At first glance, this album might appear closer to a challenging university quiz than a new popular music project from a musician whose last single was a collaboration with a global pop icon. Broken into 4 separate sections and sung in thirteen tongues, we have a head-spinning classical-tinged album that delves into feminine mystery, spiritual ascent, and bodily change, frequently via the perspective of different saintly figures. The dissolution of a romance—a theme treated with grounded honesty on another major 2025 album—is launched heavenward on this record, carried by the lush sound of a major symphony orchestra and input from an award-winning composer among a long roll call of contributors. Its sheer audacity by itself renders the efforts of other artists seem quite small.
Rising Above Academic Exercise
The fact that this album succeeds in escape overly academic posturing feels almost miraculous, and full credit going to Rosalía. While this is not the first time project to fuse the past and the present, the ambitions feel much greater here, with the tightrope walk more pronounced. The element that truly raises this fourth release, beyond its multilayered tunes, rich compositions, and inherent drama, is a core sense of joy. Much like the legendary artist during her peak, there is a wondrous quality to Rosalía's voice which sweeps the listener into its whirlwind. When she's tearing your heart apart, you nevertheless want to stay alongside her for the ride.
A Signature Example of Joy
This exuberant energy shines clearly during a stunning Italian ballad inspired by a saint. It bathes in a string-drenched melancholy over several moments. Then, all the music falls silent, to reveal we hear a spontaneous giggle and a comment prior to a comically exaggerated orchestral surge thuds in like cartoonish force. The track immediately shifts into the frenetic single driven by galloping strings, an imposing choir, and a surprise appearance from the artist herself.
"The charm of Lux lies in you rarely quite understand—nor wish to know—where it is going next."
Almost each track finishes in a completely different point from how it started. A track explores the transient nature of celebrity with a featherlight symphony only to disintegrating in digital chaos. Elsewhere, a cut that recalls the artist's earlier trap-infused style begins off dark and brooding, featuring menacing beats, before fluttering flamenco rhythms and an angelic chorus enter to soften the song's jagged corners.
The Bridge Between Art and Pop
A key achievement of the album is navigating the line between radical innovation and broad appeal. This is little coincidence that the album has become the artist's first release to crack the upper reaches of key markets: at its core a collection of utterly undeniable hits. A song sung entirely in English swells around a refrain that feels to gather increasingly infectious hooks while it spirals skyward. This feat gets repeated by another expansive ballad that expands and constricts, intertwining multiple tunes like an intricate weave.
- A waltz-like song charms via its jaunty, Disney-adjacent drama and an anthemic hook.
- In its words, it aligns the cultural honesty of other breakup anthems, lambasting a former lover labeled an "emotional bully".
- Across these tracks, the singing carry a painted-on smile, like a fairy-tale character concealing a blade: "Top prize in being a scoundrel / You've the podium of letdown."
A Maximalist Banquet for the Soul
This album represents pop on a grand scale, an ambitious grasp for capital-A Art amid of impending artificial sameness. It rejects self-absorption in favor of sublime elevation, crafting a dramatic drama that masterfully controls its own built-in excess. This is an abundant source of buried treasure that takes time to completely explore but never seem like a chore. Where some major pop albums of the year felt like a meager meal, Lux offers a sumptuous banquet where the guests around the table, perhaps tipsy on holy wine, flit from discussions about ancient saints, the galvanizing feeling of soul-shattering sadness, and shared stories about hopeless men. In essence, it's a modern-day theatrical production from music's most endlessly inventive visionary.
