Lorde fans have been waiting for that green light for some time – its been just under four years now since the New Zealand artist released her second album ‘Melodrama’. Though the singer’s confirmed she’s working on the follow-up, it’s been hard to predict when it might arrive. Until now, that is!
Firstly, Lorde’s live return is official, with a key festival date – Primavera – confirmed for 2022. Plus the Kiwi artist has teased what looks like brand new music in 2021.
Lorde album three just became increasingly likely. Here’s everything we know about it so far.
When will we hear new Lorde music?
According to Lorde’s recently-updated website, fans won’t have to wait long to hear the first taster of her next era. “Arriving in 2021…” the text reads “patience is a virtue”. It’s accompanied by what appears to be the cover art for a new release called ‘Solar Power’, which shows the singer skipping across a fisheye beach.
Naturally, there’s speculation about exactly when ‘Solar Power’ might land. Conveniently, there’s a solar eclipse taking place on June 10 for parts of the Northern Hemisphere – and fans have pointed out that the new artwork shows Lorde obscuring the sun.
Then, on December 4, there’s another solar eclipse taking place over Antarctica – which would seem to fit in well with Lorde’s recent adventures and chilly influences (more on those later).
Either way, it’ll be here at some point in 2021 – aka. the year of our Lorde.
When is the new Lorde album going to be released?
Though Lorde’s yet to confirm a release date for her as-of-yet untitled third record, fans are hopeful that it’ll land before early June next year at the latest. They have good reason, too – the New Zealand artist has been announced as a headliner at Primavera 2022, and eagle-eyed fans have spotted the festival’s website teasing the prospect of an album before then. “Lorde… will emerge from her retirement with her third album after her unforgettable visit in 2018,” it reads. Tantalizing!
Lorde herself has been keeping things vague – last year, she told Blackbird Spyplane that the ongoing corona-virus pandemic has made it even more difficult than usual to pin down a rough release date. “I’m telling people that something is taking shape,” she said cryptically. “More than ‘taking shape’ – something is; there’s a thing. But, you know, I really take my time, and I like to know the whole universe, the whole cinematic universe for what I’m making, so I’m in that process right now. I don’t know how much more I want to say. It’s such a kooky year in terms of knowing anything about timing, but I guess with me, as an artist generally, no one ever knows when anything’s coming anyway…”
What’s the album title?
Well, according to Lorde, album three has been named since last year. She’s revealed that the inspiration for the album title came to her on a trip to Antarctica in 2019 – but wouldn’t share it. “I actually decided on the album name right around that trip,” she said, dangling a carrot. “Just coming back from that trip I thought: ‘This is what it is.’
The first single’s title appears to be ‘Solar Power’ based on recent teasers.
Now would be a good time to place your bets on ‘Penguin’, ‘South Pole’ or ‘Help (I’m Really Bloody Cold)’. For now, we’ll call it LP3.
When did Lorde start working on her third album?
Lorde told fans that her third album was “in the oven” back in June 2019, but it’s possible she’s been working on it for longer than that.
Towards the end of 2019, work on the album paused as Lorde updated fans again. In another newsletter, she explained that she was taking a break following the death of her dog, Pearl. “ I’m asking for your patience, as 2020 comes around and you start to wonder where the next record is,” she continued. “I have lost my boy, and I need some time to see the good again, to finish making this for you. It won’t be the same work — as anyone who has felt loss can understand, there’s a door that opens that you step through, and everything is different on the other side. But when this great loss crystallizes inside me, and my chest rebuilds around it, hopefully I’ll be able to finish up, and share it with you, and we’ll all grow together, as we always do.”
A year later, Lorde told fans that work on LP3 resumed after a month’s break. “I started going back to the studio in December, just for something to do, and to my surprise, good things came out,” she wrote in a surprise newsletter in May 2020. “Happy, playful things. I felt my melodic muscles flexing and strengthening.”
Who’s she working with?
‘Melodrama’’s main collaborator Jack Antonoff again, with work taking place in both Auckland and Los Angeles pre-pandemic. “Jack came over to work in the studio in Auckland, and I went to LA,” Lorde wrote in a newsletter. “It flowed. A thing started to take shape. And then, of course, the world shut down,” she added. “We’re still working away — Jack and I FaceTimed for over an hour this morning going over everything. But it’ll take a while longer.”
Malay has also been working with Lorde in some capacity, telling Reverb last year: “I’ve been heavily on the new Lorde project.“ The American producer, best known for his work with Frank Ocean on ‘Blonde’, produced three tracks on her last album ‘Melodrama’ after meeting her late in the process. This time, he said, “we actually started from zero together, which is really unique and fun. But like I said, she’s another one of those, like a Frank Ocean, where she has an insane vision, and she is not going to compromise whatsoever. So that’s why I said it could be some time, especially because of the pandemic, and she’s in New Zealand.”
What will it sound like?
In 2018, Lorde told fans about her creative explorations in a newsletter, and hinted at her early thoughts around the sound of album three. “I haven’t started properly on the next record yet, and I’m not sure how long it’ll be,” she wrote. “But I’ve been teaching myself how to play piano, and here and there little bits come out. I think this next one will probably be born around the piano in my house, me and my friends, keeping it simple… But know that for now I’m happy here at home, living quietly and simply, eating toast, going for walks, swimming. And you’ll hear all about it soon enough.” We’re still waiting!
Any other clues?
A trip to Antarctica in February 2019 has also inspired the Kiwi musician – she’s publishing photographs from the trip in her upcoming book Go South. It sounds like she had a lovely time, too: Lorde told Blackbird Spyplane that she was given an Antarctica-themed patch by a pilot on the flight there in exchange for singing ‘Royals’ over the headphone mic, and raved about Antarctica’s gift shop (who knew!) “It’s cool to have things from a place I can never go again,” she said. While there, Lorde camped on a giant ice shelf, sawed ice bricks and learned how to make fires.
“Antarctica really acted as this great white palette cleanser, a sort of celestial foyer I had to move through in order to start making the next thing,” she wrote in a newsletter confirming the book. “In the plane coming down to land, I had this very intense bolt-of-lightning thought, which in all its eloquence was literally: ‘DON’T MAKE SHIT RECORDS’”.
In recent months, Lorde has also revived @onionringsworldwide, her Instagram account where she reviews onion rings. A sign of things to come, or an indicator that she’s got more time on her hands because she’s finished the album? Only time will tell.
Is she touring?
Nothing’s been announced just yet – but given that Lorde has announced her first live show in two years, and it feels unlikely that Primavera 2022 will be a one-off.
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