Songs that belie her young age

    Updated: 2013-10-13 08:25

    By Jon Pareles(The New York Times)

      Print Mail Large Medium  Small

    What is "Royals," by Lorde, the New Zealand songwriter, doing in America's Top 10 alongside Miley Cyrus's "Wrecking Ball" and Katy Perry's "Roar"? Most of all, it's insisting that pop listeners don't have to settle for cliches.

    Ms. Perry and Ms. Cyrus sing about something teenage girls are presumed to have on their minds: what's left of self-esteem after a breakup. Lorde, meanwhile, is singing about class consciousness and conspicuous consumption: the gap between pop-culture fantasies of Cadillacs and diamonds and the reality of being someone who "didn't come from money." It's a thoughtful, calmly insubordinate song; it's also written by an actual teenager. Lorde, who offstage is Ella Yelich-O'Connor, is 16.

    She's a reflective, even somber young woman. In a September concert in New York, she wore a demure black dress and was accompanied by only a drummer, a keyboardist and recorded tracks with her multilayered vocals; behind the musicians were spotlights on stands, nothing elaborate. Apart from the backing vocals, which welled up like phantom choirs, her songs were similarly austere: keyboard parts that might be as sparse as a bass line and a chord or two and subdued, unflashy drumbeats.

    Songs that belie her young age

    Nothing hid Lorde's low, breathy voice, by turns melancholy and resolute. She moved to the beat, but like a teenager, not a music video trouper; her feet sometimes seemed planted to the stage. Lorde wasn't pretending to be a superhuman pop idol, and her opening song, "Bravado," confessed to a battle between shyness and show-business aspirations: "I learned not to want/The quiet of the room with no one around to find me out/I want the applause the approval the things that make me go."

    Although her debut album, "Pure Heroine," has just been released, Lorde isn't exactly an overnight sensation. She started writing songs at 12, when she was signed to Universal after she was spotted in a talent show. After she teamed with the songwriter and producer Joel Little, she quietly released "Royals" as part of a five-song online EP in November, with an official release in spring of 2013; its popularity snowballed.

    Lorde's songs are lucid, clearly delineated pop, in current modes: anthems, ballads with a hip-hop undertow, four-on-the-floor dance beats. She has learned from Beyonce about switching between articulate, double-time verses and terse choruses. And in songs like "Biting Down," she has learned from Bjork about the power of an incantatory voice set to unfeeling electronics.

    Songs that belie her young age

    Lorde does write about teenage concerns: battling cliquishness in "White Teeth Teens," longing for companionship in "400 Lux," the temptations of drinking and fighting in "Glory and Gore," dreams of refuge in "Buzzcut Season." But she's a world away from the teen-pop staples of come-ons and kiss-offs, whining or flirting; the directness of her voice, and the catchy monosyllables and triumphal melodies of her choruses, carry her through imagery that can be splintered and oblique. She's serious - so serious that she risks being monochromatic. When the sound of a guitar appeared in the last song in her set, "A World Alone," it was a glimmer of possibilities beyond her deliberately restricted palette of keyboards, beats and electronic blips.

    Lorde is - with her discreet musicians - on her own, finding her way in a space she is creating for herself. It's one where she has plenty of room to grow up.

    The New York Times

    (China Daily 10/13/2013 page12)

    区三区激情福利综合中文字幕在线一区 | 亚洲中文字幕无码日韩| 精品国产aⅴ无码一区二区| 中文无码喷潮在线播放| 亚洲国产精品无码久久SM| 日韩精品无码一区二区中文字幕| 无码成A毛片免费| 精品亚洲AV无码一区二区三区 | 中文日韩亚洲欧美字幕| 免费A级毛片无码视频| 久久久久亚洲AV片无码下载蜜桃| 亚洲精品中文字幕乱码三区 | 狠狠精品久久久无码中文字幕| 精品999久久久久久中文字幕| 内射无码专区久久亚洲| 国产∨亚洲V天堂无码久久久| 国产AV无码专区亚洲A∨毛片| 中文字幕无码免费久久| 久久中文精品无码中文字幕| 无码中文人妻在线一区二区三区| 无码不卡亚洲成?人片| 久久久无码精品午夜| AAA级久久久精品无码片| 国产V亚洲V天堂无码久久久| 无码免费一区二区三区免费播放| 亚洲精品无码成人AAA片| 久久亚洲日韩看片无码| 久久精品亚洲AV久久久无码| 无码精品A∨在线观看十八禁| 人妻少妇看A偷人无码电影| 精品久久久无码中文字幕| 中文在线最新版天堂8| 天堂在/线中文在线资源官网| 日韩中文在线视频| 中文字幕亚洲一区| 在线看片福利无码网址| 中文字幕无码播放免费| 色综合久久精品中文字幕首页| 中文字幕精品一区影音先锋| 亚洲中文字幕无码爆乳av中文| 国产在线无码精品电影网|