Lorde
Courtesy Photo
The Release Date
As revealed by Lorde the day she announced Virgin, the album will arrive June 27.
Everything We Know About Lorde’s ‘Virgin’ So Far
Written by djfrosty on May 9, 2025
This summer, Lorde will finally deliver what fans are sure is going to be an immaculate conception: Virgin, her long-awaited fourth studio album.
As revealed April 30, the New Zealander’s next LP is set to arrive soon via Universal Music New Zealand and Republic Records, bringing an end to a four-year album drought during which Lorde has spent much of her time out of the spotlight. Finally reemerging shortly prior to the announcement, the hitmaker shared the first taste of what Virgin will sound like on April 24 by releasing lead single “What Was That,” a synth-pop dance track that catches fans up to speed on what they missed since they last heard from her (lots of MDMA and dancing at New York City nightclub Baby’s All Right, it would seem).
The track was accompanied by a DIY music video, featuring footage of the star performing it in front of a swarm of fans gathered at Washington Square Park — hours after many of them had been kicked out by authorities when the size of her crowd became too disruptive.
The numbers she pulled that day made it clear: Lorde was back. It was a resurrection that her disciples had been waiting for since her last album, Solar Power, dropped in 2021, reaching No. 5 on the Billboard 200. The soft, summery album followed 2017’s Melodrama and 2013’s Pure Heroine — and with fans knowing full well how different each of those three albums is, it only mades the anticipation surrounding Virgin greater. What will it sound like? What are the songs about? Will there be any collaborations?
And while many of those questions won’t be answered until the release date, Billboard is keeping track of everything we learn about the LP in the weeks before it drops. Keep reading to see what there is to know about Lorde’s Virgin — from the day it’s coming out to the producers behind it and more — below.
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The Producers
In a note posted to her website when she announced Virgin, Lorde revealed that the project was produced with Jim-E Stack, Fabiana Palladino, Andrew Aged, Buddy Ross, Dan Nigro and Dev Hynes of Blood Orange. Later, she’d reveal that both Stack and Hynes would also be joining her as supporting acts on her Ultrasound Tour in support of the album.
Virgin marks a departure from Lorde’s usual collaborator, Jack Antonoff, who worked on her previous two albums: Melodrama and Solar Power. Her debut album, Pure Heroine, was produced by Joel Little.
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The Album Cover
In debuting the Virgin cover, Lorde unveiled what is arguably her most daring album artwork yet. Tinted blue, the photo is an X-ray of a woman’s pelvis, showing her spine, hip bones and IUD installed in her uterus.
It’s also the singer’s first album cover that does not feature her face since Pure Heroine. After it dropped, fans praised her for picking such a “weird” and “intriguing” image to represent the music, with one listener writing on X, “Lorde’s new album being a transparent view of her femininity and the title being a societal construct tied to womanhood and the album cover being an Xray of a woman’s reproductive organs while she’s clothed … oh the symbolism.”
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It’s Super Personal
In a statement about the album, Lorde teased that — similar to “What Was That” — Virgin would be an unflinching look at her life and herself over the past few years. “THE COLOUR OF THE ALBUM IS CLEAR,” she wrote. “LIKE BATHWATER, WINDOWS, ICE, SPIT. FULL TRANSPARENCY. THE LANGUAGE IS PLAIN AND UNSENTIMENTAL. THE SOUNDS ARE THE SAME WHEREVER POSSIBLE. I WAS TRYING TO SEE MYSELF, ALL THE WAY THROUGH. I WAS TRYING TO MAKE A DOCUMENT THAT REFLECTED MY FEMININITY: RAW, PRIMAL, INNOCENT, ELEGANT, OPENHEARTED, SPIRITUAL, MASC.”
The singer added that the project was “100% WRITTEN IN BLOOD.”
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How Charli xcx Inspired It
In an interview with BBC Radio 1, Lorde revealed that her “Girl, So Confusing” remix collaborator, Charli xcx, motivated her to step up her game on Virgin by releasing such a game-changing album with Brat.
“It forced me to further define what I was doing, because Charli had so masterfully defined everything about Brat, and I knew that what I was doing was very distinct to that,” Lorde said. “It’s an amazing thing when a peer throws the gauntlet down like that, you’re like, ‘OK, I’ve got to pick it up.’ I’ve spoken to a lot of peers who’ve all had the same feeling.”
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Lorde’s Mindset While Making It
In an interview with Document Journal ahead of Virgin‘s release, Lorde got candid about struggling with body image and disordered eating around the time she started writing the album. “I had made my body very small, because I thought that that was what you did as a woman and a woman on display,” she told the publication, emphasizing that under-eating only had the effect of making her feel “weak.”
“It was like, ‘I’m not going to put anything out until I’m in my body the way I know I’m supposed to be, to be able to do my work,’” she continued. “That’s all I did the last four years, basically. This album is a byproduct of that process of fully coming into my body and feeling the fullness of my power.”