Dua Lipa was one of the few people to have a pretty great 2020. She released her album Future Nostalgia at the start of lockdown, and people really loved the pop-disco vibe – it was great music for one or two people dancing at home, and it was fun and light. Her tours were cancelled, but she still found ways to perform live, like her record-breaking live-stream concert Studio 2054. She spent much of 2020 locked down with her boyfriend Anwar Hadid in London, watching Netflix and doing interviews via Zoom. Which is how this British Vogue interview was conducted too! Dua covers the February issue of British Vogue to talk about music and her surprisingly good 2020 and more. Some highlights:
Going lighter for this album: The “smile through the pain” ennui of Gen Z is her speciality, and she describes her oeuvre as “dance-crying” music or “dark pop”. On this album, however – and its thrilling new additional tracks – “dance” and “pop” take precedence. “I had to fight inner demons. I wanted to write songs that were more sad, more about heartbreak, because I thought that writing happy songs would turn into cheesy songs. I had to fight that because I was like, ‘I am happy. I deserve to be happy.’ I should be able to write about that without the fear of feeling like I’m compromising my authenticity because I’m not crying about something or someone.”
Dating Anwar Hadid: “We have all these incredible memories and experiences, and if there’s something that we want to share together, then OK, that’s fun… But at the same time, we’re quite private – we’ll only show you as much as we want you to see. It’s a little bit of give and take, trying to find the right balance of being so excited and being in love, and wanting to share that with the people around me, but at the same time not wanting to put too much out there. I want to be able to just be happy in this relationship without having other people’s opinions.”
On Twitter: Her management now runs her account. Twitter was the first social media platform she had. She used it to connect with fans she’d meet post-shows, which now sounds absurd. “I would go into interviews and people would say, ‘How do you deal with hate?’And I’m like, ‘Hate? I don’t get hate, what are you talking about?’ It was so early on that people didn’t even care to try and say something mean.” As her star rose, however, things “got really hectic”. Despite her better judgement, she started endlessly scrolling hateful comments about herself. “I would get anxiety. And I was like, ‘This shouldn’t be the way that I’m experiencing this once-in-a-lifetime experience.’ It was messing with my confidence. I’d be super-nervous, wondering what everyone’s gonna say.”
Her home life is normal: “My home life is really normal. The people I surround myself with have known me for the longest time. My job doesn’t define my circle, and that makes a world of difference.”
She & her parents were refugees from Kosovo: It goes without saying that Lipa is staunchly anti-Brexit and troubled by anti-immigration rhetoric. “People don’t leave their home country unless they have to a lot of the time. To save their families, to try and get a better life. People want to be where their family is, where their home is, where they speak the language that is native to them, where they have their own culture.”
“I had to fight that because I was like, ‘I am happy. I deserve to be happy.’” I wonder about this all the time with Adele and Sam Smith specifically, just because they’re two artists known for sad songs about how lovers did them wrong. Even when Adele was happily married, she was still writing about heartbreak! I like that Dua was like “I’m happy and I’m going to force myself to write a happy pop album.” Anyway, y’all know I’m a Dua stan. The only thing I don’t like about her is Anwar Hadid! She could do so much better than that idiot.
Photo and cover courtesy of British Vogue.
Kinda off topic but I’m SO glad she handed her Twitter account over to managers, I need more artists/celebs to do that.
She makes a smart point. Immigrants come to make a better life. They add value. The writer Umair Haque recently wrote that the UK is the only nation to ever impose sanctions on itself. And for what?
Sadly, this is not how Brexiteers think. o them, if an immigrant risked his life to come to the UK in a raft, they are doing so in order to lounge about on benefits. And if they are willing to work hard and provide a good life for their families, they’re doing so at the expense of a British person, who should have had that job instead.
Same of course goes for Europeans, they’re either after the benefits or stealing a British person’s job.
I would also add that they think immigrants come here to work under the radar to avoid paying taxes and send the money out of the country to again avoid paying taxes.
It’s crazy the mind gymnastics that they employ to justify their hate. It’s not that easy to get the proper paperwork, it takes a long time (and a lot of money) to get legal status and many send the money home to support their families.
It’s not easy for anyone to leave all that they love and know for the unknown. The UK is a country that needs immigrants of all skill levels, sadly something lost on Brexiters.
It’s from 2017 but still interesting to see how “regular” people think- Brexittania movie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DzbctACZWY
For someone apparently locked down in london she sure has spent a lot of the last few months island hopping on various holidays. In a pandemic.
Just like many celebs have. The pandemic doesn’t exist for them (looking at you Kardashians).
She’s clearly gotten some media coaching, thankfully, because she normally comes off very pretentious for someone whose best known for making manufactured pop music. What little respect I might have had for her was lost with her constant and needless traveling, partying and vacationing during the pandemic. I don’t know why anyone thinks she’s too good for Anwar because they seem equally yoked to me: two vapid airheads who think they’re much smarter and cooler than everyone else.
Future nostalgia is so great! What a creative concept too. I’m a fan
Dua is a strikingly beautiful woman. Some of these covers she has had don’t do her justice. That’s my only complaint:) Oh and totally agree on the whole she could do sooooo much better than Anwar Hadid. I just want her to have the best and to continue being happy and successful!