Lorde has dropped “What Was That,” the lead single from her upcoming fourth studio album and her first original solo release since 2021’s Solar Power. Since then, the New Zealand singer has hopped on the remix of Charli XCX’s “Girl, So Confusing” and contributed a cover of “Take Me to the River” to the Talking Heads tribute album Everyone’s Getting Involved.
Set to a spare bassline and gently undulating synth, the deceptively ebullient “What Was That” finds Lorde setting a nostalgic scene in characteristically elegiac fashion: “I wear smoke like a wedding veil/Make a meal I won’t eat/Step out onto the street, alone in a sea.” Produced by Lorde, Jim-E Stack, and Dan Nigro, the track gradually builds in intensity to a cathartic release, as she unpacks the trauma of a years-long courtship: “Since I was 17, I gave you everything/Now wake from a dream.”
Thematically and sonically, “What Was That” is a callback to Lorde’s critically acclaimed sophomore effort, Melodrama, which landed a spot on Slant’s list of the Best Albums of 2017.
Watch the music video for “What Was That,” shot in part in Washington Square Park last night, below:
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