Like the Lord, the pandemic taketh away and giveth — at least to Dua Lipa.
After releasing her second album, "Future Nostalgia," on March 27, 2020, the British pop star had to delay her world concert tour three separate times — about 22 months — because of the pandemic. However, that enabled her to stage a splashy livestreamed concert in late 2020 — watched by a staggering 5 million paying viewers — and then watch her "Levitating" rise to the biggest song of 2021.
In short, in the pandemic, Lockdown Lipa has blossomed into a major pop star.
When Lipa's Future Nostalgia Tour finally made its way to Minneapolis on Tuesday, the 26-year-old turned Target Center into a brightly colored nightclub, filled with neo-disco sounds, athletic dancing and let's-exhale-from-the-pandemic joy for 14,000 thrilled-to-party, mask-free fans.
Lipa commenced the liberating jubilation with a retro blast of her club banger "Physical," with echoes of Patti LaBelle's 1984's "New Attitude" as well as not only samples of Olivia Newton-John's 1981 hit of the same name but ONJ-evoking aerobics, with a ballet barre but minus the headbands.
Entreating people to dance is the thing with Lipa, a former magazine cover girl who won Grammys for best new artist and best pop vocal album. Surrounded by as many as 10 dancers and two roller skaters, Lipa carried on, romping with umbrellas, stomping down a runway and whipping her hair.
With her prancing and strutting, Lipa showed all the moves of a supermodel. To her credit, she executed simple choreography but without the pronounced movements and limberness of Juicy Jayne, Miss Roo and the rest of the troupe. The most exciting dance sequence came when Lipa was offstage changing outfits, before she joined them for the aptly named "Electricity."
Like Ariana Grande and Lady Gaga, Lipa isn't known for her dancing. But those pop princesses are regarded as top-notch vocalists whereas Lipa is more a pop star with an appealing, slightly smokey voice. However, in concert she relied heavily on four backup singers and pre-recorded vocals.