An Offbeat by CFUV review
Photo via Universal Music Group.
Virgin invites listeners to Lorde’s most unfiltered album yet — one brimming with brutal truths, sexual confession, and emotional demolition. Although the project never quite offers complete catharsis, the profoundness of her work leaves you both dazed and strangely seen.
From MDMA to ego death, from pregnancy scares to riveting ovulations, there is no shortage of ear-perking lyrics and biting imagery scattered throughout Virgin. Even the album cover, a photograph — taken by Heji Shin –– of a pelvic X-ray displaying an IUD, is a blistering reminder of the artist’s defiant self-expression. Lorde’s fourth studio album leans into discomfort as both a creative tool and a personal reckoning as it engages with conflict headfirst, allowing for the emergence of themes such as the fear of intimacy, making remorseful choices, and gaining a fluid understanding of gender. All of this comes together to result in a chaotic — yet liberating — portrait of transformation.
Presenting itself as an ode to bodily fluids, discomfort, and the nitty-gritty dirty revelations of being in your mid-20s, Lorde’s Virgin is both a departure from her recent work (lyrically and sonically) and a return to form in her astute ability to resonate with her audience. Upon first listen, Virgin plays out like a hazy late-night talk with an old acquaintance or a new friend — one who tends to overshare, descends into grotesque territory, and dumps personal epiphanies that are both haunting, yet somehow thought-provoking. You’re slightly startled by the stark lyrics and raw, mechanical sounds of the album, but once you adjust to the bluntness and candour of your quirky over-sharing acquaintance, the real beauty is unveiled: chaotic revelations, emotional twists, and soul-striking discoveries about acceptance.
Moments like these unfold on tracks like “Current Affairs,” which feature lines like, “You tasted my underwear … He spit in my mouth like / He’s sayin’ a prayer” or “If I’d had virginity, I would have given that too” on the album’s final track, “David.” As the title of the album cleverly implies, Lorde is reborn here, and claims all aspects of herself — her body, her image, and a romantic carnage that captures both the destructive and uplifting emotions of maturing.
Departing from her Melodrama and Solar Power collaborator Jack Antonoff (known for his collaborations with Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey, and Sabrina Carpenter), Lorde opted to co-produce with electronic DJ Jim-E Stack, who has previously produced records with Charli xcx, Dominic Fike, and Bon Iver, to generate a grimier, throbbing, and surrealist soundscape. On Virgin, she strays from the poetic, universally human lyrics and hard-hitting ballads we’ve come to expect from her. Instead, she resorts to a blunt delivery and straightforward approach to obscure topics, causing her sentiments to take the spotlight. Lorde tackles her departure from femininity and begets more questions of womanhood, exemplified on the opening track, “Hammer,” where she boldly states that “Some days I’m a woman / Some days I’m a man.” On “Man of the Year,” she meticulously unpackages her inner turmoil when she reveals that (her) “babe can’t believe I’ve become someone else / Someone more like myself / Who’s gon’ love me like this?” and ruminates on her romantic future, asking, “Am I ever gonna love again?” on the final track, “David.”
Following her critically weak psychedelic sabbatical that was Solar Power, Lorde returns to her wretched, self-conscious, and emotional sound. Virgin’s rawness may prove some skeptics wrong, but if one dares to compare it to the tour-de-force and culturally impactful bodies of work that Lorde provided with Melodrama and Pure Heroine, they may find that Virgin rides on the cusp of not reaching its fullest potential. It’s as though each song’s climax is cut short, or that there’s an unidentifiable quality missing in each track, leaving listeners craving the full, revelatory explosion they’ve grown to expect from her.
At its core, Virgin is Lorde in full transparency, and she doesn’t care if that’s a negative or positive thing. It’s an album about transformation, the journey to feeling comfortable in your skin, the pressure that comes from being famous for so long, and the timeless question one poses in the mirror — am I worthy of love?
By the album’s conclusion, when your new friend Virgin is done speaking, you’re enamoured. You then discover, through the bizarre turns and poignant reflections, that you may have never perceived things the way she did (nor have been able to phrase them quite the same way) — and perhaps that is the beauty and lingering impact of that hazy late-night talk.
In the end, Lorde may not have all the answers or have solved any problems for her audience, but she arrives at a destination somewhere between hope for the future and embracing what life has thrown at you.
