Lorde didn’t mince words at Madrid’s Real Cool Festival on Thursday. Midway through her set, the New Zealand singer paused to thank the crowd for sharing “something real” before unloading on a specific kind of wearable tech. “You don’t know if someone is wearing sunglasses or if they’re wearing those fucked up fucking… Can I just say, for the record, fuck the glasses. Don’t get the glasses. Not sexy.”
She didn’t name a brand from the stage, but the target was almost certainly Ray-Ban Meta AI smartglasses. The timing is awkward for the festival, which counts Ray-Ban as a sponsor, and even more awkward for the next act: Blackpink’s Jennie, who happens to be a paid ambassador for those exact glasses. Jennie has been promoting the Ray-Ban Meta partnership on Instagram and in video spots screened between sets at the same event.
Lorde’s outburst taps into a real and growing anxiety. The glasses look nearly indistinguishable from regular sunglasses, meaning the person next to you at a concert — or on a date, or in a locker room — could be quietly capturing everything. Meta faces ongoing backlash over privacy concerns tied to its smart glasses lineup, and yet the company is reportedly pushing ahead with a more ambitious “super sensing” pair designed for continuous recording.
What makes Lorde’s comment land harder is the venue. Festivals are supposed to be spaces of collective, ephemeral experience — the one place where the social contract still says “be here now.” A device that silently records and processes reality undercuts that promise entirely. Whether Meta’s product team takes the criticism seriously or dismisses it as a celebrity hot take, the discomfort Lorde voiced isn’t going anywhere.
