slang

It's a variant illuminati rant. The conventional illuminati (e.g. Mark Dice) see her as the devil's spokesperson. These people want to use her as a (positive?) symbol of what they fear, so LDR is kind of like a symptom of "it's all going to hell" or a symbol for a "wake up call". Of course, LDR is simply an expressive artist and has no agenda, but these people are using her as such. I imagine LDR's reaction to this would be WTF. This is also kind of disturbing and related: https://twitter.com/robgrantdotcom/statuses/486934865481183232

Is there a place on LB that addresses the timeline for Hollywood, JFK, AFFA, Starry Eyed, and possibly Black Beauty? I got the idea that they were "outtakes" from Paradise, but couldn't they all have been the start of an album that fell by the wayside when they were leaked? That was definitely true of Black Beauty. What I'm trying to get at is whether she actually did have writer's block after Paradise. Regardless, it's amazing to me that she got the blueprint for UV so fast.

On LDR male "birds of a feather": I know people are fixating on physical characteristics, though characteristics needn't always be physical. They can also be musical or tactical (i.e., how famous people get media exposure). Anyway, the guys below strike me as much a male analogy to LDR (wrt physical dimensions) as James Dean, but they are also (damn good) musicians. LDR was referred to as Chris Isaak's granddaughter in France. Although I can't give receipts for this, this reference is what caused me to pay attention to CI (and I'm glad I did). Jeff Buckley might also have had the same kind of dark soul (not sure). Jimmy Gnecco. Rufus Wainwright. And how could I not mention Kurt Cobain (more physical than musical similarity, I mean they could be siblings). Oh my God, Axl Rose! LDR loves male analogues of herself (excepting Rufus who loves LDR)! Just try "google images" on these guys and draw your own conclusions. Bowie is interesting in that he had a relatively hard time getting launched (i.e., had to show his talent in many diverse ways before getting famous). Bowie also jerked the media around famously (the issue being his sexuality). These are recollections from having read the Mark Spitz biography. LDR also had a diverse beginning and a difficult time, and whether she does it intentionally or not, she definitely jerks the media around the same way (e.g., depression, feminism).

Triple J is there: Retweeted by Lana Del Rey Online: (1st link gets you to the 2nd one). https://twitter.com/LanaNow/statuses/485730141554098177 https://m.soundcloud.com/lindzydelrey/lana-del-rey-interview-on-triple-j-radio-july-62014 I thought it was interesting particularly when they talked about Brooklyn Baby. I didn't notice the time of it (midway thru?) and anyway I was perplexed at the interface, which didn't allow me to skip around. The talk *suggested* (to me, at least) ambiguities about Barrie. Maybe they signal a true divide or maybe it was just slyly orchestrated to seem ambiguous. Anyway, still rooting for Barrie, in the sense of wanting collaborations from him and LDR in the future.

He's a giant and quite a large piece of rock history. He is also part of a larger song-writing entity with lyricist Bernie Taupin. I wonder how the song writing process goes for him. Does he wait for the lyrics before writing music, or does he send musical ideas to BT first, or was it both? Who decided topics for songs? His earlier period was every bit as cinematic as well ... cinema. He often employed large orchestra and sang on character driven topics, where the characters were at the margin of society (not himself). Check out Tumbleweed Connection, Mad Man Across the Water. How this later developed into glam rock is mysterious to me (Goodbye Yellow Brick Road) and that there are large autobiograhical statements following/within the glam rock period which are equally fabulous (Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, Blue Moves). There's a lengthy middle period where he's adapting continuously to what's in vogue in the 80s and 90s and manages a fair number of hits. His most recent stuff (The Diving Board, The Union), with that older golden baritone, is unapolegetically reactionary (e.g., piano blues and New Orleans brassy sound). He's kind of like craggy old rocks in a rushing river of pop vapidity. The broadway and movie stuff of his is also impressive. One hidden gem among all that is the song score for The Road to Eldorado (which he performs). This has the quality of a better middle-period album for me.

I know people like full translations, but synopses of the new info are also useful and appreciated too. So yeah, the title shows either she has fallen off the wagon (which would be big news) or the Germans just have a conventional view of her (and they have not researched her past).

