Seven years ago, Irish singer CMAT (born Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson) received life-changing advice from a fellow rising pop star. Charli xcx urged her to dump her boyfriend and take making music seriously. It turns out that Charli knows best. “Euro-Country,” CMAT’s third studio album, is her strongest to date, an emotive collection of energetic, cheeky pop songs.

On her previous albums, like 2023’s BRIT Award nominated “Crazymad, for Me,” CMAT mined relationships for big-hearted and humor-filled songs pulling from country-pop rhythms and retro ’70s grooves. On “Euro-Country,” she’s sharpened her tools, becoming both more personal and political in the process.

CMAT opens the title track by singing in Irish. The song, atop swelling synths, traces periods of economic incline and depressi

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