Tate McRae came back for the Elder Millennials.

No to throw gas on the embers of the generational wars over Late McMumbles, but “It’s ok I’m ok” is still one of the worst pop songs I have ever heard in my life, and every single person I know over the age of 32 agrees with me.

Gen Z really goes hard for Tate McRae — as they should! I have aged out of New Pop Girl Discourse and have become one of the old people grumpily mumbling “back in my day, music was better,” but this is true for every generation. At some point, popular trends move past what you were connecting to as a young person and you either retreat into the familiarity of artists you know who make music you know you like, or you tentatively dip a toe into the waters of upcoming singers to see who is pulling enough references from yesteryear to hold your attention.

Also, speaking of mumbling, I call her Late McMumbles because everything she does feels like Britney Spears — 20 years too late — and I don’t know what that lil girl be singing on the track because her enunciation falls somewhere between Early Ariana Grande and Constant Toni Braxton.

But anyway, the little Gen Z vs Millennial kerfuffle over that truly horrid song was actually kind of funny. The young persons in my orbit had fun dragging my old ears and I had fun dragging their obviously inferior taste. At one point, someone actually slowed down that train wreck, to which the old heads responded “oh, that’s actually pretty good now.” So Gen Z won that. The song wasn’t bad. We just couldn’t keep up with it.

But Miss Late is back and this time, your old ass ears can listen along just fine.

A UK Garage 2 step?
Lyrics I can understand?
A smooth pre-chorus?
An ever-so-slight move toward attempting a bridge in 2024?

She got me! Even her herky-jerky choreography during the dance break feels less chaotic!

See? Sometimes fighting with the children does work, because this is a straight up bop and there’s no grown-up pop star who would have put it out. I’ma keep my ear to the young streets here and there. They do right by me every once in awhile.