Neon Fever Dream: Moncrieff’s ‘Shangri-La’ Ignites Pop Euphoria

If you bottled the reckless thrill of a road-trip fling and spiked it with neon synths, you’d pour Moncrieff’s “Shangri-La.” The Irish singer—long praised by everyone from Elton John to the late Avicii—has spent years wringing catharsis from heartbreak. Here, he flips the script, cannon-balling into joy so heady it feels illegal.

A stutter of four-on-the-floor kicks opens the track, soon swallowed by sun-bleached guitars and fizzy keyboard arpeggios that glint like glass in midsummer heat. Moncrieff’s voice—elastic, airborne, unmistakably his—rides the groove with a devil-may-care grin: “Let’s set the city on fire tonight / ignore the warning lights.” The hook detonates in a rush of serotonin, a shimmering wall of falsetto harmonies and festival-sized synth swells that practically beg for confetti cannons.

Yet this isn’t mindless euphoria. Lurking beneath the sugar rush is that knowing wink: the red flags he confesses to sidestepping, the inevitable comedown he’s already predicting. In true Moncrieff fashion, the pleasure and the peril share a heartbeat. It’s the same needle-thin tightrope he walked on “Warm” (the RTÉ Choice Music Prize winner) and the slow-burn ache of “Hard Feelings,” but “Shangri-La” sees him sprinting across it, arms wide, laughing at the drop.

Production-wise, the single feels like the spiritual cousin of Dua Lipa’s disco revival or The Weeknd’s glossy nostalgia—yet Moncrieff’s storytelling sets him apart. He frames infatuation not as blind bliss but as a deliberate, delicious delusion. By spotlighting that choice, he grants listeners permission to savor their own reckless chapters without apology.

“Shangri-La” is the fourth postcard from Maybe It’s Fine (out May 9 via Warner Music Central Europe), and if these initial tastes are any indicator, Moncrieff’s long-gestating debut album won’t just chronicle his first decade in music—it will cannonade him into pop’s front lines. Until the full record lands, this song is its own destination: three and a half minutes of pure, iridescent escape. Pack light, press play, and don’t look for the exit until the lights come up.