🔗 Share this article

At first glance, this album may look more like an arduous university challenge rather than a new pop album by an artist whose last single featured an international pop icon. Divided into four separate sections and voiced in thirteen languages, we have a head-spinning symphonic work exploring feminine mystique, religious ascent, and bodily change, often through the prism of various female saints. The dissolution of a love affair—a theme handled with grounded openness on another major 2025 album—is shot skyward here, carried by the constant sound of a full symphony orchestra and work from a Pulitzer-winning songwriter among a long list of collaborators. The pure audacity alone renders the efforts of other pop stars look rather small.

Rising Above Scholarly Pretense

The fact that this album manages to transcend overly intellectual chin-stroking feels nearly a miracle, with full praise going to Rosalía. While this is not her first album to alchemize historical sounds with modern styles, its ambitions feel far higher here, and the balancing act far more precarious. What truly elevates this fourth album, outside of its multilayered melodies, rich arrangements, and inherent drama, is an essential sense of joy. Similar to the legendary artist during her peak, you find a captivating sense to Rosalía's voice that pulls you into its tornado. Even when she's tearing hearts apart, the listener still desire to be right there through the ride.

A Signature Example of Exuberance

This playful spirit comes forth clearly on the stunning piano-led song inspired by Saint Clare. It bathes in a sorrowful melancholy over more than four minutes. Suddenly, all the music drops away, and we hear a gleeful laugh followed by a declaration before a comically exaggerated string surge crashes down like comedic impact. The song immediately shifts to the frenetic single featuring racing strings, an imposing choral group, and a surprise role from none other than Björk.

"The magic of Lux lies in the listener rarely exactly know—or even wish to know—what it is going next."

Almost every song concludes in a totally different point than how it began. One moment explores the fleeting trappings of celebrity over a delicate orchestration only to collapsing into electronic chaos. Elsewhere, a cut that recalls the artist's previous rhythmic style starts out moody and sinister, with prowling beats, before sudden flamenco handclaps and a heavenly choir arrive to soften its jagged corners.

The Balance Of Art & Pop

Another crucial balancing act on Lux involves straddling the line between bold experimentation and broad accessibility. It is no surprise that it has become the artist's first release to crack the upper reaches of key markets: at its core a collection of utterly undeniable hits. A song sung entirely in English swells around a refrain that seems to collect increasingly nagging hooks while it spirals upward. This trick gets echoed on a different powerful track that grows and contracts, weaving multiple tunes like a complex weave.

• A waltz-like song charms via its playful, Disney-adjacent drama and an anthemic chorus.
• Lyrically, it aligns the pop culture honesty of other breakup anthems, eviscerating an ex- lover described as an "emotional bully".
• Across the album, the vocals have a sharp edge, akin to a fairy-tale character hiding a blade: "Top prize in being a scoundrel / You have the podium of letdown."

A Maximalist Banquet for the Ears

Lux represents pop on a maximalist scale, a hungry grasp for high Art amid of looming artificial sameness. It eschews solipsism in favor of sublime elevation, creating an over-the-top drama that masterfully manages its own built-in excess. It is an abundant well of hidden gems that takes patience to fully explore but never feels like hard work. While other big pop albums of the year felt like feasting on scraps, this record is a sumptuous feast at which the characters at the table, some intoxicated on holy wine, flit between discussions about historical saints, the galvanizing feeling of heartbreaking sadness, and common gossip about hopeless men. In essence, it's a modern-day theatrical production from pop's most restlessly inventive visionary.