''Champagne Problems'' is the eighth studio album by Romanian singer

Inna Elena Alexandra Apostoleanu (born 16 October 1986), known professionally as Inna (stylized in all caps), is a Romanian singer. Born in Mangalia and raised in Neptun, Romania, Neptun, she studied political science at Ovidius University before ...

. It was released in two parts, ''Champagne Problems #DQH1'' and ''Champagne Problems #DQH2'', that were made available for digital download and

streaming Streaming media refers to multimedia delivered through a network for playback using a media player. Media is transferred in a ''stream'' of packets from a server to a client and is rendered in real-time; this contrasts with file downl ...

through

Global Records Global Records is a Romanian independent record label founded in 2008 by Ștefan Lucian. History Global Records's first signed artist was Inna in 2008, whose career has been spanning over 10 years. She has released a series of international ...

on 7 January and 11 March 2022, respectively. Recording sessions took place in late 2021 for both releases and was completed in 16 days in a mansion Inna resided in with several Romanian songwriters and producers; such as Sebastian Barac, Marcel Botezan, David Ciente,

Alexandru Cotoi Alexandru Cotoi (often simply Alex Cotoi) is a Romanian composer, Record producer, producer and disc jockey signed by Global Records. Over the years, he has worked with several high-profile singers including Delia Matache, Delia, Irina Rimes, Inna ...

, Minelli, Moa Pettersson Hammar and Gustav Nyström. The first release has been described as a primarily

dance-pop Dance-pop is a Music genre, genre of electronic dance music that originated in the late 1970s to early 1980s. It is generally uptempo music intended for nightclubs with the intention of being danceable but also suitable for contemporary hit ra ...

record that encompasses

Latin pop Latin pop () is a pop music subgenre that is a fusion of US–style music production with Latin music genres from anywhere in Latin America and Spain. It originates with List of countries where Spanish is an official language, Spanish-speaking ...

and

reggaeton Reggaeton (, ) is a modern style of popular music, popular and electronic music that originated in Panamanian reggaetón, Panama during the late 1980s, and which rose to prominence in the late 1990s and early 2000s through a plethora of Puert ...

influences. Inna

vlog A vlog (), also known as a video blog or video log, is a form of blog for which the medium is video. Vlog entries often combine embedded video (or a video link) with supporting text, images, and other metadata. Entries can be recorded in one ta ...

ged the progress of ''Champagne Problems'' through her YouTube channel. The daily episodic videos were part of the second season of her Dance Queen's House series. Commercially, ''#DQH1'' peaked at numbers 72 and 81 on the

UK Album Downloads Chart The UK Album Downloads Chart is compiled by the Official Charts on behalf of the British music industry. Since July 2015, the chart week runs from Friday to Thursday, with the chart date given as the following Thursday. The chart was introduced i ...

and Germany Album Download Chart, respectively. In celebration of reaching seven million subscribers on her YouTube account, Inna performed songs from both parts of ''Champagne Problems'' in March 2022.

Background and creation

On 27 November 2020, Inna released her seventh studio album '' Heartbreaker''. Sessions for the album took place over a three-week period at a rented

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ) is the capital and largest city of Romania. The metropolis stands on the River Dâmbovița (river), Dâmbovița in south-eastern Romania. Its population is officially estimated at 1.76 million residents within a greater Buc ...

mansion, where Inna resided in with Romanian songwriters and producers Sebastian Barac, Marcel Botezan, David Ciente,

and Minelli. She documented the progress of the album with daily

s on her

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

channel—which constituted the first season of her series Dance Queen's House. The second season provided viewers with the progress of ''Champagne Problems''. The recording sessions began in late 2021 and lasted 16 days to complete. Ciente was replaced in favor of songwriters Moa Pettersson Hammar and Gustav Nyström, who were present on the selected dates. The vlogs ran from 6 to 21 December 2021. By the third episode, Inna had recorded 20 songs in consideration for ''Champagne Problems''. One of those songs, "De dragul tău", a

promotional single A promotional recording, promo, or plug copy is an audio or video recording distributed free, usually in order to promote a recording that is or soon will be commercially available. Promos are normally sent directly to broadcasters, such as mu ...

