Was it trying to escape Teenage Dream with Witness, only to spend the next decade trying to get back to it?

Was it failing to capitalize on Never Really Over? Going full clown with Smile? Becoming more famous as an American Idol judge than as a recording artist? Or was the Peacock chanteuse really convinced that reuniting with Dr. Luke for 143 was the move?

Considering her decade-long decline, which mistake actually did the most damage?

The Prism single choices and the long break she took between it and Witness were the origins of her downfall.

But another big mistake was majorly pushing Small Turd rather than allocating those resources to Never Really Over or releasing Harleys as the second single instead. That's what kneecapped her comeback when there was still something to salvage.

Edited August 12Aug 12 by gelato

What was Katy's biggest mistake?

Thinking she was worthy of having a music career without the talent or likeability to back it up?

Too long of a gap between Prism + Witness, weird branding during Witness era, music just didn't interest the GP or a huge pop audience.

Most pop stars have a 5 year peak cycle, only a few are the exception. She just didn't have the range to grow into anything more and fizzled out. The subsequent mistakes she made following Never Really Over certainly didn't help.

Trying so hard to prove she wasn't Katy Perry anymore, selling pop with a purpose while making more of the same, copying Miley hair, turning the Taylor feud into Swish Swish and that embarrassing mv, never really developing a more mature side. She kept the childish clown persona, making jokes about Britney, mental health and Mariah, while the whole nun situation was handled poorly

Witness was a big decline but she could've bounced back somewhat with a proper era in 2019 led by NRO and other singles of a similar sound/quality. Smile was a disaster

She could and should have had a massive comeback with NRO. She should have been on every show and every radio station promoting it as if it was her debut single. Instead she literally disappeared for 4 months.

she never grew or took herself seriously as an artist /caseclosed.

She was always a GP driven artist and when the GP got tired of her, she got nothing to hold her back and just... fell off. Simple as that.

Funny enough, back in the day her fans used to brag how she was the "GP queen" while others were "just for the gays". Well... we saw how that turned out for her.

the Hilary Clinton Campaign loss which lead to CTTR and the "liberating" haircut

She didnt use SuperBowl for anything and waited 4 years to release Witness… and then she released BA when trying to claim it's woke pop… and then Small Talk and clown cover art… and then Łukasz It never got better

Not serving hot, fly, or sexy in the Witness era.

She was controversial for all the wrong reasons, and "Swish Swish" needed a damn hot video. Then, when she finally decided to serve sexy with 143, the music sucked.

Most critically: she waited four years to release after questionable single/video choices for Prism that limited the full potential of that era. She failed to leverage the Super Bowl hype.

She then tried to elevate her art with Witness, while forgetting everything that made her successful in the first place. She had ambitions to create artful pop music, but no one told her it had to be good, too. She wound up sullying her image with a terrible haircut and a days-long livestream that revealed the true extent of her vapidity. Katy came across as a boring and brainless woman who thought she had something profound to say. In other words, the worst kind of pop star. Katy effectively destroyed her cool factor, and the GP responded accordingly.

NRO was one of the few good choices she made in the past decade, but her failure to release a decent follow-up (Small Talk, one of her worst singles) and leverage the imagery from the NRO single/video stalled any momentum that NRO generated for her. She then served Smile with tragic clown artifice.

Bereft of any artistic credibility, she returned to Dr. Luke only to deliver a generic, second-rate version of her glory era. This decision was truly inexplicable and inexcusable. One of the dumbest self-owns by a pop star in history.

And that's it.

Edited August 12Aug 12 by DammnBaby

Honestly, I think PRISM - despite being a highly successful album - was where it kind of started. The GP was already growing tired of songs like Birthday and This is How We Do. Instead of pivoting towards either a) catchy and well written but more mature lyrics or b) genre hopping towards pop/rock or folk/acoustic, we got a long break and a mediocre album. She ditched her signature look and style for an aesthetic that didn't work for her, and the music wasn't good enough for the public to look past it.

Ultimately, she's had to much controversy and bad press to really make a full recovery since then. She needs a new team that will tell her the truth - not a bunch of yes men/women - and better songs writers because the material we've been getting has not been up to the same level she used to put out.

12 minutes ago, loveisdead9582 said:

Honestly, I think PRISM - despite being a highly successful album - was where it kind of started. The GP was already growing tired of songs like Birthday and This is How We Do. Instead of pivoting towards either a) catchy and well written but more mature lyrics or b) genre hopping towards pop/rock or folk/acoustic, we got a long break and a mediocre album. She ditched her signature look and style for an aesthetic that didn't work for her, and the music wasn't good enough for the public to look past it.

Ultimately, she's had to much controversy and bad press to really make a full recovery since then. She needs a new team that will tell her the truth - not a bunch of yes men/women - and better songs writers because the material we've been getting has not been up to the same level she used to put out.

Agree about TIHWD but Maroon 5 smashed with a Birthday cosplay dd

Edited August 12Aug 12 by halcyonday

1 minute ago, halcyonday said:

Agree about TIHWD but Maroon 5 smashed with a Birthday cosplay dd

Sugar did not have that video.

Just now, DammnBaby said:

Sugar did not have that video.

Yeah i mean they also stole the concept but didnt murder it like katy

I see all the time people blaming songs like 'Birthday' or 'This is How We Do' but none of this songs ruined her career like they were pretty decent after 2 MONSTER HITS like 'Roar' and 'Dark Horse' (let's consider she is the artist that released 'Teenage Dream' lol).

It's true 'Legendary Lovers', 'Walking On Air' or even the scrapped 'Black Widow' had more chances to be bigger Hits but it wasn't necessary.

Birthday MV. The lyric video would have been so cute

Witness live stream and that nasty wig - I wonder how Bon Appetit would do as the lead

CTTR was not catchy enough either

I think a lot of the flop issues stem from her trying to shed her carefully crafted initial image as a cheeky pin up starlet and become a more serious artist and all around entertainer. A lot of people will say "Birthday" video was the start of the end and ask why didn't she just do a cute fun sexy video instead of the clown mess. IMO it's probably because she was getting tired of being just a sex symbol. Same reason her next album was trying to break out of that. But the public put her in that box from the start because well, she got big thanks to songs like I Kissed a Girl and California Gurls with the cream boobs. It's hard to shake that image.

1 hour ago, Killah said:

she never grew or took herself seriously as an artist /caseclosed.

It's always been this. Idg the dissertations

1 hour ago, Killah said:

she never grew or took herself seriously as an artist /caseclosed.

This!! I don't believe in the theorys about the hair, bad singles choices or whatever... All artists go through highs and lows, it's normal and too many artists survive.

The real thing is, she is not an artist, just a singer who had a few hits and that's it. This type of artist will never last because they lack ambition; they only think about quick hits and not about growing as an artist. This is why she always try to make same songs all the time. She only wants songs like teenage dream and now songs like one of the boys... Did she know she can do something new?? No, bc she is not an artist

1 hour ago, gelato said:

The Prism single choices and the long break she took between it and Witness were the origins of her downfall.

But another big mistake was majorly pushing Small Turd rather than allocating those resources to Never Really Over or releasing Harleys as the second single instead. That's what kneecapped her comeback when there was still something to salvage.

I will NEVER understand the decision to push small talk. I was utterly disgusted when I heard it. It felt like a z-list pop star track

1 hour ago, Rascal said:

Thinking she was worthy of having a music career without the talent or likeability to back it up?

And despite this opinion on her she has had one of the biggest music careers of the century and will always be able to habe a global music career. Queen!

Edited August 12Aug 12 by PopKills

Her biggest mistake is not to grow as an artist at all since 2015.