When and where was AKA written and recorded?

[evilentity 13,303]

My reply to a question in another thread got me thinking about "Aviation" and the whole Alabama mystery again. In "Aviation", she mentions Pensacola and flying "fighter jets all over the nation", clearly a reference to the Naval Air Station there. But what hadn't occurred to me before is how close Pensacola, FL is to the Alabama state line, within commuting distance. If it weren't for the fact that she said she's lived in Birmingham, AL, which is farther away, in an interview and on one of her MySpace accounts (though on another that may or may not be legit she listed Dauphine Island, which is closer), I'd speculate that "Aviation" is possibly written from the perspective of someone a few years ahead of her in her degree program at Fordham who decided to become a military pilot after graduation, perhaps a boyfriend she followed down there. (I see @@PrettyBaby beat me to the punch on this theory.) Her comments in her Fader interview would align with this:

I’ve lived a lot of different lives. I lived down in Alabama with my boyfriend, I lived here in Brooklyn and in Jersey. I’ve been a lot of different people, I guess.

 
Whatever the story may be on this guy, I wonder if he ever said her pussy tastes like Pensacola.
 
 
Other possibilities, fitting with @@Monicker's non-literal "state of mind" theory, are that it was fantasy based off the True Romance character Alabama Whitman, that clearly influenced her, especially during her Lizzy Grant days (@@TrailerParkDarling beat me to the punch on that one, RIP), or the name of a subway station she used to go to.

[Valentino 884]

I'm unsure if this has anything to do with this, but I find it curious that she uses a (bad) Southern accent on AKA. It's most prominent in Mermaid Motel (because ah am) and, infamously, OSCYS (and ah weeyill). Listen to any of her interviews and you'll be able to tell that this is not her native accent (neither is the exaggerated New York accent she uses on UV, but that's a different topic). If her time in Alabama coincided with her recording AKA, it could explain why she puts on this fake accent - she's feeling inspired by the people around her, who possibly had Southern accents (the Iggy Azalea defense? ) It also explains why it hasn't shown up since then - nothing from Born To Die on has had that fake Southern accent.

 

The odd thing is not all of AKA has this accent. Yayo doesn't really have it. Smarty doesn't. Brite Lites does (ah'm goin' back to Arbor Dean, where when I was a beauty queen). Kill Kill does in the 2nd verse (do ah know rye is going to meet you). Inexplicably, Raise me Up (Mississippi South) does not have this accent. Why? And why did she feel she had to put use an accent other than her native one for her debut album? I do think it's got to have something to do with her time in the South.

 

She also talks about Florida a lot - Aviation (Pensacola), Florida Kilos (title and "we could get high in Miami"), Florida Dark (Kill Kill), Axl Rose Husband (you look like a Florida native), Delicious (South Beach). That makes 3 Southern states she's mentioned: Florida, Alabama, Mississippi. And she says she got the name "Lana Del Rey" when hanging out with Cuban friends in Miami. Do I believe her? Who knows.

 

She also experiments with non-standard English in Sirens, with My Momma: my momma, she would say you was a hoodlum but I done known a hoodlum, you don't pass the test. She's still singing with her native accent, but she's clearly trying something out since she does not speak like this in her interviews or at concerts. "You was" is pretty run-of-the-mill in non-standard English varieties, but "done known" narrows it down to Southern American English.

[evilentity 13,303]

I'm unsure if this has anything to do with this, but I find it curious that she uses a (bad) Southern accent on AKA. It's most prominent in Mermaid Motel (because ah am) and, infamously, OSCYS (and ah weeyill). Listen to any of her interviews and you'll be able to tell that this is not her native accent (neither is the exaggerated New York accent she uses on UV, but that's a different topic). If her time in Alabama coincided with her recording AKA, it could explain why she puts on this fake accent - she's feeling inspired by the people around her, who possibly had Southern accents (the Iggy Azalea defense? ) It also explains why it hasn't shown up since then - nothing from Born To Die on has had that fake Southern accent.

