promotions through TikTok, sometimes they still don’t become successful, like Tate McRae’s “Uh Oh.” In August of 2023, Tate McRae posted a TikTok promoting her new single “Greedy.” Even though the song wasn’t released, it went viral with more than 220,000 people using the sound for their own different trends. With the release of “Greedy” on September 15th, the full song was expected to become a big hit. 

Despite its popularity through TikTok, the song itself sounds original. Tate McRae is known for sappy love songs, while “Greedy” brings in a new wave with fans seeing a feistier and more playful side of her. The current trend for music however is sampling a lot of songs that are considered “nostalgic.” Tate McRae interpolates Promiscuous by Nelly Furtado and Timberland. To keep up with people’s short attention spans nowadays, McRae’s song “Greedy” is short but sweet. A lot of songs tend to suffer from being super short, but Greedy feels like a complete pop song. McRae hit the chorus within 20 seconds and had all of the pop song elements including a bridge. 

RCA Records took advantage of this opportunity immediately rolling out McRae’s sophomore album called Think Later, released on December 9th of 2023. With the success from her second single Exes and Run for the Hills, her sophomore album debuted at #4 on the Billboard 200 competing against Nicki Minaj’s Pink Friday 2. In this era, she trades neon sweatshirts for hockey gear becoming a Canadian Sporty Spice. Compared to her debut with blunt ruminations on teenage love, her second album toughens up that first impression with homogeneous one-dimensional introspections.

An industry plant is an artist who has a major label backing their movement but presents themselves as a “homegrown start-up” to create a pseudo-organic following. Because of this wild random success from Tate McRae and entering the main pop girl era, accusations of being an industry plant come along. During a conference office in Los Angeles, McRae mentioned “I’ve been grinding since I was 13 years old! I’m probably the furthest thing from an industry plant for how long I’ve been doing this.” It’s no surprise that McRae is offended because it discredits all of the hard work she has put in to get to where she is now. 

With a growing generation now relying on becoming viral on YouTube, TikTok, or Soundcloud. It is really easy for people to consider so many new upcoming artists and industry plants. Nowadays, it is super hard for people to organically grow through record label promotion. There is also a huge trend where artists are now considered indie despite being backed up by a huge team but isn’t that what people wanted? Aren’t people tired of seeing the typical pop girl? It seems hypocritical when people want more diversity in the music industry, but then afterwards call them industry plants. 

If an artist truly claims to be independent while having the backing of a label, they could be considered an industry plant. Lorde is a great example. 

Lorde made music that was considered “different” and not just about sex, drugs, and money. Billie Eilish brings a depressed girl persona with her deep lyrics and baggy clothes. Being an industry plant doesn’t mean bad—being an industry plant can be a positive thing. In easier terms for people calling out “industry plants” just say that their growth in the music industry is just manufactured differently. 

Edited by Kate Castello & Elisabeth Kay