Well-worth the four-year wait since her gloriously moody debut, Lorde’s sophomore success Melodrama continues to prove her mettle as one of today’s most important pop stars.

In 2013, 17-year-old Lorde confessed on ‘Team’ that she was “kind of over getting told to throw her hands up in the air” – an unabashed scoff at party emphases that heavily littered the charts. Had the song been in any way lacklustre, her profound dissonance to the mainstream might have easily backfired on the Kiwi teen. But ‘Team’, along with the #1 hit ‘Royals’, were pure pop gems, both instrumental for her emergence as a serious force in the industry, with the latter even scoring her two Grammy wins in 2014. On top of her musical dominance, her goth-influenced style, eccentric dance moves and enigmatic persona ironically made her the unintentional and alternative ‘cool kid’ – a running label she commented on throughout her debut album Pure Heroine.

Years later, Lorde has made her graceful, yet steady return to the pop landscape she once conquered, picking up where she left it off with the relentless ‘Green Light’. “She thinks you love the beach, you’re such a damn liar”, she snarls about an ex-lover on the album opener. It’s crystal clear that previous uncertainties that come with being a teenager are long gone, instead replaced with a reinforced self-assuredness expressed by a young woman on the brink of adulthood. Attribute the personal growth to the possible guidance through fame via her friendship with Taylor Swift, or the mastery production of Bleachers-frontman Jack Antonoff, but every vocal delivery and heartfelt lyric is undeniably, uniquely Lorde.

Other than the by-now-familiar key change in ‘Green Light’, there’s starkly delightful surprises to be found at every corner of Melodrama elsewhere. From the spoken word chorus of ‘The Louvre’ to the trumpets on ‘Sober’, Lorde details every single moment of the album with careful precision to make them work seamlessly. “I’ll be your quiet afternoon crush, be your violent overnight rush”, she fearlessly sings on the album’s chirpiest tune ‘Supercut’, over a piano hook and scattering, electronic beats that would make eve Swedish pop-maestro Robyn envious. 

Navigating through heartbreak, scorn and then self-discovery, it’s by the time the closing track rolls around that Melodrama comes full circle; where Lorde embraces acceptance on ‘Perfect Places’. “What the f— are perfect places, anyway?”, she rhetorically shrugs – questioning the very state of yearning she had put herself through in the album’s previous tracks, alongside playing observant to the similar tribulations youths face.

It’s rare to witness young artists not only match the success of their debut, but best it as well – and as far as this album goes, Lorde takes the sound of its predecessor and moulds it into near-perfection. Once guarded and awkward in public appearances, Melodrama is a heroic way for Lorde to re-introduce audiences to the evolved artistry she’s honing (and perfecting) today, which should easily make this a contender for Album Of The Year.

Melodrama is available for purchase or streaming now.

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