Read and weep popstars: Dua Lipa is back again for another hit album, this time featuring eleven unique titles. Radical Optimism was her first album to debut at Number 1 on the U.K. Billboard. All weather forecasts indicate thunderous applause for her new album Radical Optimism, with singles ‘Houdini’ and “’Training Season’ each hitting over two hundred million streams on Spotify alone. These accomplishments are not atypical for the star, but it’s yet another goal breached and added to the repertoire of Dua Lipa, the Queen of Pop.
Three times GRAMMY winner and seven times BRIT award winner, Lipa has made a name for herself since her explosive debut performance of ‘New Rules’ seven years ago. An article from Medium shares this opening statement: “Dua Lipa, a growing force to be dealt with, whose name is synonymous with chart-topping hits and a distinctive style.” Just before the release of her newest album, she was featured in multiple chart-topping hit songs including ‘Sweetest Pie’ with Megan Thee Stallion in 2022 and ‘Dance the Night’ in 2023, the latter of which is currently featured on the Barbie movie soundtrack. Her success story doesn’t stop there, as the star is always raring to go, even appearing on Rolling Stone to talk about her now-released new album back in January of 2024. “For better or for worse, I throw myself into something so heavily to get it right and to make it perfect,” she shared enthusiastically.
We all know the sensation that Dua Lipa has grown into, but what were the humble beginnings of her career? How did someone rise to fame at such an unprecedented rate? What were her secrets? For Lipa, maybe there was never a secret in the first place. Over the years, she has been incredibly open with her upbringing, giving us a clearer picture of the star’s younger years.
Dukagjin Lipa, later shortened to the stage name of Dua Lipa, is a born Albanian with current residency in the United Kingdom, along with two younger siblings. Her father was the one who proposed an introduction to the world of music; he was a member of a Kosovan rock band named Oda. Even as a curious child, she often sought out the mastery of various instruments including the daunting-sized cello. Her musical alignment led to an eager pursuit of singing even before she hit the age of six. Her environment was the key factor in germinating a passion for music and the arts. In an excerpt provided by Rolling Stone, she shares, “My parents are the people I look back on for everything. While I was a kid, they never made me feel like anything was ever wrong. They tried to give me as normal of a childhood as possible.”
Her enthusiasm soon hit a wall, a stamp in her dreams coming from one of the most unexpected sources: her primary school’s chorus teacher. Her teacher told her, in certain terms, that her singing was subpar. Luckily, Lipa was never one to back down from a challenge. From trailblazing her path to getting her belly button pierced in a split-second decision, Lipa followed her heart and it led back to music the entire time.
In her early teen years, she found herself returning to Kosovo for a few years. She says that after her move to Kosovo, she intertwined her vocals, her self-discovery, and her love of the Albanian language into a primary motivator. It was during her years in Kosovo that cemented her plan to become a musician. When Lipa reports on her upbringing, she feels that she can’t help but bring up her two younger siblings. In the years that followed her explosive debut in 2018, her younger siblings have also decided to take up producing music and acting respectively. Without a doubt, the performing genes really do run in the family!
Not every story starts with success, and Lipa found that out the hard way. Starting out as a self-sponsored singer, the only résumé she had to her name was a couple of song covers posted on YouTube. As things usually are, the path to the top is always convoluted, and Lipa found her fair share of troubles. After some legal clashes and manager searching, Lipa found herself signed under the mega-corporation Warner Music Group in 2015. However, the singer was practically thrown out into a pack of wolves. The music industry is cutthroat, and she didn’t see an immediate hit. Her debut single, ‘New Love,’ was released on August 21st, 2015, and barely scratched the surface of a hundred thousand streams at the time. At the time, she wasn’t getting much promotion despite being signed to a record label, so most of her biggest shows were piggybacking off other stars including Troye Sivan, Bruno Mars, and Coldplay. As an opening act to several other famous singers, she was slowly and steadily gaining a following.
This discouraging start wasn’t enough to throw Lipa off her aspirations, no, she was never one to back down from a challenge after all. She found her first pop success with her fourth single in August of 2016, ‘Blow Your Mind (Muah),’ which remains one of her most popular songs years after its release. It reached the top of the charts within weeks and her song was blasting on radio stations. Following the massive streaming success, Lipa finally scheduled her first set of shows, a huge step forward for the upcoming star.