Well I don't know, death is kind of a big deal, so why not write about it if one wants to? The point about her glamorizing it or it being about herself would be irrelevant if everybody had the mindset that no matter what she says on the topic, the choice will always be yours to interpret her songs as fiction or character studies. Also didn't somebody ask her about "Die Young" tattoo, and didn't she come up with some kind of politically correct answer for it? http://popdirt.com/lana-del-rey-on-die-young-tattoo-lizzy-grant-name-change/112217/ @@evilentity: "And that's just BTD. I could go on all day with her other albums and unreleased material." Her leaks and unreleased don't seem saturated with self-death imagery to me. Other death imagery (aka tragedy) maybe, but that is not a controversial thing in art. In LDRAKALG there's "Jump", which is probably the most explicit on suicide, but it's just one song, and I still think it has a right to exist as a song. I mean isn't Hollywood's Dead a great song on the topic of death emphasizing tragedy over glamor?

It's fair to say that nobody knows LDR better than Barrie, so when he says it's not over it has some weight. The only thing I didn't like was his possible comment on LDR's alleged death wish being a publicity stunt.* Whether it was or not, he'll probably catch some shit from LDR on that. Even so, I hope their studio stuff comes to light someday. I'm also wondering about the album he said he was recording and whether LDR is involved. *Here's what I heard: "That's just pathos man, you know it's just .... She's got an album to sell man". I actually understand Barrie better than the interviewer who seems a bit uncomprehending of Barrie's response.

The more I think about her, the less I think of her as being depressed, but of just not knowing and therefore changing her mind frequently, but only about certain things. So in a lot of interviews she says she's happy, but in others she says she's not. This is just another aspect of "I'm going to re-release AKA; I'm not going to release AKA" ; "The album (UV) is finished; let's redo the album"; "I derive strength from my audiences; I feel guilty that I don't care as much as my audiences". "I'm engaged; "we're friends". I'm tempted to view the whole leaks/unreleased phenomenon in similar terms. I mean why bother to have a "final version" of Behind Closed Doors, if you're not going to release it? She must have changed her mind. While I think she has stable core principles or values (e.g. family, human rights, artistic aesthetics), the phrase "strange weather" would seem to apply as much to herself as anyone she has ever sung about. There is also the question of balance and bias. If she says the right thing (such as the mention of her community outreach interest in the Guardian interview) it will be buried in the print; if she says the wrong thing it will be a headline. I don't think it's a given that journalists are obligated to use the most shocking sound bite as the "news", especially if other articles contradict it (i.e., doesn't she say in an earlier interview dead artists aren't very useful? Doesn't she also like living artists?). From what I can tell, the interviewer's attempts to get her to rebut or even clarify her answer were lame. Instead of asking her about family or her art for reasons to go on in the land of the living, he asks her about live shows and adoring (if sometimes annoying) fans. But we all know she's often uncomfortable with performing. If the interviewer had said something like, "well, but what if I were to use 'I wish I were dead already' as the title for this interview? Would that be accurate?", do we believe LDR would have simply said yes, or would she have back pedaled furiously? If you're going to treat the headline as "news" and not just LDR saying something stupid, then that's the kind of probing you have to do. But the interviewer clearly quit while he was ahead (at least in the 2 min excerpt I heard).

She talks about her belief in God in this article. It's not inconsistent with what she says to NPR. Also what she says is pretty scarey. http://lanaboards.com/index.php?/topic/1385-original-sin-an-interview-with-lana-del-rey-john-calvert-october-4th-2011-0707/?p=34637 here's the excerpt: You also told Pitchfork that God has saved your life a million times, which strikes me as in opposition to your music. Because, in films based in small town America, religion is frequently a patriarchal, repressive and evil presence, with the archetype you portray acting as a force in subverting it. LDR: I think there’s a division of organised religion similar to what you’ve described. But where I’m concerned, my understanding of God has come from my own personal experiences… because I was in trouble so many times in New York that if you were me, you would believe in God too. When things get bad enough, your only resort is to lie in bed and start praying. I dunno about congregating once a week in a church and all that, but when I heard there is a divine power you can call on, I did. I suppose my approach to religion is like my approach to music - I take what I want and leave the rest. What kind of ‘trouble’? LDR: Any and all. When I was in New York I had nowhere to live, and I was trying to find a way to be a musician… Just trying to survive, which is fucking hard by the way. So I got myself into a lot of situations I didn’t plan on. [Pauses] I think what I was going for was something beautiful, but I kinda got myself into trouble along the way. Sorry, that’s pretty vague.

