Initially, this album may look more like a challenging scholarly challenge than the latest popular music project from an artist who just had a previous single was a collaboration with an international pop icon. Split across 4 distinct parts and performed in 13 tongues, we have a dizzying classical-tinged opus exploring feminine mystique, religious transcendence, and corporal transformation, frequently by way of the perspective of various female saints. The end of a love affair—a theme treated with raw openness on another major 2025 album—is shot skyward on this record, buoyed by the constant sound of a full orchestra and work from an award-winning composer among an extensive list of collaborators. Its sheer ambition alone makes the work of contemporary artists appear rather small.
Rising Above Academic Exercise
That this album manages to transcend dry academic chin-stroking feels nearly a miracle, with full credit belonging to Rosalía. Although it's not the first time album to alchemize the past and modern styles, the ambitions feel much greater on Lux, with the tightrope walk far more dramatic. What really raises her fourth release, beyond its multilayered melodies, rich arrangements, and inherent drama, is a core sense of joy. Much like the iconic Björk during her height, you find a wondrous sense to the vocalist's voice which sweeps the listener into its tornado. Even when she's breaking your heart in two, you nevertheless want to be right there for the journey.
A Prime Example of Joy
That playful energy shines clearly during the stirring piano-led ballad about a saint. It bathes in a string-drenched melancholy over several moments. Suddenly, everything drops away, to reveal there's a spontaneous laugh followed by a declaration before a hilariously exaggerated orchestral crescendo thuds down like comedic impact. The track then segues into the wild single featuring galloping orchestration, a powerful choir, and a cameo role from none other than Björk.
"The charm with Lux is that you never quite know—nor want to know—where it will go to next."
Almost every song ends in a completely distinct place from how it started. One moment explores the fleeting nature of celebrity over a featherlight orchestration only to disintegrating into electronic chaos. Elsewhere, a song echoing her previous rhythmic work begins out moody and brooding, featuring menacing beats, until fluttering flamenco handclaps and an angelic chorus arrive to soften its jagged corners.
The Bridge Between Art and Pop
A key balancing act of the album involves straddling the line of radical innovation and mainstream accessibility. This is little coincidence that it has achieved her first release to crack the upper reaches of key markets: at its core a collection of utterly undeniable pop songs. A song sung primarily in English swells around a refrain that seems to gather more and more infectious hooks as it spirals skyward. This feat gets echoed on another expansive ballad that expands and constricts, intertwining multiple melodies as a complex weave.
- A waltz-like song seduces with its playful, Disney-adjacent flair and an anthemic hook.
- In its words, it shares the pop culture impact of other heartbreak anthems, lambasting an ex- partner described as an "psychological bully".
- Throughout these tracks, the singing have a painted-on edge, like a fairy-tale character concealing a blade: "Gold medal in being a scoundrel / You've the podium of letdown."
A Maximalist Banquet for the Soul
This album represents popular music on a maximalist scale, an ambitious reach for capital-A Art amid of impending AI-generated blankness. It rejects self-absorption in favor of sublime elevation, creating a dramatic spectacle that skillfully manages its own inherent ridiculousness. This is a deep source of hidden treasure that requires patience to completely explore but doesn't seem like a chore. While some big pop albums of the year felt like a meager scraps, this record offers a sumptuous banquet where the guests around the table, perhaps intoxicated on holy drink, flutter between conversations about ancient figures, the galvanizing sensation of heartbreaking sadness, and common stories about useless men. In essence, it's a contemporary musical from music's truly endlessly inventive visionary.