The Internet can be ruthless, as we have seen time and time again. By 2017, Lipa had just turned 22 and she was already facing heavy criticism about her shows. No, the sets weren’t boring, and the budget wasn’t an issue. Rather, Lipa had grown famous overnight but for all the wrong reasons. A clip of her performance circulated online on social media and people complained that her dancing lacked the ‘oomph’ needed for a ‘true’ performer. While Lipa later admitted that her dancing may have been lackluster, she said the criticism came at a tough time. “It’s always so easy with social media to get caught up in a negative spiral or people being mean, telling you what they think about you without really knowing you at all,” Lipa shared, venting her frustrations during an interview in Rolling Stone. She had just been bombarded with new experiences, including setting up a show with her at the center, and she claims she was just testing the waters. Luckily, Lipa isn’t one to take hits lying down. The negative online attention allowed Lipa to show her fantastic work ethic as her dancing has undoubtedly improved over the years. We know Lipa takes criticism and transforms it into a learning experience. After all, who else do you see going viral over an aerial stunt only a few years down the line?
The song that truly catapulted the singer into the spotlight was ‘New Rules.’ The song was one-of-a-kind in 2017, one of the few songs that year with a feminist backing that was both critically acclaimed and best-selling. The song eventually became Lipa’s first song to hit the #1 single on Billboard UK charts. ‘New Rules’ was a part of her debut album Dua Lipa, an album that against all odds skyrocketed in sales amongst English communities. By the end of the month, Dua Lipa had tracks reaching over fifty million streams on Spotify. She was passionate about women’s rights and empowerment, allowing her to rise to fame overnight. Her newfound fans were hungry for content, and they would get it within days. When Lipa gave her first interview to TIME in September of that same year, she was a confident 22-year-old, with the world in front of her. It was almost as if she had completely transformed from the frustrated young adult a few months earlier; she wasn’t letting anyone stop her progress. As Lipa eagerly shared with TIME magazine in 2017, “I’d like to take over the world… If I could.”
Now 28, Lipa prepares for one of the most successful launches of her career and the transformation into an international superstar. Between 2017 and 2024, the seven years have truly changed her into a pop princess, a term recently referenced by Dazed when reporting on her recent collaboration with designer brand Versace. In any case, Dua Lipa is globally acclaimed, her second album Future Nostalgia helped to build her compilation of #1 Billboard singles. Anyone who browsed the Pop radio stations can attest to her almost overwhelming influence over the field. All day, every day, you would hear ‘Levitating,’ ‘Don’t Start Now, ‘and ‘Breaking My Heart,’ simply because they were that popular with listeners. On Spotify, each one of these songs has amassed over one billion streams, with ‘Don’t Start Now’ and ‘Levitating (Featuring Da Baby)’ hitting over the two billion benchmark. Her years haven’t been unproductive, and her grit has pushed her through tough experiences into massive success. In the years following her first shows, she has been one of the few singers who have sold out multiple stadiums across Europe. She has been on the cover of Vogue twice, one of the most influential magazines in the world. In less than a decade, Dua Lipa has already left a lasting mark on the music industry.
The recently released hit single ‘Houdini’ in January of 2024 was a taste of her new album’s style. It’s a testament to her popularity that hours after the track appeared on streaming services, it already hit the #1 track spot on UK Billboard. For Lipa, Radical Optimism is more than a continuation of Future Nostalgia. ‘Houdini’ had already given her audience a glimpse into her musical genius, and she wanted to shake something up. Whereas Future Nostalgia, her second album released in 2020, may have been more Disco-pop, Lipa claims that Radical Optimism is cut from a different slate. Radical Optimism was encouraged by Lipa’s growth as an artist while traveling and touring the world. The album is filled with Brit-pop, trip-hop, and techno beats. Don’t be discouraged, loyal listeners! Although her new album may not feature her famous disco-pop signature to an excess, it’s still present in the background of her tracks. She stated in an interview with AP News, “But I wanted to just experiment and try and create something new… I think this was always kind of the album that I’ve always wanted to make.”
Radical Optimism is meant to represent Lipa’s experience with her love life. She wants to take her newest album and run with it, so to speak. For Lipa, the album isn’t just a performance catalog. The eleven-track list is meant to represent her struggles with finding herself and pushing past fears in her relationship and beyond. “It’s about me, it’s designed by me, always.” she shared.
It’s been two months since the release of Lipa’s most emotional work, Radical Optimism. Multiple songs including ‘Illusion’ and ‘Training Season’ have hit the charts at record speeds. Throughout her career, she still hasn’t faltered despite finding difficulties throughout her journey to her coronation as the Queen of Pop. She laughs lightly in her highlight video for WIRED’s Answers the Web’s Most Searched Questions series. “What are Dua Lipa’s Rules? Well, Work hard and Be Nice. That’s all there is to it.”
As Lipa eagerly shared with TIME magazine in 2017, “I’d like to take over the world… If I could.”