In the Guardian followup, the staff pick for a "debate-contributing comment" is very interesting (that is concilatory): http://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2014/jun/20/lana-del-rey-problem-interview-but-why be sure to click on the "guardian picks" tab of the comment section. I think the issue with LDR is just personal. She may have said something stupid but she expected more of a safety net or balanced presentation on what she said. She didn't get that and it surprised her (her reference to a "masked as a fan"). Instead, from her perspective the article emphasized the one thing that would give the publication the most boost (at the most expense of the artist).

It's interesting they focused on the meaning of the chorus scenes (driving at night), and it was different than what I expected. But jeeez, the stuff they left out of the discussion (the fire scene, the drug references in the beginning, Bradley's death?) sort of makes me think LDR wants to keep it undetermined as to what West Coast is about. If I were to rationalize it, I'd say LDR doesn't want to restrict our "free will" about how to interpret the video, but I really don't know.

I agree, she's not an enigma that has to be rationalized, but I think there is enough ambivalence (and clear statements) in her lyrics that she *can*, in her current UV album, be rationalized in feminist (or humanist) terms. I mean what if LDR had said something like this: "the major theme to UV is that these (submissive?) toxic relationships I've had with my men parallel the toxic the relationships my men have had with drugs, but like my men I can't (easily) stop it." Maybe she doesn't mean this in UV (although that's my preferred interpretation), but her lyrics have enough flexibility or vagueness to allow interpretations like this. There's also a lot throughout UV that suggests she doesn't enjoy the relationships she's singing about, but that she was addicted to them. I mean sure there's the song Ultraviolence, but doesn't that strike people as a sad song? And there are songs like Cruel World and Pretty When You Cry where she is more explicit about not liking the situation. Zoladz doesn't connect the dots as I would wish. From PWYC: All those special times I spent with you my love They don't mean shit compared to all your drugs But I don't really mind, I've got much more than that Like my memories, I don't need that I'll wait for you, babe You don't come through, babe You never do, babe It's just what you do

Money Power Glory at about 1:57 for about 15 secs seems to phase in to a slowed or maybe key-altered version of "Us Against the World". In fact, the words seem conceptually related to UATW at that point too.

I wasn't impressed by the article either. The comments about SNL performances were biased. The "truth" is that there is a fence and about half the people on one side of it like the SNL performances and on the other side of the fence they hate it (actually the likes exceeded the dislikes something like 60/40 on youtube when SNL performances were on LanaDelReyVevo). I for one see those performances as the official start of my fandom. The other thing the article did, which was kind of shameless, is represent Lizzy Grant's persona with the performance that best illustrated the idea that the LDR transformation from Lizzy Grant was "inauthentic". If they'd have used her 2008 NY Living Room performance of Yayo instead, people would be much more confused about who would win a fanciful bitch fight (Lizzie Grant vs. Lana Del Rey). However, the article does provide the SNL Video Games performance, which is surprising to me because I thought LDR shut them all down. I predict that video will be gone soon, so enjoy it (or not) while it lasts!

