It’s been a long four years, everyone, but now it’s time to chilllllll. We finally got a new Lorde album to soak in like sunbeams. Solar Power isn’t the bombastic Melodrama or the angsty Pure Heroine; it’s straight-up vibes — cucumber bongs and all. It’s an album that Lorde sees as “sexy, playful, feral, and free” and “vibrating at the highest level when summer comes around.” Perfect for our last few precious weeks of summer. But with all the talk of Solar Power’s carefree attitude, it wouldn’t be Lorde without a bit of existentialism, snarky fun, and ripped-straight-out-of-the-diary lyrics. So below, we looked at all the cheekiest moments from Solar Power that made us go, Oh!
“The Path”
“Now if you’re looking for a savior / Well, that’s not me / You need someone to take your pain for you? / Well, that’s not me.”
Lorde really started with a punch. With a moniker and lyrics like hers, it’s easy to fall into the trap of using her music as gospel, but she’s here to reset the record.
“’Cause we are all broken and sad / Where are the dreams that we had? / Let’s hope the sun will show us the path.”
Broken AND sad! Well, yes, we are. Thanks for the reminder, ma’am.
“Solar Power”
“Come one, come all / I’ll tell you my secrets / I’m kinda like a prettier Jesus.”
A lyric that will go down in the history books. Rumors have it the Disciples are rewriting the Holy Scripture as we speak.
“Come on and let the bliss begin / Blink three times when you feel it kickin’ in / That solar power.”
We’ll have whatever she’s having. Damn.
“California”
“Once upon a time in Hollywood when Carole called my name / I stood up, the room exploded, and I knew that’s it / I’ll never be the same.”
Lorde is recalling her 2014 Grammy win for “Royals,” which Carole King presented, that helped launch her to new heights of celebrity. But with the rush of excitement comes a deep well of newfound anxiety.
“And I’d pay it all again to have your golden body back in my bed / But I don’t miss the poison arrows aimed directly at my head.”
When you find out Hollywood isn’t all sunshine and dreams.
“Stoned at the Nail Salon”
“’Cause all the music you loved at 16, you’ll grow out of / And all the times, they will change, it’ll all come around / I don’t know / Maybe I’m just / Maybe I’m just stoned at the nail salon again.”
It’s just kind of unbelievable that she doesn’t think “Ribs” still lives rent free in our heads.
“Fallen Fruit”
“To the ones who came before us / All the golden ones who were lifted on a wing / We had no idea that the dreams we had were far too big.”
“But how can I love what I know I am gonna lose?”
Solar Power was never meant to be a crusade on climate change, but “Fallen Fruit” does lament the fact that our world is literally on fire.
“Secrets From a Girl (Who’s Seen It All)”
“Dancing with my girls, only having two drinks, then leaving.”
Well, now Lorde is just describing our ideal night out.
“’Member all the hurt you would feel when you weren’t desired? / ’Member what you thought was grief before you got the call? / Baby girl, no one’s gonna feel the pain for you / You’re gonna love again, so just try staying open.”
The lyrics from “Secrets From a Girl” are a whole lot like Solar Power Lorde doling out sage comfort to Pure Heroine Lorde. A girl once full of pain, heartbreak, and anxiety is now older and a bit wiser and has probably discovered therapy.
“Your emotional baggage can be picked up at Carousel No. 2 / Please be careful so that it doesn’t fall onto someone you love.”
Some more free mentoring, coming in the form of Robyn’s spoken word.
“The Man With the Axe”
“But you with your doll’s lashes, your infinite T-shirts / I should’ve known when your favorite record was the same as my father’s you’d take me down.”
Rumors swirled that Lorde was dating Justin Warren, a music-promotions director who is 17 years her senior, and “The Man With the Axe” seems to at least hint that it could be him. She describes him with “silver hair,” “infinite T-shirts” (just look at the Oasis shirt), and being old enough to like the same records as her father.
“I loved you, the boy with the plan.”
“You felled me clean as a pine / The man with the axe.”
Sigh, when “boy with the plan” turns into “man with the axe,” it really can be like that. Let us guess, he’s a Virgo?
“Dominoes”
“It’s strange to see you smoking marijuana / You used to do the most cocaine / Of anyone I’d ever met.”
As Lorde told Apple Music, “We all know that guy,” and sometimes you just gotta knock a man down a peg. It’s retribution.
“You get 50 gleaming chances in a row / And I watch you flick them down like dominoes / Must feel good being Mr. Start Again.”
Oof, clown behavior!
“Big Star”
“Baby, you’re a big star / You’re a big star / Want to take your picture / Till I die.”
A tribute to her dog, Pearl, whose passing in 2019 had Lorde put a pause on the whole album process. “Big Star” has layered references, from a direct nod to the band Big Star to the giddy feeling of seeing someone you love, but in the end, the biggest influence on “Big Star” is just how much Lorde loved Pearl, wanting to capture every moment she had with him. In a newsletter to fans, she wrote, “Pearl brought an immeasurable amount of joy and purpose into my world. Love vibrated all around us.”
“Leader of a New Regime”
“Wearing SPF 3,000”
Okay, same.
“Won’t somebody, anybody / Be the leader of a new regime? / Free the keepers of the burnt-out scene.”
Again, Lorde said, I’m tired.
“Mood Ring”
“I’m tryna blow bubbles but inside / Can’t seem to fix my mood / Today it’s as dark as my roots.”
Going to use “Today it’s as dark as my roots” as the answer to every “How’s the weather?” question we get.
“I can’t feel a thing / I keep looking at my mood ring / Tell me how I’m feeling.”
Lorde didn’t write a pandemic album, and hell, this is supposed to be a satirical song, but after a year of gloom, this is the mood!
“Oceanic Feeling”
“Now the cherry-black lipstick’s gathering dust in a drawer / I don’t need her anymore / ’Cause I got this power / Just had to breathe and tune in.”
Meanwhile, TikTok is obsessed with the damn deep-colored berry lipstick that Liv Tyler wears in The Lord of the Rings!
“I know you’ll show me how, I’ll know when it’s time / To take off my robes and step into the choir.”
And, of course, Lorde ends her album by reiterating the fact that she’s not our god. Get used to it.
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