Luna Li - Duality Review

On her debut album, Luna’s craftsmanship is incredible. With the quality music she’s shown to be able to produce, she’s poised to be the next big artist in the pop space.

Luna Li’s debut album, Duality, is a gorgeous pop anthem that introduces a potential dominant name in the lo-fi, DIY pop game. Bringing in sounds from sub genres including psychedelic pop, bedroom pop, indie pop, and art pop, Luna has crafted the perfect album to throw on during a rainy night drive.

Luna started gaining traction at the beginning of the pandemic, when she posted clips of some of the jams she created, ultimately making their way to her 2021 jams EP. However, her single Silver Into Rain with experienced and successful bedroom pop contemporary beabadoobee put her on a lot of people’s radars. Silver Into Rain is one of my favorite cuts on the album, as bea takes her feature and really runs with it, taking the song to the next level, as she usually does.

Duality kicks off with one of the best highlights on the whole album, Cherry Pit. Originally a single from 2021, the song starts out with a textbook psychedelic pop guitar introduction that fades into a gorgeous lofi beat with a harp sprinkled in for extra flair. Her dreamy vocals about knowing a lover better than they know themselves introduce a lot of the themes she discusses on the album, mostly revolving around questions of love. Luna’s talent of pulling sounds from multiple genres and tying them together with a cohesive bow is on full display on Cherry Pit, making this track my personal favorite on the album.

The front half of Duality is loaded with previously released songs apart from Boring Again, featuring vocals from Jay Som, another successful pop artist. The duo’s chemistry on this track is very apparent, as their respective parts subtly and soothingly flow into one another.

Another highlight comes directly after, with the single Afterglow. On this track, Luna delivers her one of her best vocal and lyrical performance, with the transition from verse to chorus impressively utilizing the brief absence of sound to emphasize different parts of the song, whether it be the jangly guitars, the plucking of a harp, or her beautiful vocals. My favorite part of the song comes at the very end, where she concludes over piano that while she loves this person the song is about, she “needs to explore how to be alone”.

Part of my amazement towards this project is how Luna really makes use of different instruments and styles, like the beautiful orchestral instrumentation on Trying, the heavy-hitting guitars on songs like Alone But Not Lonely, Silver Into Rain, and Star Stuff, or even the combination of the two on What You’re Thinking and Magic.

Luna crafts another psychedelic masterpiece on one of the final cuts of the album, Space, utilizing vocal and instrumental distortion to really give the listener the feeling they are on a rocket ship traveling through the sonic cosmos.

The final track, Lonely/Lovely is one of the best examples of telling a story without actually speaking, as there are minimal vocals on this song. The song builds with an orchestra then fades into Luna hypnotically repeating “stare into the sky”. After which, an even grander build up and release is showcased. Vocals aren’t needed here though, as the instrumentals really capture the feeling of loneliness and the transition into loving oneself, which is the perfect way to end an album that tackle these themes.

Duality isn’t free of its faults though, as some songs and ideas feel like they could have been fleshed out more. This is shown on tracks like Alone But Not Lonely and Misery Moon, both just clocking in at a little over a minute. These songs, while good, don’t add much to the album and really could have benefitted from more thought put into them. Songs like Alone But Not Lonely and What You’re Thinking also could have used stronger songwriting, as they start to feel repetitive towards their ends. These songs don’t take much away from the listening experience of the album, but they don’t hold their own against much stronger tracks by themselves either.

Luna’s craftsmanship on her debut album is incredible. With the quality music she’s shown to be able to produce, she’s poised to be the next big artist in the pop space. The final result of Duality is a stunning piece of pop that will be in my rotation for quite some time. If you’re a fan of bedroom pop and its adjacent genres, Duality is definitely a must-listen.