A Definitive Ranking of EVERY Song from Miranda Cosgrove's High Maintenance EP

Welcome Back to Disney (& More)!👋🏻😊🎉I hope you enjoyed my last post on A Definitive Ranking of EVERY Song from Miranda Cosgrove’s Sparks Fly Album, and that you’re ready for some more NOSTALGIC FUN down music memory lane.🎶💿🥳 ‘Cause today, we’re continuing with Miranda Cosgrove’s ICONIC discography and talking all about her THIRD and FINAL album, but her SECOND EP, High Maintenance.👩🏻🎤🎶💿🤍❤️🖤🩶💛🤎

Like I briefly mentioned before, High Maintenance is the SECOND extended play (EP) by American actress and singer Miranda Cosgrove, recorded from 2010 to 2011, and released by Columbia and Epic Records on March 15, 2011.💿🎶🎉The EP was preceded by the release of its lead single, “Dancing Crazy”. Which, fun little fact, was co-written by Avril Lavigne and produced by Max Martin and Shellback (?). That single peaked at #100 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the U.S. .👏👏Musically, High Maintenance mainly incorporates the pop genre with electropop influences. The EP received mixed to positive reviews from music critics, with many complimenting its sound and production as more adult than Miranda Cosgrove's previous teen pop-oriented releases. However, others maintained that Miranda Cosgrove and her music lacked originality.😮👎🏻High Maintenance was promoted mainly through touring and live promotional appearances on TV, including the aforementioned Dancing Crazy Tour.

In fact, in October 2010, Miranda Cosgrove announced new tour dates for the Sparks Fly Tour, in support of her debut full-length studio album of the same name. It was later renamed the Dancing Crazy Tour, aptly named after her single “Dancing Crazy”. Miranda Cosgrove tweeted a picture from the photoshoot of the EP on January 11, 2011. In an interview with Billboard she revealed the title of the EP to be High Maintenance, named after the track of the same name. A song that is a duet with Rivers Cuomo, that was also co-written by Cuomo, along with Billy Steinberg and Josh Alexander, and produced by Alexander and Cuomo. About the new EP and collaboration with Rivers Cuomo, Miranda Cosgrove once stated, "It's the first duet I've ever done, and it was really fun. My part of the song is this girl who's high maintenance, and Rivers is this guy who's having to put up with it. I really enjoyed working with (Cuomo). He's really cool. I've worked with Dr. Luke for awhile [sic]…and he ended up introducing me to Rivers.” 

Along with the first two confirmed tracks, three more songs were confirmed for the new EP, which were: the electropop song “Sayonara”. A song co-written by Bonnie McKee, Nicole Morier, and Greg Kurstin, as well as produced by Kurstin. A cover of the Shontelle ballad, “Kiss You Up”, which was produced by Mozella, who co-wrote it with Tony Kanal and Jimmy Harry. And “Face of Love”, which was co-written by Anne Preven, Cartsen Mortenson, Scott Cutler, and Lucas Secon, who produced it. 

When it came to promotion for this EP, as I briefly just mentioned before, Miranda Cosgrove headlined the Dancing Crazy Tour, which was named after the EP’s lead and ONLY SINGLE “Dancing Crazy”. The tour began January 22, 2011 and ended on August 10, 2011. It featured dates in House of Blues locations, and accompanying Miranda on the tour was Greyson Chance. The music video for “Dancing Crazy” was available for free digital download on iTunes, during the week before the EP’s release.🎉 Aside from being performed while on tour, “Dancing Crazy” was also performed live, the day of the EP’s release (March 15, 2011), at the Hard Rock Cafe in Hollywood, California. And the first 500 customers to purchase High Maintenance from FYE or the performance at the Hard Rock Cafe received a free wristband, which granted them access to an album signing held by Miranda Cosgrove.

On Saturday, March 19, 2011, Nickelodeon also aired the TV special Dancing Crazy With Miranda Cosgrove.📺🎶A special that showed footage of Miranda Cosgrove recording the single as well as its accompanying music video, and a behind-the-scenes look at her tour. On April 5, 2011, Miranda Cosgrove tweeted that she would be going on tour again in the summer. To which Greyson Chance also opened up for her again on the North American part of the tour. Unfortunately, in August 2011, Miranda Cosgrove's tour bus was involved in a traffic collision on Interstate 70 in Vandalia, Illinois.😮😞Five passengers, including Miranda, were injured. Miranda Cosgrove in particular had sustained a broken ankle. Initial reports confirmed that the tour would be postponed while Miranda recovered, but a week later, she (Miranda Cosgrove) released a statement stating that the tour was canceled by the doctor's orders. However, Miranda apparently said that she would resume touring by the following year. Though, from what I could research, that didn’t happen. As instead, she decided to prioritize other projects as well as her education, and she transitioned away from music and more into acting. However, at some point, to further promote High Maintenance, the tracks on the EP were also released on the Japanese edition of Miranda Cosgrove's debut album Sparks Fly.

