Album Review: LUX | ROSALÍA

Today we’re talking about Spanish singer/songwriter ROSALÍA (In all caps) and her fourth studio album, LUX (2025), a magnum opus which sees the artist pressing forward in this intrinsic self-discovery journey throughout this four-part project - a mission to find the light (LUX) by any means necessary. She offers herself up and cracks herself open to let the light in, utilizing 13 languages to possibly commune with a higher power or God or anything.

ROSALÍA previously worked with experimental music, especially her prior album Motomami in 2022, bending genres and warping sounds into a metallic pop fever dream. LUX is the album that ROSALÍA in many ways has been preparing herself to put together; London Symphony Orchestra, opera, sheet music, choirs in the most unconventional manner to create a modern work of art. It demands to be studied and really dug into, unpacked to really understand the emotional depth.

Despite every language she has woven through the album, the emotional resonance pierces through each vocal performance. I think in particular to in La Yugular where she seamlessly transitions from Spanish into Arabic in this transcendent chorus: "من أجلك أدمَّر السماء، من أجلك أهدم الجحيم، فلا وعود ولا وعيد" which translates to "For you, I would destroy the sky. For you, I would tear down hell. No promises, no threats". ROSALÍA described studying sainthood and the self-sacrificial love for going to the ends of the earth for finding the light, for finding the truth of God...almost each language is dedicated to a particular saint or priestess that devoted themselves to the conquest of divinity, nearly deities in their conquest for a higher power.

Perhaps at the centerpiece of this whole project is Berghain which appears in the second act of LUX...it is maximalism at its most brilliant. The leading single to the album, which is this gut punch of strings, choral progressions and operatic vocals. In the placement of the album this feels right, it is almost the total destruction of self, the overwhelming feeling of being at the end of your rope in your conquest for the light. Every instrument and voice drops to silence and then comes...Björk's voice, which brings back in the light and the hope to help ROSALÍA back onto her conquest; "The only way I will be saved is through divine intervention". It feels like the album revolves around this moment to propel it forward. On this vision quest, ROSALÍA is joined by guest vocalists Björk, Carminho, Dougie F, Estrella Morente, Sílvia Pérez Cruz, Yahritza y su Esencia, and Yves Tumor.

LUX deserves to be heard the whole way through, the journey and the story behind it, it is truly auditory story-telling the likes of which is rarely present on the radio today. Among the most standout moments are the static Divinize, the soaring vocals of Mio Cristo Piange Diamanti, the lead single Berghain, the falsetto and transcendence of La Yugular, the romanticism of Sauvignon Blanc, and the bittersweet end of Magnolias. For all the reason above, LUX cannot be recommended any higher.

Listen to LUX here:

https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kqKSSUvhqlZJQUlvZzxdhm4fXg7mLtpVQ&si=VbVmCyp3i-f5kYE6