In comparison with the sound and lyrical content of Sinclair's debut album Perfectionist (2011), Trouble has a heavier atmosphere driven by electric guitars and strong percussion.

Compared with Perfectionist's roster of eight producers,[3] Trouble used four, including Guillaume Doubet, Glass John and HaynieKills—all of who Kills worked with for the first time.

Doubet, Haynie and American producer Mike Will handled the record's programming; Messer, Pawel Sek Tyler Sam Johnson and Rob Suchecki served as engineers for some songs of the album.

Bhasker and Tony Maserati mixed Trouble while Chris Athens controlled the mastering process at his eponymous studio.

[18] Writing for The New Zealand Herald, Paula Yeoman called the album's music "darker pop", while finding it resembles the works of Lana Del Rey, Lady Gaga and Gwen Stefani.

[19] AllMusic's Matt Collar wrote that the overall sound of the album was influenced by Stefani, Grimes and Courtney Love.

[20] The themes of Trouble deviate from those of Perfectionist; while the latter explores Kills' ambitions and perfectionism, the former is about her upbringing and adolescence, when she left her home and engaged in dangerous behaviour.

[18][21] Kills stated that the album reflects her experiences as a teenager and her feelings of powerlessness motivated by her lack of identification with recent, upbeat popular music.

[24] "Television", which Romy Olutski of Harper's Bazaar described as a "more alternative" song, opens with police sirens and progressively introduces guitars and percussion using a vocoder effect.

[14][24][31] Writing for MuchMusic, journalist Allison noted Motown influences on the melancholic love song "Outta Time".

[34] During an interview with Glamour, Kills said it serves as an introductory track to the album "because it's a verbal collage of things we see on a daily basis that we turn a blind eye to, especially in the Internet age, where you can literally see anything and everything instantly ... We all laugh and joke when it's someone else's suffering".

[45] Following the album release, Kills was interviewed by a number of magazines and websites, including Billboard,[28] Teen Vogue,[46] Refinery29,[47] and Playboy.

[51] Matt Collar of AllMusic awarded Trouble a rating of three and a half stars out of five, calling it a "pantomime that artists have been trying to pull off ever since Madonna sang about a sexual experience so revelatory it gave her back her virginity".

"[52] Writing for The New Zealand Herald, Paula Yeoman stated that pop listeners "should pay attention to" the album, to which she gave a rating of three and a half points out of five.