Ariana Grande’s debut album Yours Truly was the turning point in her career which brought her from Nickelodeon actress to pop star sensation in the eyes of the public. While Grande’s career has involved music before – previously being cast in a few musicals, singing on the soundtrack albums to Victorious, and releasing “Put Your Hearts Up” – Yours Truly’s leading single “The Way” was her first major success in the pop music world and her first track to chart on Billboard’s US Hot 100 chart, peaking at #9. The album was supported by two more singles: “Baby I” and “Right There.”

Yours Truly was noted by critics to have abandoned the pure bubblegum pop of “Put Your Hearts Up” and the tracks for the Victorious soundtracks for a mixture of modern pop music with 1990s contemporary R&B and 1950s-and-1960s doo-wop which was more sophisticated but still appealing to youth.

“The Way” was played on multiple Top 40 radio stations across the US, and Grande started a stream of radio interviews to promote the single. “Almost Is Never Enough” was released to radio as a promotional single along with a music video as a tie-in to the 2013 action-adventure film The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones. “Popular Song” was also released as a single, but was classified as a single from Mika’s album The Origin of Love. Grande’s first concert tour, The Listening Sessions, supported the album.

Yours Truly received positive reviews from critics, who enjoyed the throwback style and compared Grande’s singing to that of Mariah Carey. AllMusic called the album “surprisingly sophisticated and unique.” Entertainment Weekly described it as “one of the most purely enjoyable albums of the year.”

After the initial release of the album, a deluxe edition with the bonus track “The Way (Spanglish Edition)” was released. The Japanese edition of the album featured three remixes as bonus tracks: “The Way (JdB Radio),” “Baby I (Cosmic Dawn Radio Edit),” and “Right There (7th Heaven Radio Edit).”