From her voice to her fingertips, Lorde’s whirlwind Grammys appearance has captured global attention.
Seventeen-year-old Ella Yelich-O’Connor won Grammy awards for Best Pop Solo Performance and Song of the Year, becoming the first New Zealander to take those awards and the youngest Kiwi to win at the industry’s most prestigious awards.
The New York Times ArtsBeat blog, which covered the awards show live, described Lorde’s performance as a “highlight”.
“Some things Lorde did beautifully: pleated pants, platform boots, paint-dipped fingers, purple lipstick. And sing,” critic Jon Caramanica wrote.
The blog lapped up Lorde’s undeniably Kiwi acceptance speech for Song of the Year.
“I just want to hear Lorde say ‘mental’ a few more times,” critic Dave Itzkoff noted.
Caramanica said: “Lorde also respectfully let the guy no one cares about speak first. She is the ethics queen!”
The Los Angeles Times was impressed by her “stark” performance.
“The teenage New Zealander has made an appealing habit lately of jolting awards shows with her seriousness of purpose, and here she did it again, thrillingly stretching out the negative space in a tune about feeling disconnected from the ambition and glamour enshrined in so many pop hits.”
The Hollywood Gossip praised her “show-stopping vocals” on the stripped-down version of the song.
“Donning uncharacteristically straight hair, a black-and-white pantsuit and black nails, Lorde painstakingly built up to the crescendo of the radio version,” it reported.
“Tremendous talent aside, she also looked every bit her age, with the normal level of teenage awkwardness, disdain and amusement on the podium.”
Celebrity entertainment blogger Perez Hilton praised her wins and “stellar vocals”.
“The sassy, spicy singer won Best Pop Solo Performance and Song Of The Year. She had a bigger night than her hair!!! LOLz!” he quipped.
The devil was in the detail, with many commentators scrutinising Lorde’s black-tipped fingers – which now have their own Twitter account, @LordesFingers.
MTV speculated it was imagery of the Black Death, or the bubonic plague – black fingertips were a symptom of the medieval disease.
The internet also whipped itself into a frenzy over the mutual girl crush between the Kiwi popstar and pop princess Taylor Swift.
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“The two Grammy darlings spent the big night putting their BFF status on full display when they each weren’t on stage performing or, in Lorde’s case this year, accepting trophies,” MTV reported.
Lorde was the most-tweeted about star of the night, according to TIME.
She attracted 146,083 tweets per minute for her Royals performance and 152, 688 tweets per minute for her Best Pop Solo Performance win.
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