Lorde has officially released her nostalgic and hazy comeback single, ‘What Was That’ – listen to it below.
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Today (April 24), the New Zealand-born pop star released ‘What Was That’, her first new solo release in four years. The cathartic track sees Lorde reflecting on a years-long courtship: “Oh, I’m missing you / Yeah, I’m missing you / And all the things we used to do / MDMA in the back garden, blow our pupils up / We kissed for hours straight, well baby, what was that?”
She continues: “I didn’t know then that you’d never be enough for me / Since I was seventeen, I gave you everything / Now we wake from a dream, well baby, what was that?”
Listen to the track below.
Lorde’s evocative vocals are set to a spare bassline, light percussion and gently pulsing synth that build as she slowly comes to terms with moving on as she sings towards the end of the track: “When I’m in the blue light, I can make it alright / What was that?”
Both thematically and sonically, ‘What Was That’ harkens back to the hazy narrative she conjured up on her critically acclaimed 2017 sophomore album ‘Melodrama’.
‘What Was That’ marks the first release from what is expected to be an upcoming album. It was first announced last week (April 16) and comes after she previewed the song for fans at Washington Square Park in New York yesterday after police had previously shut down a pop-up gathering.
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She began hinting at new material at the end of last year, wiping her social media accounts and leading to fans believing that a new chapter was on the way.
Most recently, she shared a voice note with her fans, teasing a new era after making a surprise appearance at Coachella during Charli XCX’s set: “I just wanted to say hi because everything is about to change. These are really the last moments where it’s just us, which is crazy. It’s so right. I’m so ready. I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to say that, but I am. I’m so thankful for your patience. I’ve felt your love, I’ve felt you right there. This is going to be crazy, you have no idea.”
The ‘Ribs’ artist has released a new album every four years, beginning with 2013’s ‘Pure Heroine’, 2017’s ‘Melodrama’, and most recently, 2021’s ‘Solar Power’.
