20. I Kissed a Girl (2008)
There’s no getting around the fact that Katy Perry’s breakthrough single has not aged well in some ways – the lyrics are like a lads’ mag reader’s idea of female bi-curiosity – but musically it’s an impressively fizzy retooling of the early-70s low glam sound, with crunchy guitars and glitterbeat drums.
19. 365 (2019)
German EDM producer Zedd is not renowned for the subtlety of his musical approach, which makes his Perry collab a pleasant surprise: low on big drops and the kind of synth riffs that get the Las Vegas bros waving their hands in the air, it’s got a sweet melody.
18. Harleys in Hawaii (2019)
A Charlie Puth co-write that apparently documents a holiday Perry spent with her then beau Orlando Bloom. The lyrics are pretty frightful – it rhymes “hula-hula” with “take me to the jeweller” – but no matter: driven by acoustic guitar, the music is intriguingly misty and understated – and oddly charming.
17. ET (ft Kanye West) (2011)
Originally written by Perry with the intention of giving it to horrorcore rap pioneers Three 6 Mafia – truly, the mind boggles. In the end, she kept the rock/hip-hop hybrid for herself. The remix, with a star turn by 808s and Heartbreak-era Kanye, is the version to hear.
16. Swish Swish (ft Nicki Minaj) (2017)
Taylor Swift’s Bad Blood was supposedly a jab at Perry, and this is supposedly a jab back. The exact subject of Swish Swish is less important than its appealingly sparse 90s house-influenced sound, the Roland Clark-by-way-of-Fatboy Slim sample and Nicki Minaj’s splendid this-is-how-to-throw-shade guest verse.
15. Thinking of You (2008)
A burst of surprisingly angsty, distinctly Alanis Morissette-like soft-rock power balladry (“He kissed my lips, I tasted your mouth … I was disgusted with myself”) that unexpectedly cropped up on breakthrough album One of the Boys. It’s not a style that Perry has really pursued since, which is a shame.
14. Unconditionally (2013)
Perry trailed Prism, the album she made after her divorce from Russell Brand, as “shoegazing”, which it definitely wasn’t, although you could maybe hear the faintest glimmer of it in Unconditionally’s echoing guitars. Its real thrust, however, is its big old Max Martin-assisted chorus, custom-made to get arena crowds’ phone lights on and fists in the air.
13. Never Really Over (2019)
So similar to Dagny’s 2017 track Love You Like That that the song’s authors got co-writing credits, Never Really Over is nevertheless a precision-tooled pop earworm. Its despair at a relationship that won’t lie down and die is undercut by the faint sense the protagonist is secretly rather enjoying herself.
12. Waking Up in Vegas (2008)
Perry’s early appeal in a nutshell. Waking Up in Vegas’s depiction of a hungover couple attempting to piece together the previous night’s events in Sin City is preposterous, funny (“Did we get hitched last night?” it ponders, adding a panicked “Don’t call your mother!”) and packs a nailed-on chorus.
11. Last Friday Night (TGIF) (2010)
Inspired by Black Eyed Peas’ I Gotta Feeling, the new wave-infused Last Friday Night offered a more realistic and relatable party anthem. Drunken misbehaviour and a maxed-out credit card get them kicked out of the bar, the police may or may not have been called and, uh-oh, the photos “ended up online – I’m screwed”.
10. Birthday (2013)
Birthday marries the kind of melody Mariah Carey might have sung early in her career to Daft Punk-inspired disco-house – although it’s unlikely the Parisian duo would have countenanced something so unashamedly pop, or indeed so laden with Carry On-esque double entendres: “It’s time to bring out the big balloons”.
9. The One That Got Away (2010)
The One That Got Away was the only one of six singles from Teenage Dream not to make No 1 in the US, but that’s no reflection on its quality. The jackhammer beat makes it dancefloor-friendly, but the song spikes the singer’s frothy image with a hefty dose of wistfulness and melancholy.
8. Firework (2010)
For a few years after its release, Firework was wearyingly ubiquitous: no TV talent show was complete without it blaring out when a contestant passed their audition. The passing of time has made it easier to appreciate as a perfectly turned piece of anthemic pop songcraft. Allegedly inspired by – would you believe – Jack Kerouac’s On the Road.
7. Dark Horse (ft Juicy J) (2013)
Prism was the sound of Perry picking sorrowfully through the wreckage of her marriage to Brand. The subject matter didn’t dent her pop smarts, but it may well have influenced the music’s hue: the trap-influenced Dark Horse had a noticeably different tone to her previous hits.
6. Roar (2013)
The fifth biggest-selling single in the world in 2013, shifting 9.9m units, Roar offers an immense singalong chorus and the kind of post-heartbreak self-empowerment sentiments destined to be belted out at karaoke nights by the recently divorced for the rest of time.
5. Chained to the Rhythm (2017)
A flip into singing about serious issues was always going to be fraught for a pop star as wilfully cartoonish as Perry, and so it proved on her fifth album, Witness. That said, her first attempt, aided by Martin, is pretty great – not so much for its critique of late-stage capitalism as for its monster chorus.
4. California Gurls (ft Snoop Dogg) (2010)
Influenced by the Beach Boys and, more unexpectedly, Big Star – the spelling was changed to match their September Gurls after frontman Alex Chilton’s death – this song was intended as a west coast answer to Jay-Z’s Empire State of Mind. Snoop Dogg turns up in fine laconic style; every melody is a hook.
3. Hot N Cold (2008)
The ghost of late-80s pop hovered appealingly over Hot N Cold, particularly in its more guitar-heavy Rock Mix. You could imagine Tiffany or Debbie Gibson performing it, although they were unlikely to sing “you PMS like a bitch, and I would know”. Whichever version you pick, it’s a killer pop song.
2. Wide Awake (2012)
Written for the documentary Katy Perry: Part of Me and subsequently added to Teenage Dream, Wide Awake is the best of Perry’s teary post-divorce tracks. It’s anthemic but sparse and thoughtful, noticeably less straightforwardly eager to please than Roar and more emotionally impactful for it. She later sang it dressed as a ballot paper at an Obama rally.
1. Teenage Dream (2010)
In 2014, composer and arranger Owen Pallett offered a detailed musical theorist’s examination of why Teenage Dream was so popular. It is apparently all to do with syncopation in the vocal line and a lack of I chords, the latter a trick also used in Fleetwood Mac’s Dreams (Lorde even went so far as to describe the song as “holy”). But whatever the technical breakdown, there’s no doubt Teenage Dream works. Its lovestruck optimism is shot through with nostalgia, and its euphoric chorus is supremely contagious, meaning it stood out even among the plethora of hits spawned by its parent album.