Like I mentioned before, “Dancing Crazy” was the EP’s LEAD and ONLY SINGLE, that was co-written by Avril Lavigne with Max Martin and Shellback, who produced it. On December 21, 2010, the song was released for digital download, and the ICONIC music video was released onto Nickelodeon on February 13, 2011.🎉📺🎶“Dancing Crazy” peaked at #36 on the Billboard Pop Songs chart in the U.S. .👏It also debuted and peaked at #21 on the Top Heatseekers chart, at #34 on the Billboard 200 chart, and on the Billboard Hot 100 chart at #100.👏👏👏 However, upon its release, the EP was still met with mixed to positive reviews. 

For instance, Common Sense Media reviewed the EP’s lead single (“Dancing Crazy”) and stated, "Dancing Crazy, [...] has one thing on its mind: cutting loose on the dance floor until the wee hours of the morning. [...] Though the actions in this tune aren't necessarily irresponsible, they may be a little iffy for the youngest tweens." While Hiponline said of the album, "The High Maintenance EP is a pop-rock whirlwind, complete with sing-along choruses, candy-coated vocals and dance floor friendly beats."👍🏻👎🏻To which they later went on to say "Title track 'High Maintenance' sees Miranda trading tongue-in-cheek vocals about her carefree, fun-loving ways with Rivers Cuomo,  who contributed as a songwriter and producer to the track. From the sentimental ballad 'Kiss You Up' to the explosive, electronic ‘Sayonara' this album shows Miranda's true versatility as an artist embracing multiple styles and influences."👏🏻👏🏻

AllMusic’s James Christopher Monger wrote that High Maintenance has a more adult pop sound, and gave the EP a rating of two and a half stars out of five.👎Lauren Carter of The Boston Herold gave a positive review of High Maintenance comparing it to the likes of Avril Lavigne and Kesha, and commented "High Maintenance is mostly high-octane fun, Cosgrove's all-grown-up soundtrack to letting loose and testing the rules without breaking them."👏Mikael Wood from Entertainment Weekly gave the EP a B+ and said that Miranda Cosgrove's return to music is stronger than before. Allison Stewart from The Washington Post gave a mixed review of High Maintenance, stating, "Cosgrove's new EP, High Maintenance will sound familiar to anyone who heard her modestly received, similar-sounding 2010 full-length debut, Sparks Fly or any other teen pop disc released in the last five years." However, the editors for USA Today gave High Maintenance two and a half stars out of five with a negative review, noting, "She has been singing since the start of Nickelodeon’s iCarly, but Cosgrove's new electro-inspired EP is the first release to distinguish the 17-year-old from the show's lead character. But the break's not too sharp."👎🏻

But of course, who cares what the negative critics have to say about this EP, because as a long-time fan of Miranda Cosgrove, I like it. As I’m sure many others my age or around my age do, as well.👍😊 I will say, though, I do prefer Miranda Cosgrove’s full-length album Sparks Fly. But still, for an EP, this one isn’t bad. And it’s definitely her better EP when it comes to the only two that she released. Which, I guess, now is the perfect time for me to get into a bit of my history with this EP. How I became a fan of it and all.

Basically, I just remember getting the CD of this EP in 2011.💿🎶 And it came out not too long after my birthday.🎂 🎈So I must have gotten it as, like, a late birthday gift from my dad. And I’m pretty sure I just chose to buy it, with the money that he gave me at the time, from the new releases CD section at the local grocery store that my sisters and dad would go to all the time. ‘Cause that's what I would do anytime we would go to our local grocery store, which is never pass up the CD and DVD section without buying something. In fact, one of the first sections of the store that I would always go to check out was the section where all of the DVDs and CDs were.💿📀💸 With the teen magazine section being the FIRST place that I would stop, because it was always at the front of the store, whereas the CDs and DVDs section was all the way in the back.

