by It’s summer, and you’re scrolling past story after story with the same EDM buildup to the same quite unremarkable lyrics. You stop to think: could this really be Lorde’s first work in half a decade? But most incredulously – why does everyone love it?
The darling mystic of pop has produced a parody of her former work by relying too much on what Lorde had become for people. Known for her contemplations of youth in the limelight, ‘What Was That’ delivers cliché nostalgia with lyrics like “Since I was 17, I gave you everything, Now we wake from a dream”. I felt like I was listening to a lazy attempt at recapturing Melodrama’s charms, and frankly, I was disappointed.
Lorde’s forceful recollection of drugs and youthful rebellion falls flat alongside an equally flat synth track. “MDMA in the back garden, blow our pupils up” and “This is the best cigarette of my life” leave very little to the imagination, and in their unremarkable digression from lyrical poetry, are still awarded a consistent place in the chorus.
Breaking away from the brooding ballads of her younger music, Lorde has decided to marry her new album Virgin to a monorhythm based on synths and unsynchronised lyrics. Her smooth, almost choir-like vocals are lost in the haze of dissonant electric drums, and its first release, ‘What Was That’, leads an album in which all songs sound exactly the same.
Almost every line felt like it was trying too hard, like it’s almost a lyric, like in the second verse: “I stare at the painted faces that talk current affairs”. There’s also what seems to be frequent attempts at depth, such as “Indio haze, we’re in a sandstorm,” that don’t sound ethereal, no matter what sci-fi-esque electronic music it’s paired with.
Lorde’s track record is thoughtful, lively and full of meaning. A loss of musicality in ‘What Was That’ is partly to blame, since a lack of guitar or piano acoustics would have gone a long way to bring the song to life, as in ‘Green Light’ and ‘Royals’.
Yet what made this song most annoying this year was that it was so overdone: perhaps because established artists can release very average work and their loyal fans will still relish the end of their wait, or because its title encapsulates Gen Z’s enduring exhaustion, and it just matches the need for a post’s caption.
I was confronted with the high expectations I had held for such a promising artist. Her outspoken journey of understanding her gender fluidity and the significance of her very young rise to fame were expected to be quite present themes in Lorde’s new work, and with precedents like ‘Stoned at the Nail Salon’, I was intrigued to see what new existentialism her listeners would be subject to in 2025.
As one of the few mainstream artists making bold political statements, I still respect Lorde and hope for a stronger comeback. Withdrawing her music from music streaming platforms in Israel earlier this month, while shouting ‘Free Palestine’ during concerts, Lorde has still done a good job at preserving her image as a cultural icon of rebellious pop for young and older fans alike. But still, what was that?