released by Inna earlier in 2021, was revealed to have been recorded during the sessions for ''Champagne Problems'' in the fourth episode of the series. The final episode released on 21 December 2021, provided viewers a link to pre-order the album. The episode revealed the street date of 7 January 2022 for the first part of ''Champagne Problems'', dubbed ''#DQH1'', for digital download and

through

. The label handled the release for the second part, ''Chamapgne Problems #DQH2'', released on 11 March 2022.

Composition and reception

''#DQH1'' is a

dance pop Dance-pop is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in the late 1970s to early 1980s. It is generally uptempo music intended for nightclubs with the intention of being danceable but also suitable for contemporary hit radio. Developi ...

album with

and

influences, according to Matjaž Ambrožič of

24UR 24UR (24 hours) is a daily news show on the Slovenian commercial television POP TV Pop TV is a Slovenian generalist television channel operated by Pro Plus d.o.o., a subsidiary of Central European Media Enterprises (CME), which is in turn own ...

. Contrary to works done by Inna, the recording is performed entirely in English. Ambrožič praised ''#DQH1'' as being "solid" and a "pleasing rhythmic pump" and enjoyed the melodies on the album as well as Inna's vocal delivery. ''

Adevărul (; meaning "The Truth", formerly spelled ''Adevĕrul'') is a Romanian daily newspaper, based in Bucharest. Founded in Iași, in 1871, and reestablished in 1888, in Bucharest, it was the main left-wing press venue to be published during the Kingd ...

'' Maria-Alexandru Mortu categorized the opener "Always on My Mind" as a

dance Dance is an The arts, art form, consisting of sequences of body movements with aesthetic and often Symbol, symbolic value, either improvised or purposefully selected. Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoir ...

song, praising the "catchy"

refrain A refrain (from Vulgar Latin ''refringere'', "to repeat", and later from Old French ''refraindre'') is the Line (poetry)">line or lines that are repeated in poetry or in music">poetry.html" ;"title="Line (poetry)">line or lines that are repeat ...

and "honest" lyrics, while

Jon Caramanica Jon Caramanica (born 1975) is an American journalist and pop music critic who writes for ''The New York Times''. He is also known for writing about hip hop music. Biography Born in Brooklyn, New York, Caramanica received his bachelor's degree ...

of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' found the title track as being "immaculate club-

pop Pop or POP may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Pop music, a musical genre Artists * POP, a Japanese idol group now known as Gang Parade * Pop! (British group), a UK pop group * Pop! featuring Angie Hart, an Australian band Album ...

: ecstatic, bubbly, heartless". Musically, "Champagne Problems" is meant to resemble the

spicy Pungency ( ) is the taste of food commonly referred to as spiciness, hotness or heat, found in foods such as chili peppers. Highly pungent tastes may be experienced as unpleasant. The term piquancy ( ) is sometimes applied to foods with a lower ...

taste and is the result of a challenge presented to Inna and her team during the second season of Dance Queen's House. Commercially, ''#DQH1'' debuted and peaked at number 72 on the

published by

The Official Charts Company The Official UK Charts Company Limited (formerly Music Industry Chart Services Limited), trading as the Official Charts Company (OCC) or the Official Charts (formerly the Chart Information Network), is a British inter-professional organisation ...

(OCC) for the week ending 20 January 2022. It also reached number 81 on

GfK Entertainment The GfK Entertainment charts are the official charts for music, home video, and video games in Germany and are gathered and published by GfK Entertainment (formerly Media Control and Media Control GfK International), a subsidiary of GfK, on be ...

's Album Download Chart on 17 January 2022.

Track listing

All lyrics written by Elena Alexandra Apostoleanu with additional help from Jordan Shaw, Minelli, Moa Pettersson Hammar, and Gustav Nyström on select tracks. Credits adapted from Tidal.

Charts

Release history

References