Dance Therapy may be Nora Schjelderup’s second album under the Ora the Molecule moniker, but the way she describes it, it feels like a debut. Even beyond the logistical element of 2021’s Human Safari being a more collaborative affair, this new project is landing at the top of a new year, and sees the artist undergoing a process of self re-examination that’s equal parts reflectively existential and purely physical. Hence the album title.
Her new single “Intergalactic Dance” is a perfect reflection of this dichotomy, as the nu-disco instrumental and fairly straightforward lyricism weigh against a much deeper meaning for Schjelderup. “‘Intergalactic Dance’ was written from a feeling of urgency,” she shares. “It’s the calling to be unapologetically you while on this planet. It’s a wake up call and a command for love, in a robotic fashion. So, do the dance, the intergalactic dance, the dance of you.”
The single’s music video exhibits some of the project’s more extraterrestrial influences, with Schjelderup citing Antoine de Saint-Exupèry’s The Little Prince as an influence on the track. “[The novel] follows a little intergalactic boy who travels from planet to planet and discovers essential truths about connection, life, love, and freedom of self and what is unseen, but eternal,” she explains. Sounds familiar!
Check out the visual below, and pre-order Dance Therapy ahead of its March 21 release via Mute here.