Maybe a 70 or better is overstating a bit. But on a really quick read I really did get the impression he liked it. I put some of the paragraphs that I think gave me this impression below. The double asterisks where you see them are mine. It's pretty clear, imo, in the last paragraph of the article that he's working out his own shit, as there is nobody at LB who doesn't know the answer to this question: "Is Lana Del Rey able to have feelings this embarrassing and overwrought and still mean them and have them meant?" Everybody here would say yes, but he seems to be having an epiphany (or a breakdown) in that final paragraph, which is pretty rare for a review (even if it says it's an article). I truly cannot tell if he's praising or criticizing LDR in that last paragraph, so if I were metacritic, I'd ask for a number. Some quotes: "On its face, LDR’s politics might be broken, but her lyrics and persona have the potential to embrace a kind of Lynchian feminism, one that explores the power behind desiring something hurtful by exploiting images of women in trouble. But even that representation is problematic (especially on a massively mediated scale like radio music), because its meaningful exploitation will itself be exploited and then (deliberately) misread as sexy, backwards, proper, fake. So, there’s no real room for subversion, and it all becomes about Lana Del Rey’s personal fucked-upness, which still feels unreal. Her lyrical commitment to being dominated emotionally by the men in her life and swept up in red dresses is not that out of step with most of her contemporaries, but her aesthetic drags her into the past, away from progress narratives or play or irony or defense. We don’t know if the detachment is hers or ours, from reality or sincerity. She sings from a Twilight Zone of political irresponsibility, in which the singer’s self-obsession forces our gaze toward the possibility of our complicity in this broken present we pretend to know we can’t escape. And still, somehow, Ultraviolence **doesn’t** feel like a retreat or forgery. ..... "So, this is the mythology she revels in. For all the talk of her opportunistic artifice, there’s not much here to draw a bigger commercial audience or to readapt LDR for a pop landscape that doesn’t, say, clamor for a star as fucking brooding and Gatsbyphilic as she plays. It’s a bad act or maybe not an act at all, but either way, we should be listening intently because Ultraviolence finally finds the right sound to make Lana Del Rey’s everlasting sadness **feel significant** by the end of its 50 minutes." ..... **Most of the songs come with pop hooks, memorable bridges, bells, whistles, and impressive vocals from LDR.** The way “West Coast” slips into slo-mo for the chorus makes it a boring single, but it clicks as a show-stopping mid-album track that throws the momentum from bright standout “Brooklyn Baby” into clumsy confusion, a series of awkward restarts with a menacing barely-there synth that creeps up behind the verses. **There’s real bite to her delivery and the bluesy, surfy Badalamenti guitar.** Elsewhere, we get deadpan ambition (“Money Power Glory”), sneering resentment (“Fucked My Way Up To The Top”), and **genuine** heartache ([every song]). ..... Is Lana Del Rey able to have feelings this embarrassing and overwrought and still mean them and have them meant? For those feelings to be so strangely articulated, on an album that’s too stuck in its ways to be a good fit anywhere, is the sort of topsy-turvy uncanny realness (we were born) to die for, or at least to take a second look into, and to maybe see the flicker of our own fake/real selves in the way we might linger on the right selfie: politically bankrupt, disarmingly genuine, captivating and alienating in its perfect composition. What we’re looking for isn’t there until we take a long look, where we find in the subject’s blanked-out fakeness the reassurance that either we are real and the subject is not, that we have the power to be as real in as many ways as the subject does, or that we are powerless — even in this moment as witness — not to be fake or a part of the spectacle."

Sounds like they liked it though, maybe at least a 70. And I think it is an actual review.

I didn't get much of a sense of what the music was like from the review. There is one paragraph about it ("languid desert rock") and then the rest seems to be about artist attitude. The sense I got was the music might have been great but the artist's attitude spoiled it (the last line in the review actually), so the 6 in 6/10 tells me more about the reviewer's sense of the importance of attitude than the quality of the artist's work. Waiting to see who (if anyone) will review/talk about UV at http://music.thetalkhouse.com/

She's singing this "live", so her sticking to the lyrics as in her notebook is not certain. Anyway, I'm hearing sometimes (not that it matters that much). I'm a sad girl, I'm a sad girl I'm a sad girl I'm a sad girl, I'm a *mad* girl I'm a bad girl and I'm a sad girl, I'm a sad girl I'm a sad girl I'm a sad girl, I'm a bad girl I'm a *mad* girl Also I'm getting impressed with the number of drug references in combination with the toxic relationship references. This is maybe not strongest in this song, but I'm not sure of that, at least there's: "Creeping around while he gets high It might not be something you would do" and all those fire references. How ironic would it be if there were a strong relationship between drugs and toxic relationships throughout, as that could be construed as a feminist agenda (substance abuse == toxic relationships). Interesting that the super-delux BOX has lyrics. I was thinking she wanted me to think the lyrics weren't as central, although I'm understanding most of what she says.

