La Roux – Old Flames

Elly Jackson, aka La Roux, can seem like a musical cicada – emerging once each decade to produce a beautifully crafted album of synthpop bangers before disappearing again into the Brixtonian ether.

Following a 2009 self-titled debut, made as a duo, and the ubiquitous hits it spawned (In for the Kill, Bulletproof), La Roux fans have had to content themselves with two excellent but all too rare follow-ups in 17 years.

That’s perhaps a poignant number as her latest, Old Flames, is inspired by the heartbreak of the end of a 17-year relationship with a childhood sweetheart turned muse.

The self-produced album, then, is a very personal record – though the combination of Jackson’s unique cut-glass soprano with minimalist synths feels wonderfully familiar.

After an intro referencing the title track, Cabin Fever’s bitter but wistful lyrics over the top of turn-of-the-century pop encapsulate the ambivalence of lost love and the contradictory feelings of enmity and longing it inspires.

Lose Myself leans into pain, with its hints of near-namesake Michael Jackson’s patented shrieks, and jarring electronic bass interspersed with entreaties to return. Falling is more melancholic, before To Make Our Love enjoyably harks back to the tropical pop of La Roux’s second album Trouble in Paradise.

Sonically, that continues on Your Lover, whose chorus seems a semi-sarcastic rebuke at unfaithfulness. Whether or not Jackson is drawing on experience, or riffing on the subject, it’s enough to make any prospective love rat bop back to their burrow.

Final Fantasy introduces elements of soul to great effect and nails the misplaced desire to go back and recapture old feelings despite everything, a theme continued on Night Vision.

If much of the record is dedicated to processing a break-up, concluding with the cathartic letting go of I Just Keep Crying, the brilliant Babyline is about emerging out the other side. It’s vintage La Roux and yet fresh – combining Jackson’s vocal angularity with an openness that maybe some of her earlier work has lacked.

After all that, the closing title track is the perfect coda to tie things up. Resolving it’s time to walk away, as “old flames burn out”, but with the optimism that comes from moving on.

It’s great to have La Roux back, even if, unlike the emergence of cicadas, one wishes it were a more regular occurrence. As with a new record that adds the emotional depth of heartbreak to her tried-and-tested synthpop formula, Jackson’s music is one old flame it’s a delight to revisit.

Mark Worgan
Image: Nabil

Old Flames is released on 6^th November 2026. For further information or to order the album, visit La Roux’s website here.

Watch the video for Cabin Fever here: