‘I have lost my boy’ - Lorde delays new album over death of pet

Lorde performs on the Coachella Stage during day three of the Coachella Valley Music And Arts Festival

New Zealand musician Lorde has revealed a bump in the road on her way to releasing her third album.

In a rare letter penned to fans online, the 22-year-old asked for “patience” as she works through the death of her dog, Pearl.

“Pearl had been ill in various forms his entire life,” she wrote.

“But one day we woke up and I knew, in that way mothers do, that he was sicker than we had realised, and that we were nearing a point where his body wasn’t going to be able to cope. I rushed him to the specialists. Pearl had two cardiac arrests about an hour apart, and after the second one, he died.”

The singer, whose real name is Ella Yelich-O’Connor, had been working on new music in New Zealand for “most of this year” and said in the letter Pearl had been an important part of that.

“We spent almost all our time alone together, him asleep under the piano as I played, or on the porch together, or in the park, where he became a blurry speck of gold in the green, far away,” the letter read.

Seven Sharp's Tim Wilson hits the streets to get advice for the global pop icon.

“I was holding him when he went, and I know he knew that I was there. But this loss has been indescribably painful, and a light that was turned on for me has gone out.”

Lorde, who turns 23 this month, says the death has affected the record she was working on.

“Pearl visits me in my dreams, and I am able to see or hold him for a brief time most nights. But the bright energy I was trying to communicate to you has gone, for now. He was instrumental to the discovery that was taking place. I felt he led me towards the ideas. And it’s going to take some time and recalibration, now that there’s no shepherd ahead of me, to see what the work is going to be.

The Kiwi singer attended Devonport Drama’s Fairytale the Musical.

“So I’m asking for your patience, as 2020 comes around and you start to wonder where the next record is. I have lost my boy, and I need some time to see the good again, to finish making this for you. It won’t be the same work — as anyone who has felt loss can understand, there’s a door that opens that you step through, and everything is different on the other side. But when this great loss crystallises inside me, and my chest rebuilds around it, hopefully I’ll be able to finish up, and share it with you, and we’ll all grow together, as we always do.”

It’s been more than two years since Lorde released her sophomore album, Melodrama’ Her breakout record Pure Heroine, featuring Grammy award-winning hit Royals, was released in 2013.

Lorde has recently withdrawn her presence from social media.

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