Revamped is the first remix album by the American singer Demi Lovato, released on September 15, 2023, through Island Records. Warren "Oak" Felder entirely produced it, while Alex Niceforo and Keith Sorrells received additional credits. The album comprises ten re-recorded renditions of songs from Lovato's previous albums, conceived as "rock versions". It served as a follow-up to her return to rock music with her 2022 studio album Holy Fvck, and contains elements of pop-punk and other subgenres. The musicians Slash, Nita Strauss, Bert McCracken, and the band the Maine appear as featured artists.
Lovato promoted Revamped with performances at several festivals and made a televised appearance at the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards, where she sang the singles "Heart Attack" and "Cool for the Summer", as well as the promotional single "Sorry Not Sorry". Upon release, the album received mostly positive reviews from music critics; many of them described it as a fun record, although some did not find drastic changes to the original songs. Commercially, Revamped peaked within the top 30 on the national charts in Flanders, Scotland, and Spain, as well as the top 60 in the United States and the United Kingdom.
Demi Lovato has experimented with several music genres in her career; she started it with pop rock before shifting to "mainstream pop".[1] She expressed her admiration to rock, metal, and alternative music throughout the years.[2] Lovato's eighth studio album, Holy Fvck, was released in 2022 and described by critics as "her heaviest work yet", drawing from pop-punk and hard rock.[1] Before its release, she staged a "funeral" for her pop music in social media.[3] It was entirely produced by Warren "Oak" Felder.[4] Lovato supported the album with the Holy Fvck Tour in the same year.[5] She performed several songs from her music catalog with a rock rearrangement, to match her then-current sound and style. Lovato toured with a band that included the American guitarist Nita Strauss.[6] The tour was received positively, and it led Lovato to consider re-recording some of her older singles.[3] In an interview with Rolling Stone's Tomás Mier, she said: "When I got home from tour, I was like, 'Why don't I just record those versions and release them?".[7]
For Revamped, Lovato returned to work with Felder.[5] He is credited in all the tracks as the producer, with collaboration from Alex Niceforo, Keith "Ten4" Sorrells, Mitch Allan, Oscar Linnander, Zaire Koalo, Chopsticks, and John Feldmann.[8] The album contains 10 re-recorded versions of songs previously included on the albums Don't Forget (2008), Unbroken (2011), Demi (2013), Confident (2015), and Tell Me You Love Me (2017).[9] The songs were conceived as "rock versions".[5] Lovato made Revamped in order to reflect the changes in her life, and stated that it allowed her to reconnect with the songs as she had felt tired of singing them live.[3] Discussing the album, she said: "I wanted to pay homage to the songs that resonated the most with fans and played a big role in my career by breathing an exciting new life into them."[10] Lovato added extra high notes to the songs, that felt that were "easier to record, just because [she has] been singing them for so many years".[5]
Musically, Revamped is a rock album that follows Lovato's genre shift with Holy Fvck.[1][9] It contains perceived elements of pop-punk,[12]electronic rock[1] and alt-rock.[3]Revamped opens with the remix to "Heart Attack", a punk rock song[9] with lyrics about avoiding to fall in love.[5] It changes the original tempo of the verses and features guitar riffs.[13] The second track, "Confident", is a glam rock song.[9] The Paste writer Allison McClain Merrill connected the lyric "I used to hold my freak back, but I'm letting go" with the opening line from "Freak", Holy Fvck's opening track.[5] "Sorry Not Sorry" is also glam rock,[9] and contains a metal scream in the lyric "Wait a minute", which was not made by Lovato in order to not damage her voice.[5] Slash appears in the bridge with a guitar solo.[5] "Cool for the Summer" is a metalcore song[9] that starts with synthesizers and static sound before a drum beat and electric guitars are introduced.[5] The original version was written by her, Max Martin, Ali Payami, Alexander Kronlund, and Savan Kotecha; the remix contains a change in the lyric "Don't tell your mother", which was replaced with "Go tell your mother". Lovato stated that it was made to reflect pride in her sexuality.[5]
