When Lorde’s Pure Heroine was released in 2013, I had just started ninth grade. The transition from middle to high school was filled with all that fun, existential kind of anxiety that comes with growing up; the kind of emotions captured on Pure Heroine so accurately and delicately in the way only then 17-year-old Lorde could. In the summer of 2017, right before I left for college, she released her long-awaited follow-up album Melodrama. Lorde’s albums about transitional times were released exactly when I needed them to be; there are certain Pure Heroine lines that feel more relevant now than ever and certain Melodrama lines that I’m saving for the future. Perhaps the most Melodrama moment I experienced was the second day of orientation, listening to “Perfect Places” as a I rode in a cab back to school in a city that I already knew but was just beginning to call home. For those inclined to experience her albums in the same, all-consuming way, I present: The College Experience as Described by Lorde (more accurately titled, The Best Lorde Songs to Listen to as a College Student. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, though.)
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“Royals” for being a Broke College Student™
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“A World Alone” for having “a million bad habits to kick, not sleeping is one.”
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“Green Light” for feeling free and discovering new things about yourself.
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“Homemade Dynamite” for partying, I guess.
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“Ribs,” for “reeling through the midnight streets” and feeling scared of getting older.
6. “Perfect Places” for hating “the headlines and the weather” and being “19” and “on fire.”
7. Bonus gif! Not a song, but Lorde would totally fit in at Barnard.