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Dua Lipa talks Elton John friendship, says next album has “taken a complete turn”

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David M. Benett/Getty Images for the Elton John AIDS Foundation

Back in March, Dua Lipa said on her At Your Service podcast that her next album — the follow-up to Future Nostalgia — was halfway done. But now she tells Variety that she spoke too soon, because she’s changed musical direction.

“It’s taken a complete turn as I’ve carried on working, and I really feel now that it’s starting to sound cohesive,” she tells Variety. “So I’m going to keep writing in the early months of the new year and see where that takes me.” 

She adds, “The album is different — it’s still pop but it’s different sonically, and there’s more of a lyrical theme. If I told you the title, everything would make sense — but I think we’ll just have to wait.”

It was during a trip to Malibu, California, to write that new album that Dua was first pitched on the idea of recording “Cold Heart” as a duet with Elton John, with whom she was already friendly. 

“My first answer was ‘Yes, absolutely,’” Dua tells Variety. “But they were like, ‘Well, listen to it before you agree to it’ … they sent it to me very early one morning. We were on FaceTime … and I remember I was in my bikini by the pool, wearing a cowboy hat for some reason.”

Elton picks up the story, telling Variety that he said to Dua that day, “You’ve got to listen to it by the pool — loud. And within a day or so, she said, ‘I’m in,’ and that was that.”

The two finally got to perform the song together last month, at the final North American show of Elton’s Farewell tour at Dodgers Stadium. She told Variety the next day, “I could have never imagined a night like this — it reminded me to never stop dreaming.”

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