Melodrama effortlessly captures the specific nuances of love in the Instagram generation. Lorde harpoons the way that our second life, the online one, can be a mask to hide the pain Even timelessness needs regular rewrites, to be couched in the idiosyncrasies of its era. The crude lyrical parallels are all there: see Dylan’s “Laying in bed, wondering if she’d changed at all, if her hair was still red” vs Lorde’s “When you see me, will you say I’ve changed?” But more than these overt similarities, both albums are timeless portraits of love in their time. It is the Gen Z equivalent of Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks, or other iconic break-up albums. It plunges the listener into its electropop limbo of dark highways, deafening nightclubs and strangers’ bedrooms. She defied patriarchal prescriptions on the risks she should take, and in doing so, sailed right over them. But in the minefield of music industry misogyny, Lorde is a hovercraft. Lorde’s out-of-left-field dive from Pure Heroine’s indie treatment of youth culture to the navel-gazing agony of a personal loss, presented the perfect opportunity for the male critical pen to start scribbling vitriol. You don’t have to look far to find reviews of women by men, describing their heartbreak songs as “melodramatic” – the male gaze eye-rolls at women’s emotions. With Melodrama, Lorde was taking a risk – and, self-aware as ever, she nods to it in the very title.
She boycotted the Grammys stage after the recording academy snubbed her by asking her to perform a cover as part of a group tribute to Tom Petty – because all her fellow male Album of the Year nominees were invited to perform songs from their albums. Lorde herself is all too aware of the male ear wiggling in her direction. Melodrama, Lorde was taking a risk – and, self-aware as ever, she nods to it in the very title
Her analysis is still relevant, stretching across the chasm of genre and time to today’s pop. When Helen Davies wrote in 2001 that the rock music press constructs credibility in a way that is impossible for women to attain, the male ear must have been burning. There’s no safe path through the minefield. Rather, they reveal one simple unifying principle: whatever women do, they are torn apart. The contrasting experiences of these two women don’t contradict one another.
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In 2016, she expressed fury in an open letter about sexism in music criticism, saying she only felt accepted by the media when she “shared a heartbreak” and that artistically, women are only allowed to “bleed about the men” in their lives.ījörk’s account jars when you consider the treatment of Taylor Swift by the media – a viral Buzzfeed diatribe was only one of dozens of hit pieces determined to characterise Swift as a professional victim for daring to write about her break-ups. Was there any way Lorde could have taken a step forward without putting a foot wrong?Įven Björk, a seasoned artist whose career is founded on defying expectations, feels gendered critical standards stacking against her. Step on the wrong note, and you’re done for.Īs i-D wrote about Lorde and the myth of the female wunderkind in 2017, the music industry assigns value to women according to their age, so being a female teen talent feels booby-trapped. The musical refinement and lyrical depth of the album landed Lorde with the loaded handle of child prodigy – a mantle which, if you’re a woman, is landmined with misogyny. Pure Heroine, Lorde’s debut, catapulted 16-year-old Ella Yelich-O’Connor to international superstardom. Melodrama was born the younger sister of an obnoxious over-achiever. Apart from achieving universal critical acclaim, having been named one of the albums of 2017 by virtually every major music publication, the immersive electropop masterpiece defied expectation and is set to be Gen Z’s break-up album of note. Ordinarily, a retrospective would be premature, but Melodrama already merits one. It is precisely one year since the release of Lorde’s second album, Melodrama.
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