At first glance, Lux might appear closer to an arduous scholarly challenge rather than the latest pop record by a musician whose previous hit featured a global K-pop icon. Broken into 4 separate movements and sung in 13 tongues, we have a breathtaking orchestral-influenced work that delves into female mystique, religious transcendence, and corporal change, frequently through the perspective of different female saints. The end of a romance—a topic handled with raw openness on another major 2025 album—soars heavenward here, buoyed by the lush sound of a full orchestra and work from a Pulitzer-winning composer among a vast list of collaborators. Its sheer audacity alone makes the efforts of other artists look rather laughable.
Rising Above Scholarly Pretense
That Lux succeeds in avoid overly intellectual chin-stroking feels nearly miraculous, with sole credit belonging to Rosalía. Although it's not the first time project to alchemize the past and the present, the stakes are much greater here, with the balancing act more precarious. What truly raises her fourth album, outside of its multilayered tunes, rich arrangements, and engrained drama, proves to be an essential spirit of playfulness. Similar to the iconic artist during her peak, there is a wondrous sense to Rosalía's voice that pulls the listener into its tornado. When she is tearing your heart apart, the listener nevertheless want to be alongside her through the journey.
A Signature Moment of Joy
That playful spirit comes forth brightly on the stunning Italian ballad inspired by a saint. It luxuriates in a sorrowful whirlpool over more than four minutes. Suddenly, everything falls away, and we hear a spontaneous laugh and a declaration prior to a comically exaggerated string crescendo thuds down with cartoonish force. The song then segues into the wild track driven by galloping strings, an imposing choir, and a surprise role from none other than Björk.
"The charm with this album is that the listener rarely exactly know—nor wish to know—what it will go to next."
Nearly each song ends in a completely different place from where it started. A track examines the fleeting nature of fame over a featherlight orchestration only to disintegrating in electronic chaos. Elsewhere, a cut echoing the artist's earlier trap-infused style begins off dark and brooding, featuring menacing beats, until fluttering traditional handclaps and an angelic chorus arrive to soften its rough edges.
The Bridge Between Art and Accessibility
A key achievement of the album involves straddling the line of radical innovation and broad accessibility. This is little coincidence that the album has achieved her highest-charting work to break into the upper reaches of major charts: at its core a collection of utterly catchy hits. A song sung entirely in English builds around a refrain that feels to gather more and more nagging melodies while it spins upward. This feat gets echoed by another expansive track that grows and contracts, weaving layered melodies like an intricate weave.
- A waltz-like number seduces with its jaunty, Disney-adjacent drama and an anthemic hook.
- In its words, it shares with pop culture honesty of other breakup songs, eviscerating a former partner described as an "psychological terrorist".
- Throughout these tracks, the vocals have a sharp edge, akin to a fairy-tale character hiding a blade: "Top prize in being a motherfucker / You have the podium of disappointment."
A Maximalist Banquet for the Ears
This album is popular music on a maximalist scale, an ambitious grasp for capital-A artistry in an era of looming artificial sameness. It eschews solipsism for sublime elevation, crafting a dramatic spectacle that skillfully controls its inherent ridiculousness. This is an abundant source of buried treasure that takes patience to completely mine but doesn't seem like a chore. Where some big releases of the year seemed like feasting on meal, this record offers a sumptuous feast at which the characters around the table, some intoxicated on holy wine, flutter between conversations about historical figures, the galvanizing sensation of heartbreaking grief, and common stories about hopeless men. It is a contemporary musical from pop's most endlessly creative practitioner.
