Multi-talented artist Laufey has carved out her own lane since debuting in 2022, blending classical music, jazz, and soft pop with lyrical sincerity. She continues to champion timeless genres, both preserving and reinvigorating jazz and classical music.
Now, in her third studio album, A Matter of Time, Laufey deepens her signature sound while embracing emotional and sonic risk. With characteristic vulnerability, she captures the angst of young adulthood, a difficult journey amplified by her success and public life. The new album is her most personal and ambitious to date, showcasing far more confident storytelling. Still, the wide array of themes and sounds attempted can make the album feel disjointed and overloaded at times.
“Clockwork” opens the album with a smooth rhythm that blends warmth with precision. The steady, ticking beat mirrors the movement of a clock, contrasting with the emotional highs and lows that follow throughout the rest of the album. “He just called me, said he’s runnin’ late / Like me, he probably had to regurgitate,” Laufey sings, capturing the awkwardness and anxiety of falling unexpectedly in love with a friend. While her repeated “ding, dong” background vocals add vintage charm, the track is quickly outshined by the more memorable songs that follow.
Laufey’s use of breezy rhythm continues in “Lover Girl,” a lighthearted track that fantasizes love from a distance. “I’m in a reckless fever, love-struck girl, I’d tease her,” she sings. While self-aware about her own hypocrisy, most of the lyrics are surprisingly shallow and frivolous. Like “Clockwork,” the song keeps a soft, syncopated beat that feels gentle and steady—playful on the surface but lacking deeper weight.
Sharply diverging from romance, “Snow White” confronts the darkness of unrealistic beauty standards, heightened by being in the spotlight. “The world is a sick place, at least for a girl,” she sings over slow guitar and moving violin. With its stripped-down tone and despairing lyrics, Laufey’s vocals shine full of truth but remain dejected by her unremitting feelings of inadequacy.
Continuing to step away from romance-focused tracks, “Castle in Hollywood” mourns a friendship lost to betrayal and the end of girlhood innocence. “I wish I could tell him about us / I wish I could tell you how I finally fell in love,” Laufey sings, grieving the absence of a friend who once knew her innermost thoughts. Though she clings to fragile hope in the lyrics, the sharp strings and tense guitar lines carry too much resentment to fully align with that optimism—creating a striking emotional contrast instead.
Laufey slows down on “Carousel,” letting soft piano and strings swirl beneath softer, almost whispered vocals. Framing love as a chaotic circus, Laufey fights between the thrill of closeness and the fear of being known too deeply. It’s a searching track about wanting connection while staying guarded—trapped on the carousel of vulnerability and hesitation. Her emotional intensity deepens with “Silver Lining,” a sweeping ballad that wrestles with the fine line between devotion and self-destruction. “When you go to hell, I’ll go there with you too,” Laufey sings, portraying love as both beautiful and dangerous.
“Too Little, Too Late” can feel confusing without context—it’s written from a male perspective, reflecting on regret and lost love. Its raw emotion comes through in Laufey’s desperate vocals and what may be the album’s strongest bridge. “I lay my sword down anyway / I’ll see you at heaven’s gate / ‘Cause it’s too little, way too late,” she sings. The song hits harder once the perspective shift is clear, but the male narration still feels a bit out of place among the rest of the album.
“Tough Luck” and “A Cautionary Tale” grapple with messy breakups—from losing patience with a love interest to feeling lost after giving up too much of oneself. The latter track is immediately compromised by its overly theatrical and cliche lyrics. “Oh heavens, hear my story, a cautionary tale / Of how I came to be loved, and how it came to fail,” Laufey sings, leaning into melodrama that feels more forced than sincere. Eventually, the chorus and bridge recover a somewhat stronger message about self-rediscovery, but the song still falls short following the pop sensation that is “Tough Luck.”
“Clean Air” marks a complete deviation from Laufey’s typical sounds, leaning into upbeat percussion, folksy guitar, and references to “sweeter pastures” that give it a subtle country flair. It lands oddly between heavier tracks, but after the first 40 seconds, it swings towards catchiness rather than cringiness. Laufey quickly returns to darker territory with “Sabotage,” a song about spiraling paranoia in a relationship. Though self-aware, its excessive radio static and heavy cymbals in the post-chorus feel like a jarring way to conclude an otherwise graceful album.
A Matter of Time highlights Laufey’s confidence to take on heavier topics through her evolving sound and lyricism. Still, she struggles with cohesion more than in past albums, as she embraces bolder sounds and shifts abruptly between too many narrators and subjects. While the album is admittedly imperfect, Laufey’s newest work proves she is unafraid to take creative risks, even if it means stepping outside of her usual flow.
