NASA

“NASA” is the third track off of global pop artist Ariana Grande’s fifth studio album: “thank u, next”.

“NASA” is an abbreviation of: “National Aeronautics and Space Administration” which is a United States space agency. The song follows the story of Grande telling a lover that she needs space. The track opens up with a spoken introduction from Shangela, a popular American drag queen. She uses Neil Armstrong’s infamous quote: “One small step man, one giant leap for mankind”, but replaces the word “man” with “woman”. Grande tells her lover that: “I’d rather be alone tonight / You can say “I love you” through the phone tonight”, insisting that she have some time to herself. The pre-chorus emphasises how Grande believes that this time apart will be good for the relationship: “I can’t really miss you if I’m with you / And when I miss you, it’ll change the way I kiss you”. The chorus consists of Grande saying that if she “give you the whole world, I’ma need space”, which could be Grande also stating her dedication to the relationship as she will give everything to the person she is with, so she’ll need a break to herself from time to time.

Shangela spoke to E!News in February about her contribution to the track: “The song [‘NASA’] was amazing, and when the song ended, she was like, ‘What do you think?’ And I was like, ‘Oh girl, I live! I love it, and it’s amazing! I’m already thinking of how I’m going to perform it for my drag number when I do my version.’ And she looked at me said, ‘Your version?’ And I said, ‘I’m just going to put a fun intro on it for drag, and I’m going to be in a spacesuit with like space-Titties and I’m going to come out in a moon man suit and I’m going to lift the mask and say, ‘This is one small step for woman, one giant leap for womankind.’ And she was like, ‘Oh my God! I love that!’”

There is currently no music video for “NASA”.

Release Date: 8th February 2019

Songwriter/s: Ariana Grande, Victoria Monét, Tayla Parx, Tommy Brown & Charles Anderson

Producer/s: Tommy Brown & Charles Anderson

Label/s: Republic Records

Chart Rankings: “NASA” hit the charts not only in the US (coming in at #17 on the US Billboard Hot 100 Charts), but Australia (#16), Canada (#17), Spain (#85), Slovakia and many other countries.