18 August 2017
The most disappointing thing about Dua Lipa’s 2024 album Radical Optimism was that it meant her excellent preceding album Future Nostalgia was the exception. Where she had infused the fresh and exciting ‘Don’t Start Now’ and ‘Physical’ with character and energy, seemingly kicking on to a higher level and upping her game, naff new songs ‘Houdini’ and ‘Training Season’ felt like Dua going back to basic: the watery blankness of ‘New Rules’.
So, ‘New Rules’ sets out what we can assume now is the Dua Lipa standard. Even in 2017 it was yet another tropical house hit, by then the safe option for any mainstream pop product. The verses are fairly featureless, and the three theses nailed to the door by Dua are essentially the same rule rehashed. Only the snappy pre-chorus quip of “if you’re under him, you ain’t gettin’ over him” saves ‘New Rules’ from sinking into total Sheeran-Bieber trop-pop gloop, and still Dua makes it sound stilted and second-hand. On the plus side, it’s better than calling your song ‘Houdini’.