@@SitarHero - As far as mimicking, look to her new interview for the significance of the hip-hop sound of this song: "I would say the track having more of a hip hop heavier beat, whereas the rest of the album is live and organic…it kind of drives this one particular point home." Hip-hop influence is important here, something she and Lorde share. I mean plenty of sewer rats on LanaBoards.com have attempted to (unconvincingly) compare their sounds, and maybe Lana is surrounded by too many yes men and she believes this, too. I finally listened to the album all the way thru (God bless Amazon autorip). What's not being mentioned is the strangled loon (or is it a baboon sound) that happens at least twice in FMWUTTT. This strengthens the reference to hip hop LDR makes about the song in the article as corresponding to a self-reference (BTD era), not necessarily a Lorde reference, imo. Maybe a little diss to Emile? My point is that it's not necessarily exclusively about Lorde (or Taylor, or Gaga). I also think that So Legit was not (exclusively) about Gaga. On the topic of diss in general, isn't it somewhat "normal" to diss in hip hop? So for instance Tyler the Creator in Yonkers has that love tap to Bruno Mars in it (about stabbing in the esophagus) and his Domo23 seems to have a reference to pointing a gun at "one direction". So spreading the ambiguity further (I like thinking of LDR in uncertain terms), maybe the diss element is reference to hip hop itself.

I'd go with Pretty Baby (from Sirens), primarily to see how well she could sing it and whether she would sing it the same way. She's got a bunch of songs that I like just as much (i.e., that I would consider top tier), so it's the curiousity factor driving the choice, not the idea that it would be appropriate for a single. If the idea behind the topic is which would you choose and it *had* to be a single, I'd go with Serial Killer (because I think the song can be interpreted as about herself relative to her romantic entanglements).

@@evilentity : Hmm, maybe this is about Lorde. If you take the position that the songs are autobiographical then FMWUTTT having hip hop beats could still be referring to herself at the onset of the BTD era. She's addressing rivals in the song pretty obliquely. However, there are also statements about herself and about needing someone too. Doesn't seem very dissful to anyone to me. On the hypothesis of tracks being sequenced as loosely autobiographical, Old Money would be the Paradise era (or post BTD). So what would "The Other Woman" be about? The UV era? She cites that song as very deliberately positioned/chosen.

Well the parts like 1:15 ... and 2:10 ... seem strong to me (youtube's my source). I agree the production might have been better, but I have to wait and see what the physical or spotify sound like.

Why do you think she wouldn't approve? LDR non-jazz covers are mostly faithful (Chelsea Hotel, Blue Velvet, Summer Wine), as if absolute music in a repertoire. This being a cover of a Jazz type song, it could justifiably have a lot more Lana flourishes (I haven't listened to it overmuch, but more than the other non-single UV songs). I'm guessing you think LDR's version is too overblown in some way?

I think Lorde being the subject of the *potential* dis song FMWUTTT is debatable. So to recap: http://lanaboards.com/index.php?/topic/4780-lana-del-rey-interview-with-grazia/?p=188032 Interviewer: When you got famous like overnight people doubted about the authenticity of your music. LDR: Yeah, a huge topic. I’ve always felt confident about my music. Who doesn’t have to say anything cannot create pop music. I already know that later I’ll tell the whole story of my live to my children on the basis of my songs. Interviewer: Like you do in “Fucked My Way Up To The Top” on your new album? It’s about a singer who first sneered about my allegedly not authentic style but later she stole and copied it. And now she’s acting like I am the art project and she the true super artist. My God and people actually believe her, she’s successful! I shouldn’t continue ranting, it doesn’t get anywhere. My problem with Lorde as the target (other than making LDR seem quite the psycho bitch) is that I can't map this statement of LDR's onto Lorde: "And now she’s acting like I am the art project and she the true super artist." Lorde talked about political correctness of LDR's art but does not make LDR, specifically, into "an art project". Now consider Taylor Swift's Trouble video (which jacks LDR's Ride style) and the song the Lucky One. I'm using this lyrics source: http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/taylorswift/theluckyone.html here's the first para: "New to town with a made up name in the angel city, Chasing fortune and fame. And the camera flashes, make it look like a dream. You had it figured out since you were in school. Everybody loves pretty, everybody loves cool. So overnight you look like a sixties’ queen." Sounds like LDR, although Taylor puts in inconsistent details in the song. So for instance, Taylor is writing from the perspective of someone who got famous after this person, which is the reverse wrt LDR. I also like the fact that Taylor's protagonist retires (something LDR threatens repeatedly but never does). Anyway, the inconsistent details make the song more fictionalized and give plausible deniability that the song is specifically about LDR, and maybe it's not, although it still could have been inspired by her. Now FMWUTTT being about Taylor? That is a stretch (with some delicious ironies), but I prefer that interpretation, because I like Lorde.