“You met me at a really strange time in my life.” Is that ever untrue? I’ve found life doesn’t move in cycles of strangeness and non-strangeness, but from one surreality to another. Since the release of “What Was That,” the press cycle around Lorde’s Virgin has taken up more of the frequency range than the album itself: think Brat Summer with more ego death and less branding, praising the Tommy Lee and Pamela Anderson sex tape then unpacking the nuances of her gender on the Met Gala red carpet. For three minutes, “Man of the Year” vaporizes all the noise. It starts off so piercingly spare: just Ella Yelich-O’Connor and a thumbed bassline.

If “What Was That” could sound like several Melodrama songs duct-taped together, “Man of the Year”’s lineage goes back to the cover of Frank Ocean’s “Solo” Lorde used to perform on that album’s tour. “Who’s gon’ love me like this/Who could give me lightness,” she wonders aloud, as a wave of synthesizer crests on the horizon, gathering and growing until it crashes ashore. Max Martin once described Lorde’s “Green Light” as “incorrect songwriting.” Similarly, “Man of the Year” doesn’t have peaks or valleys; it goes up and up and up and then it’s gone. A strange time, indeed.