 

The odd thing is not all of AKA has this accent. Yayo doesn't really have it. Smarty doesn't. Brite Lites does (ah'm goin' back to Arbor Dean, where when I was a beauty queen). Kill Kill does in the 2nd verse (do ah know rye is going to meet you). Inexplicably, Raise me Up (Mississippi South) does not have this accent. Why? And why did she feel she had to put use an accent other than her native one for her debut album? I do think it's got to have something to do with her time in the South.

She's definitely got what sounds to me like a New Yawk accent (whether real or put on) on a number of UV tracks, but I've personally never really thought of her sounding "Southern" on AKA, more vaguely rural American.

 

She also talks about Florida a lot - Aviation (Pensacola), Florida Kilos (title and "we could get high in Miami"), Florida Dark (Kill Kill), Axl Rose Husband (you look like a Florida native), Delicious (South Beach). That makes 3 Southern states she's mentioned: Florida, Alabama, Mississippi. And she says she got the name "Lana Del Rey" when hanging out with Cuban friends in Miami. Do I believe her? Who knows.

I'm pretty sure I've seen references to Grant family vacations in Florida. I think she mentioned in an interview that her dad bought a trailer down there and I think Rob has tweeted pics while on vacation in Florida. I've also seen old social media posts of hers about visiting friends in Miami and going to a Heat game.

 

She also experiments with non-standard English in Sirens, with My Momma: my momma, she would say you was a hoodlum but I done known a hoodlum, you don't pass the test. She's still singing with her native accent, but she's clearly trying something out since she does not speak like this in her interviews or at concerts. "You was" is pretty run-of-the-mill in non-standard English varieties, but "done known" narrows it down to Southern American English.

I'm from a northern state in the Midwest and I done known lots of people who talk like that who done never lived in the South.

[Valentino 884]

She's definitely got what sounds to me like a New Yawk accent (whether real or put on) on a number of UV tracks, but I've personally never really thought of her sounding "Southern" on AKA, more vaguely rural American.

The monophthongization of /aɪ/ to [aː] is distinctively Southern. A farmer from Minnesota won't sound like that. A farmer from Mississippi might. You can still find city dwellers who do this although since it's a stigmatized feature it's less common.

 

Similarly, the breaking of /ɪ/ to [ɪjə] (ah weeyill) is Southern. It's more likely to be encountered if you're working class (rural or urban), but you can find middle class speakers. This particular feature (along with breaking other front vowels) is what people know as the Southern drawl.

 

When you say rural, do you mean like Appalachian english? That does share the monophthongization of /aɪ/, although it changes to a different vowel. It also doesn't have the drawl. They're often conflated in the popular imagination, though, so someone trying to sound "southern" or "rural" might borrow from both.

 

I'm from a northern state in the Midwest and I done known lots of people who talk like that who done never lived in the South.

I can't explain that, but done as an auxiliary verb for past tense is a feature of Southern english. It's one of the many features of Southern english people mock. Perhaps some features have spread?

[cheaptrailertrashglm 3,197]

My reply to a question in another thread got me thinking about "Aviation" and the whole Alabama mystery again. In "Aviation", she mentions Pensacola and flying "fighter jets all over the nation", clearly a reference to the Naval Air Station there. But what hadn't occurred to me before is how close Pensacola, FL is to the Alabama state line, within commuting distance. If it weren't for the fact that she said she's lived in Birmingham, AL, which is farther away, in an interview and on one of her MySpace accounts (though on another that may or may not be legit she listed Dauphine Island, which is closer), I'd speculate that "Aviation" is possibly written from the perspective of someone a few years ahead of her in her degree program at Fordham who decided to become a military pilot after graduation, perhaps a boyfriend she followed down there. (I see @@PrettyBaby beat me to the punch on this theory.) Her comments in her Fader interview would align with this:

 

Whatever the story may be on this guy, I wonder if he ever said her pussy tastes like Pensacola.

 

 

Other possibilities, fitting with @@Monicker's non-literal "state of mind" theory, are that it was fantasy based off the True Romance character Alabama Whitman, that clearly influenced her, especially during her Lizzy Grant days (@@TrailerParkDarling beat me to the punch on that one, RIP), or the name of a subway station she used to go to.

Plot twist....that new podcast "S-Town" aka Woodstock Alabama.....she lived there..

Ultraviolence: "we could go back to WOODSTOCK, where they don't know who we are.."