Initially, Lux may look more like a challenging university challenge rather than a new popular music project by a musician who just had a previous hit featured an international K-pop star. Divided across four different parts and voiced in thirteen languages, this is a breathtaking orchestral-influenced work that delves into feminine mystique, religious ascent, and physical transformation, frequently through the prism of various saintly figures. The dissolution of a romance—a topic handled with grounded honesty elsewhere—is launched skyward here, supported by the constant presence of a major orchestra and work from an award-winning songwriter among an extensive list of collaborators. The pure audacity alone renders the efforts of other artists look rather modest.
Rising Above Scholarly Pretense
That Lux succeeds in escape dry intellectual posturing is nearly a miracle, with sole credit going to the artist. While this is not the first time project to blend the past and the present, its scale feel far greater on Lux, and the tightrope walk more dramatic. The element that really raises this fourth release, beyond its multilayered melodies, dense arrangements, and engrained theatricality, is a core sense of fun. Similar to the iconic Björk during her peak, you find a wondrous quality to Rosalía's voice which sweeps the listener into its whirlwind. Even when she's tearing hearts in two, you nevertheless want to stay right there for the journey.
A Signature Moment of Exuberance
That playful spirit shines clearly during a stirring piano-led song inspired by Saint Clare. It bathes in a string-drenched melancholy for more than four minutes. Suddenly, all the music drops away, and there's a spontaneous laugh followed by a declaration before a hilariously exaggerated orchestral crescendo crashes in with cartoonish impact. The track then segues to the wild single featuring galloping strings, an imposing choral group, and a surprise role from none other than herself.
"The magic of Lux is that you rarely quite know—nor wish to know—what it is going next."
Almost every song concludes in a completely different point from where it started. One moment explores the fleeting nature of fame over a featherlight symphony only to disintegrating in electronic cacophony. Elsewhere, a song that recalls the artist's earlier trap-infused work begins off dark and sinister, with menacing vocals, until fluttering traditional handclaps and a heavenly choir arrive to soften the song's rough edges.
The Bridge Of Experiment & Accessibility
A key achievement of the album is navigating the line between radical experimentation and mainstream accessibility. It is no coincidence that the album has achieved the artist's first work to crack the Top 5 of key markets: its heart contains a collection of truly undeniable pop songs. One track performed primarily in English swells on a chorus that feels to gather increasingly infectious melodies while it spirals upward. This feat is echoed on a different expansive ballad that expands and contracts, intertwining layered tunes like a complex tapestry.
- A waltz-like song seduces with its playful, theatrical flair and a chant-along chorus.
- In its words, it aligns with pop culture honesty of contemporary breakup anthems, lambasting a former lover described as an "emotional bully".
- Throughout these tracks, the singing have a painted-on smile, like a storybook figure concealing a knife: "Top prize in being a scoundrel / You have the podium of disappointment."
A Maximalist Feast for the Ears
This album is popular music on a grand scale, a hungry grasp for high Art in an era of impending artificial blankness. It eschews solipsism in favor of glorious transcendence, creating a dramatic drama that masterfully controls its built-in ridiculousness. It is a deep source of buried treasure that requires time to completely explore but never seem like a chore. Where some big releases of the year felt like feasting on meal, this record is a lavish banquet where the guests around it, perhaps intoxicated on holy drink, flutter between conversations about ancient figures, the profound sensation of soul-shattering grief, and common stories about useless men. It is a contemporary musical from music's truly endlessly inventive visionary.
