There is a weird disconnect for me between the cover, the cover line, and the story itself. The latter is gushy and complimentary — it doesn’t dig too deep or tell you much you may not have already heard — and the header on here proclaims Dua Lipa the Queen of the Dance Floor, which I think is true. You cannot hear her songs without tapping a toe or shimmying a little. “Dance the Night Away” was robbed of an Oscar nod by that silly rule that you can only nominate two from a certain movie. However, I don’t QUITE understand how all that gels with a cover in which Dua is slumped against a wall. Even if she’s artistically, carefully slumped, there is a defensive posture to it, like someone is crawling toward her and she’s weighing whether she needs to kick them in the face. Something triumphal would’ve been more fun. I just wish, especially as a forward-facing newsstand image, that it projected strength and not trepidation.