So, anyways, I definitely bought the CD of this EP either right when it came out or not too long after. A CD that I still have by the way, and definitely utilized for this post.💿🎶(See pics below.😊) At the time, I didn’t know what an EP was, so I just remember wondering, "Why?", and being a little disappointed that there were only FIVE songs on it.🤔😞😂 And I still wish High Maintenance was a full-length album, but for what it is, I definitely like and appreciate this EP more than I did then. ‘Cause I do remember being happy to have the CD of this EP back then, but I didn’t listen to it nearly as much as I did with the Sparks Fly album. I actually only used to just listen to the two main songs on this EP, “Dancing Crazy” and “High Maintenance”, on repeat. And “Sayonara” a little bit as well. But, now I actually don’t mind and actually like the couple of other slower songs on this EP. That’s why doing this ranking was a bit interesting, because a few of the songs I actually had different thoughts and opinions about from when I was a teen listening to this EP. Although, this year, this month, wasn’t my first time in a long time re-listening to this EP. ‘Cause that was actually last year when my younger sister wanted my older sister and I to listen to this EP and rank the songs. But before last year, I hadn’t listened to this EP in years. So, re-listening to it last year for the first time in awhile was VERY NOSTALGIC and FUN. The same for me this time around re-listening to it, as well. But, yeah, I don’t have many specific memories when it comes to this EP. Other than just that I was a teen in high school at the time, and I bought the CD at one point then, and I would listen to it sometimes. So, whenever I do go back to listen to these songs they do instantly bring me back to that time in 2011, which is nice. And, yeah, I just couldn’t wait to get to talk about this EP with you all on here, because it’s been a long time coming. So, what are we waiting for? Let’s start dancing crazy and get into A Definitive Ranking of EVERY Song from Miranda Cosgrove’s High Maintenance EP! 👩🏻🎤🎶💿🤍❤️🖤🩶💛🤎

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(from LEAST to MOST FAVORITE)...

#5 "Sayonara"

#4 "Face of Love"

#3 "Kiss You Up"

#2 "High Maintenance"

#1 "Dancing Crazy"

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Well, that concludes A Definitive Ranking of EVERY Song from Miranda Cosgrove’s High Maintenance EP!🎉🎶💿🤍❤️🖤🩶💛🤎I really enjoyed getting to go back and listen to this EP once again, and I hope you enjoyed this post as much as I did creating it. ‘Cause, like I said before, even I found a new LOVE and APPRECIATION for this EP that I never had before. Although like I mentioned before, even then, I remember being like, “This album is too short.” Which obviously makes sense, because it’s an EP and NOT a full-length album. But I do still wish this was a full-length album and not just an EP, because once you get done with listening to just these five songs you want to hear more. At least, I always do, whenever I get to the end of this EP. But it is what it is. And at least we got this EP with these five songs from Miranda.😊👍

For an EP this one is pretty GREAT. There’s really not a bad song on it. Yeah, there’s a couple that I like over a few of the others if I had to choose, but there’s no terrible song. To no surprise too, really, it also wasn’t that hard to rank the songs from this EP just because there are so few songs on it. Plus, I kind of already knew my favorites going into this ranking right away. Not only because I knew this EP pretty well already, but also just because I had just ranked these songs last year for a video my sister did. But I think even my ranking from last year is a bit different. Which, I need to go back and look.🤔

All in all, it was just VERY NOSTALGIC to go back and listen to this EP. ‘Cause it definitely took me back to my high school days, which is what stage of life I was in at the time when this EP first came out. It also just brought back all of those early 2010s vibes in general.🥹And it was a bit bittersweet once I was done listening to this EP again, because it’s the last one from Miranda Cosgrove’s discography. Which means there’s no more of her albums to talk about on here.😢😞But no worries, because you can always come back to this post, and the two posts I did before this one, whenever you feel like reliving these songs again. Or, definitely go support Miranda’s music on Spotify or wherever you listen to music, because it's always worth it. 'Cause she's such an UNDERRATED artist and all of her albums, that I've now talked about on here, are AMAZING.👏👏👏I know I’ll definitely be re-listening to all of these Miranda Cosgrove albums again.😊But for now, I have some more FUN and VERY NOSTALGIC posts to create and share with you all. So, until then, make sure that you hit that follow button to get notified when my next post goes up, comment down below what your favorite song is from High Maintenance, and come Back to Disney soon for more!!!👋🏻 🤍❤️🖤🩶💛🤎 🎉🎶💿✌🏻😊