The fifth track, "Tell Me You Love Me", is a stadium rock[9]power ballad.[13] McClain Merrill said that it is a quiet moment between the "harder, louder" songs on the album.[5] Its outro was made with a vocoder.[5] Before the lyric "No, you ain't nobody 'till you got somebody" in "Tell Me You Love Me", Lovato sings "They say". When discussing this, Lovato stated that she did not want to retain the original's "negative connotation", which "always bugged [her]" while performing it live.[7] "Neon Lights", the collaboration with the Maine, is a dance rock song with techno and emo countermelodies.[5] The stadium rock "Skyscraper"[9] begins with soft organ chords, which leds to the chorus that is "a promise of survival": "Go on and try to tear me down / I will be rising from the ground / Like a skyscraper".[5] "La La Land" is an "old-fashioned" rock & roll song,[9] which contains an electric guitar solo from Strauss.[5] While the original version was already rock-infused,[2] punk rock elements and staccato guitar lines were added.[14] Opossed to the first track, "Give Your Heart a Break" explores the feeling of being doubtful in a romantic relationship.[5] "Don't Forget" closes the album. The original version was also inspired by rock music,[9] and the rearranged version is led by guitar and piano.[5]
Promotion and release
"Heart Attack" was released on March 24, 2023, as the first remix from the album, to mark the song's 10th anniversary.[15] The second single, "Cool for the Summer", was released on May 25 of the same year, announced via social media on May 18.[16] On July 14, 2023, Lovato released "Sorry Not Sorry" as the first promotional single from the album and subsequently announced Revamped on her social media accounts.[17] The album announcement was supported by the release of an album trailer, with a snippet of the singles serving as the background music to a series of clips of Lovato in a photoshoot.[18] On the same date, Rolling Stone revealed that "Give Your Heart a Break" and "Tell Me You Love Me" would be featured on the album.[7] The remix to "Confident" was released on August 18, announced as part of the track listing three days before its release.[19]
At the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards, Lovato performed a medley of the remixes to "Heart Attack", "Sorry Not Sorry", and "Cool for the Summer".[20] She was accompanied by Constance Antoinette on guitar, Leanne Bowes on bass, and Brittany Bowman on drums.[21] It was chosen by USA Today and Billboard as one of the best performances of the ceremony.[22][23] She also performed at several festivals, such as Philadelphia Welcome America Festival,[24] Wonderbus Music & Arts Festival,[25] and The Town Festival.[26]Revamped was released as Lovato's first remix album on September 15, 2023.[3] It was issued to vinyl LP, CD, and digital formats.[27]
Commercial performance
Upon its release, Revamped peaked within the top 20 on the Scottish Albums Chart (14),[28] and in the Flanders region of Belgium (20).[29] The album charted at number 27 in Spain,[30] number 59 on the UK Albums Chart,[31] number 60 on the US Billboard 200 chart,[32] number 71 in Belgium's Wallonia,[33] and number 120 in France.[34] In the United States, Revamped reached 11,000 pure album sales in its first week.[35] It additionally debuted at number 4 on Top Album Sales, 8 on Top Alternative Albums,[36] and 10 on Top Rock Albums;[37] in the former ranking, it became Lovato's ninth consecutive top 10 album.[35]
On the review aggregatorMetacritic, which assigns which assigns a normalized rating from publications, the album received a weighted average score of 85 out of 100 based on 6 reviews, indicating "generally favorable" reception.[38] Stephen Daw from Billboard described Revamped as "the work of an artist taking the narrative back from her years of pop stardom".[39]
Lovato's vocal performance was highly praised by critics,[5][3] with American Songwriter's Alex Hopper calling them "strong as ever".[14] Several reviewers described Revamped as a fun project, including Jeffrey Davies of PopMatters and Neil Z. Young of AllMusic. The former praised the sound as natural, while the latter lauded the diveristy of Lovato's music catalog.[3][9] It was also named a nostalgic album by McClain Merrill and Clash's Ims Taylor; the former described it as an experiment.[5][2] A few critics also thought that Revamped would be well received from fans.[9][5] The remixes to "Skyscraper" and "Don't Forget" were predominantly highlighted as standouts.[14]
On the other hand, some reviewers believed that the album was under the expectations. Hopper opined that the songs do not contain drastic changes to the original versions.[14] Vicky Greer from The Line of Best Fit agreed, while writing that the album was a disappointment and a "musical step backwards in [Lovato's] career", containing missed oportunities.[1] She described it as "formulaic rock" and criticized its production, although lauded the participation of Slash and Strauss.[1] McClain Merrill also admired the collaborations.[2]
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