Dua Lipa’s new album, Future Nostalgia, put her on top of the pop world: The album peaked at No. 4 on the US charts, and “Don’t Start Now” is her most successful single yet in the states thanks to its No. 2 peak. The record is an undeniable success, and it turns out it may not have happened if Dua Lipa hadn’t taken some time to step away from social media.
Lips guested on a recent episode of Adwoa Aboah’s Gurls Talk podcast, and on the program, she said she needed a break from the internet because the things being said about her were so upsetting: “In all honesty, I don’t think I could have done my second record if I hadn’t taken a step back from social media. When you first start, when I first started putting new music out, everything was super positive and I had lots of nice messages. I think the more stuff you do, then there is criticism and comments and it all comes in thick and fast, and for a while it was really getting to me. I just felt like people had nothing but mean things to say or I was being picked on. It did upset me, it made me feel I didn’t deserve to do certain things.”
She also discussed what it was like to release her album during the coronavirus pandemic, saying, “It’s weird to have had such a clear plan and it all goes out [of] the window, but [then] realize that it’s all OK and that maybe we need to slow down a bit, take a bit [of time], have some patience with ourselves.”
Listen to the full Gurls Talk episode here.
Dua Lipa is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.