Initially, this album could seem closer to an arduous academic challenge than a new pop record from a musician who just had a last hit was a collaboration with an international pop star. Divided across four different sections and voiced in thirteen tongues, we have a head-spinning orchestral-influenced opus exploring feminine mystery, religious ascent, and corporal transformation, frequently through the perspective of different women saints. The end of a relationship—a topic handled with raw honesty elsewhere—is launched upwards here, supported by the lush sound of a full orchestra and input from a Pulitzer-winning composer among an extensive list of collaborators. Its sheer audacity alone renders the efforts of contemporary pop stars appear quite laughable.
Transcending Scholarly Exercise
The fact that Lux manages to transcend dry intellectual posturing is nothing short of a miracle, with full praise belonging to the artist. While this is not the first time project to alchemize the past with the present, its stakes are far greater here, and the tightrope walk more precarious. The element that really elevates this fourth release, outside of its complex melodies, rich arrangements, and engrained theatricality, is an essential sense of joy. Similar to the iconic artist during her height, you find a captivating sense to Rosalía's voice which sweeps the listener into its tornado. When she's tearing hearts in two, the listener still desire to stay right there through the ride.
A Prime Example of Exuberance
That playful energy comes forth brightly during a stunning Italian ballad inspired by Saint Clare. It bathes in a string-drenched whirlpool over several moments. Suddenly, all the music drops silent, to reveal there's a gleeful giggle followed by a comment before a hilariously over-the-top orchestral crescendo crashes in with cartoonish force. The song immediately shifts into the wild track driven by galloping orchestration, an imposing choir, and a cameo role from the artist herself.
"The magic with Lux is that the listener rarely exactly understand—nor want to know—where you will go to next."
Almost each song concludes in a totally different place from where it started. A track explores the fleeting nature of celebrity with a delicate orchestration before collapsing in electronic chaos. Another, a song that recalls the artist's earlier rhythmic work begins off dark and brooding, featuring menacing beats, until fluttering traditional handclaps and an angelic choir enter to smooth its jagged corners.
The Bridge Of Experiment & Accessibility
A key balancing act of the album involves straddling the line between bold experimentation and mainstream appeal. This is little surprise that it has achieved the artist's first work to crack the upper reaches of major markets: at its core a collection of truly catchy hits. A song sung entirely in the English language swells on a chorus that seems to collect more and more nagging melodies as it spins upward. That trick is echoed by a different expansive track that expands and constricts, intertwining layered tunes as an intricate weave.
- A waltz-like song charms with its jaunty, Disney-adjacent drama and a chant-along chorus.
- Lyrically, it shares the cultural honesty of contemporary breakup anthems, lambasting an ex- partner labeled an "emotional bully".
- Across these tracks, the vocals carry a painted-on smile, like a storybook figure concealing a knife: "Top prize in acting like a motherfucker / You've won the trophy of disappointment."
A Maximalist Feast for the Ears
This album represents pop on a grand scale, a hungry grasp for high artistry in an era of looming AI-generated blankness. It eschews self-absorption in favor of glorious transcendence, crafting an over-the-top spectacle that masterfully controls its own built-in excess. This is a deep well of buried treasure that takes patience to completely explore but never seem like a chore. While other major releases of the year seemed like feasting on scraps, Lux is a lavish banquet at which the guests around it, some tipsy on sacred drink, flutter between discussions about historical figures, the galvanizing sensation of heartbreaking grief, and shared gossip about useless partners. It is a contemporary musical from music's most restlessly inventive practitioner.
