Lorde's Virgin Gets 7.6 From Pitchfork

[RAMROD 109,217]

Lorde’s fourth album returns to the digital, physical sound of Melodrama. While rooted somewhat in her past, it’s a gritty, tender, and often transcendent ode to freedom and transformation.

For her last album, 2021’s Solar Power, Lorde took an extended beachside sabbatical, channeling her retreat into psychedelic, somewhat stifled acoustic pop that felt out of place and time. Afterward, four years ago now, she plugged back in and bought an apartment in Manhattan. She befriended artists and read a lot of books; she went through a breakup, came to terms with an eating disorder, and began to inhabit a more fluid understanding of her gender.

This broad set of circumstances—moving to and finding oneself in the city—has precipitated so much art that it almost feels too obvious to bother pointing out. But some make the familiar story revelatory. I think of Nan Goldin, whose Ballad of Sexual Dependency is a vital record of queer downtown New York in the 1980s. Her photos—flash-lit, unsentimental images of tangled lovers and friends—are lodged in my head as I listen to Virgin, Lorde’s gritty, tender, and often transcendent ode to freedom and transformation.

It’s long been her writing that telegraphs Lorde’s capital-A artistry. Where someone like Charli XCXis keen to move culture, and Addison Rae is keen to put on a good show, Lorde is happy to sweat it out in the Notes app. The music’s job, it seems here, is mostly to not get in her way. “Shapeshifter” is a high mark, a lovely bit of text painting that starts with a skeletal garage beat, shaded in gradually until it hits you with a full bleed of color. This song moves; it mirrors the state of constant flux that Lorde is singing about. Virgin could stand to have more of that synergy—production touches that are as freaky and unpredictable as the person at their center. Instead, there’s the glitchy vocal fragments and oddball samples that we’ve heard before. There’s so much negative space, it feels almost like a tease, because it implies everything that could fill it.

But that ecstatic sense of possibility—of being many things at once, of following your impulses in all directions, all the time—is the animating force of Virgin. Some would be cowed by the enormity of the prospect. Not Lorde: “I swim in waters that would drown so many other bitches,” she crows on “If She Could See Me Now.” It’s not hard to see why she’s drawn to another stop on the Lorde tour of New York: Walter De Maria’s Earth Room (1977), a Soho loft filled with nothing but 250 cubic yards of dirt. Lorde recreated it in her video for “Man of the Year,” where she binds her chest with duct tape and thrashes about in the soil, tapped into some elemental lifeforce. The original installation has been there for nearly 50 years; nothing grows. The whole thing is pregnant with possibility, blissfully abstract, ripe for interpretation. It feels like a portal to anywhere you want to go.

 

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/lorde-virgin/

[ALGAYDO 32,411]

Deserves at least an 8 but whatever, I’ll take it 

Edited June 28 by ALGAYDO

[clownery 6,302]

I think it's a fair score, a really good album imo but not as good as Melodrama or Pure Heroine 

[alsemanche 93,395]

1 hour ago, ALGAYDO said:

Deserves at least an 8 but whatever, I’ll take it 

They gave melodrama at 8.8 and PH 7.3 so didn't really expect them to go higher but yeah definitely deserved more (and so did the other albums)

[banjosnap 352]

OK but music critics are pretend. There can be food critics, for example, as there is a correct and incorrect way to prepare food. However, there is no incorrect way to make music. It's such a vast, infinite universe of sounds & combinations paired with limitless emotional projection that being a "music critic" and giving a ranking out of 10 is, undoubtedly, absurd. 

A music critics would need to study the roots, the process, the intention of that piece, but would also need to be an expert in poetry, composition, production & storytelling.

They are none of those.

They're just.. random men.

[Battle 4 Ur Life 6,698]

that’s the least they could rate it. I love at first listen. best since Melodrama. it’s AOTY material.

[FfFfFfFF 55,680]

The concept of @Addison Rae being more critically acclaimed than Lorde 😍💪

[MingersPrayer 581]

Enjoying the record a lot. Definitely not an immediate hit for me but a few listens in and I’m getting it more and more 

[Addison Rae 16,582]

11 minutes ago, FfFfFfFF said:

The concept of @Addison Rae being more critically acclaimed than Lorde 😍💪

not everyone can be goddison 

[culturalbaptism 2,918]

Deserved a 9.

[clownery 6,302]

Current Affairs will probably be the next single and maybe one of the best songs I've heard this year 

[Ziggy 11,747]

2 hours ago, banjosnap said:

OK but music critics are pretend. There can be food critics, for example, as there is a correct and incorrect way to prepare food. However, there is no incorrect way to make music. It's such a vast, infinite universe of sounds & combinations paired with limitless emotional projection that being a "music critic" and giving a ranking out of 10 is, undoubtedly, absurd. 

A music critics would need to study the roots, the process, the intention of that piece, but would also need to be an expert in poetry, composition, production & storytelling.

They are none of those.

They're just.. random men.

What?  they usually have a pretty deep knowledge, understanding and education of music. Yall get so bent out of shape for even a GOOD review

[Ziggy 11,747]

Completely apt review. It’s good, but is a little stuck in the past at times. My biggest thing actually is I wish the physical sound felt more physical. Like man of the year and hammer kinda have that but a lot of the album’s mix doesn’t feel particularly punchy or crisp or stark. Not particularly anything. Great sound choices for what ultimately doesn’t get to REALLY shine bc they’re made to feel a bit too palatable and equal in the mix. I feel like for this album she needed to go there as she did with a lot of melodrama where the sounds you could often FEEL like homemade dynamite’s second half. So it’s good but feels a bit palatable in that it approached being the ugly rawness but shied away last second 

[banjosnap 352]

29 minutes ago, Ziggy said:

What?  they usually have a pretty deep knowledge, understanding and education of music. Yall get so bent out of shape for even a GOOD review

I dont have any interest in lorde or her music. These "critics" may have some knowledge but what they also have is human flaws & preferences. They do not have the time or effort to properly research the subject matter... otherwise all critic scores would be the exact same.

A critic is just a spectator with a louder voice.

[salty like sodium 1,816]

4 hours ago, banjosnap said:

there is no incorrect way to make music

143 would like to challenge this notion

but agreed, most critics are frauds who have no idea what good music would be if it hit them in the face.