Cece Natalie’s latest single, Not Even Lying, marks both a geographic and artistic shift. Having recently relocated to New York City, the rising internet pop artist channels that sense of displacement into a song that feels both intimate and distant, as though whispered from the corner of a dimly lit room. It’s a chilly, nocturnal track, built on sparse piano chords and wisps of synth that stretch and bend like neon lights in the rain.

What sets the song apart is its emotional ambivalence. The hook “You were supposed to turn evil, but you never did / You were not even lying” captures the paradox of waiting for hurt that never arrives. Instead of relief, there’s a hollow sense of anticlimax, as if betrayal itself might have offered more clarity than ambiguous trust. Natalie leans into that unease, her voice hovering in a register that is equal parts pout and confession.

Musically, the track nods to the hazy glamour of early 2010s alt-pop, echoing the noirish mood of Lana Del Rey’s earliest ballads and the narcotic haze of the Weeknd’s House of Balloons. Yet Natalie’s touch is lighter, less theatrical; she allows the space between notes to speak, creating a tension that keeps the listener suspended. The production resists easy catharsis, refusing to explode into a climax, and instead lingers in shadow.

As an evolution from her earlier work blingy, 2000s-inspired bedroom pop laced with hypnotic R&B flourishes Not Even Lying shows Natalie stepping into a darker, more restrained palette. It’s a song that trades sugar rushes for slow-burn atmosphere, and in doing so, it suggests an artist testing the boundaries of her own aesthetic. Moody, alluring, and unresolved, it leaves the impression that Natalie is only just beginning to map the terrain of her new creative world.