Dua Lipa's Future Nostalgia Is A Feminist, Disco-Fueled Ride: Listen

"Sophomore slump" isn't even in Dua Lipa's vocabulary. On Friday (March 27), the Brit pop star delivered her second album, Future Nostalgia, and it's brimming with disco-pop gems to cut loose to while in our long isolation.


Ever since winning the Grammy for Best New Artist last year — something once imagined a "curse" — Lipa has kept her foot firmly on the gas. Future Nostalgia includes all of the lead-up singles we already know and love: the chart smash "Don't Begin Now," the '80s throwback "Physical," the quirky title track, and this week's "Break My Heart." The rest of the album maintains that high common with retro-futuristic tracks recalling each person from Madonna and Debbie Harry to Prince and Chic.


Among the highlights are the roller disco bop "Levitating" and the clubby floor-filler "Hallucinate." Elsewhere, she streams Lily Allen on "Good in Bed," scores a Tove Lo co-write on the thumping synth ballad "Cool," and slows it down for the seductive "Pretty Please." There's even room for some social commentary — the self-described "female alpha," as Lipa deems herself on the title track, handily dismantles the patriarchy on men Will Be Gentlemen Right after making that observation, the 24-year-old cooly adds, yet females will be women."


In the past week, things were looking pretty bleak for pop music fans right after artists like Lady Gaga and Haim postponed their albums due to growing concerns over the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. So whenever Lipa reported that Future Nostalgia was not only still on track for release, nevertheless could be arriving a week early — soon after online leaks and as the thing we need now is joy" — it was definitely cause for celebration. Right now that the whole project is here, well, the party has only begun.


Get willing to dance and then hit play on Future Nostalgia below.