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Lorde was one of the hottest young pop stars to come out of the 2010s. The Grammy-winning singer dazzled audiences everywhere with her honest lyrics and emotion-packed vocals.

Lorde performs 'Royals' on September 25, 2013. in Hollywood, California.
Lorde performs ‘Royals’ on September 25, 2013. in Hollywood, California | Jon Kopaloff/FilmMagic

Lorde was a young prodigy with songs like ‘Royals’

Lorde burst onto the scene in 2013 with her ubiquitous debut single “Royals.” It originally appeared on her debut EP The Love Club, and later acted as the lead single for her debut album Pure Heroine.

“Royals” peaked at number one on the Billboard Hot 100, making Lorde, who was 16 at the time, the youngest artist to earn a number-one single in the United States since Tiffany in 1987. The song has since been certified Diamond with over 10 million copies sold. The track won two Grammy Awards for Best Pop Solo Performance and Song of the Year, while Pure Heroine earned a Grammy nomination for Best Pop Vocal Album.

Her sophomore album, Melodrama, was released in 2017. It was more mature in tone than her debut, and was a snapshot of her life as she entered her twenties. The album debuted atop the Billboard 200 albums chart and contained hit songs such as “Green Light” and “Liability.”

Lorde at Lorde iHeartRadio Music Festival in 2014
Lorde attends the 2014 iHeartRadio Music Festival | Isaac Brekken/Getty Images for iHeartMedia

Lorde’s net worth in 2021

Lorde has amassed a sizable personal fortune as a result of her years of hard work. According to CelebrityNetWorth, she’s worth approximately $16 million in 2021.

Lorde has been involved in several philanthropic causes throughout her career, mostly in New Zealand and throughout the Pacific. Her early song “The Love Club” was included in the 2013 charity album Songs for the Philippines to support the people in the Philippines who suffered from Typhoon Haiyan. In 2015, she recorded a charity single, “Team Ball Player Thing,” which raised funds for research for the cure of Batten disease, a fatal neurodegenerative disorder. That same year, she was featured in the compilation album The Art of Peace: Songs for Tibet II to raise funds for the preservation of the Tibetan culture.

In 2016, Lorde donated NZ$20,000 (approximately $13,000 USD) to Fuel the Need, a New Zealand charity that provides lunches for underprivileged schoolchildren. In 2018, she donated NZ$5,000 (about $3,000 USD) to Starship children’s hospital in Auckland for new portable neurology monitors.

Lorde performing on stage in front of a neon hand-shaped light sculpture
Lorde | Joseph Okpako/Getty Images
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Lorde’s new album, ‘Solar Power’

Now, four years after the release of Melodrama, Lorde has entered the next era of her career. Her third album Solar Power was released in August 2021, and was preceded by the singles “Solar Power,” “Stoned at the Nail Salon,” and “Mood Ring.”

The album was first teased after the release of Going South, a June 2021 memoir documenting Lorde’s 2019 visit to Antarctica, which she declared the precursor to the album. The album’s title was inspired by the trip, and she told The New York Times that she “felt like [she] could just chill out and flex a little bit” while creating the record. She also noted that she didn’t feel pressure to release hit songs like she once did, and dubbed Solar Power her “weed album.”

She also brushed off claims that having Jack Antonoff as a co-writer on her projects meant that she wasn’t an accomplished songwriter and artist herself. “I haven’t made a Jack Antonoff record,” she said plainly. “I’ve made a Lorde record and he’s helped me make it and very much deferred to me on production and arrangement.”