Wryta Thinkpiece

I do know a little Latin. Him and I don't see eye to eye though And I actually didn't take a liking to Noir until...what...two weeks ago? I sat down, turned it on, and closed my eyes, listening to it with my "inner self," something my Acting professor would have us do when he really wanted us to pay attention to and really feel what he was saying. I'm not too into the verses or the intro, and the lyrics altogether are just commonplace to me, but goddamn is "Noir" raw in delivery. I personally am just really fond of the chorus, Lana just sounds so scorned and there's just so much wrath when she sings it, that's what I love more than anything. She totally got possessed by Emilie Autumn on that track. If Emilie collab'd with her and composed the backing track with her, it would have been so sick. I wouldn't rant or rave about anything else with "Noir," though. Raw delivery and an erotically angry chorus, and that's all it's got, the backing track restricts "Noir" from being any more exquisite. BUT I FUCKING LOVE IT THOUGH

No worries, I totally understand! I know you're speaking generally, but I do have to say that in retrospect, I find myself a bit contradicting and conflicted, as I agree with everything you said just as much, if not said it myself to a lot of people I've talked about/listened to Lana with. I'm just so desensitized to the thrill I used to get from tracks like "Cola" and "G&M." I can listen to them and love them, but getting into them like I used to is a whole other story. I think I just need a break from the two more than anything. ... "Bloody..." ...I'm just not going to even go there, but As for the Tumblr overexposure with certain Lana songs... I am going to stop there to avoid having a Hipster moment. "Y&B" and "DP" are still candidates though, and I still wish I tasted like Pepsi-Cola or at least like Lemon Meringue pie. Someone make me Lemon Meringue pie, pls.

TEN!

So bear with me as I try not to look like an idiot. Numero uno, I hear "Come on, baby, tell me where his tattooed-ass beat ya." It's right based on my biased support of it because I just find it sexier. That Yale line...I hear it, and I also hear "Yeah/Yo, that's/it's not a problem, let's solve it." I do hear "love," but not too often. I also think that when she's saying the "not a problem, let's solve it," it'd segue into the tutor lyric if we instead think of it as the "you" of the song like a student (obvi Lana) having difficulty with figuring out/solving something that's otherwise very simple (which makes it a problem for them), and Lana (from the scandalous teacher's perspective) is just basically saying, "It's very simple, let's do it together," since "let's" is short for "let us," so basically the teacher is..."helping" Lana with his expertise because she's having a bit of a problem with what would be a cakewalk for him. Which, whether the problem is getting the scholarship itself or getting into Yale (because she can't get the scholarship because she doesn't have the grades to get it) is the problem, my interpretation is, basically, that sex between her and the teacher is being traded so that way he gives her the grades/letter of recommendation to get the scholarship and/or get into Yale...because I'm pretty sure not too many people are doing crack in the back of the school and acing As all across the board. So...yeah...

^^^ Forgot to just edit that post when I made a typo and posted another instead. SORRY!

Also on the "Body Electric" and "Cola" bandwagon. Paradise has a few other overrated tracks for me, "Gods & Monsters" and "Yayo" "Cola" was all for the sake of the first line, though I do think that the "I pledge allegiance to my Dad/For teaching me everything he knows" line was quite clever, but that song and "Gods & Monsters" were just sexually-charged, saucy fillers for me. Love the songs, but it's filler to me and just is an awkward segue from "American," and same for "Gods & Monsters" from "Blue Velvet." And "Body Electric" just felt so devoid of emotion and lyrically-inarticulate. "Yayo" should have been left at its AKA perfection. I respect the Paradise version, but I could have done without it on Paradise. These tracks should have been unreleased leaks. I personally think that a Paradise-esque (maybe even a more ballad Paradise style) version of "1949" and "I Don't Wanna Go/Last Girl On Earth/My Best Days" would have been a more suitable segue between "American" and "Blue Velvet," and from "Blue Velvet" and "Bel Air," Paradise-esque versions of "Hollywood's Dead" and "You & Me," except both have to keep most of their magic, just enough Paradise influence to keep it smooth.

No. You don't love Anna Calvi. Anna Calvi loves you.

Not going to lie, I did not like Mermaid Motel when I first heard it. Now? I practically go in like this, retro-trip trance every time. ESPECIALLY WHEN THE CHORUS COMES. GOD. BLISS.

"Young & Beautiful" for me. I love the first verse and everything about it, it is probably my favorite part, but everything else is just weak to me, especially the bridge. This is basically another "Dark Paradise" for me, except that I rarely go back to the studio version of DP after hearing the demo and then seeing the 52-second-long video where sings what I've been calling "the lost verse." Most of the lyrics in the Y&B and DP studio versions just seem hackneyed to me. I'll be hoping for Y&B demos over the summer and praying for a full-length demo of DP lolnevergonnahappen . Beautiful songs, but hardly Lana's best, and I'd probably involuntarily cringe if I heard someone say either of them were, but art is pretty subjective. I love all of Lana's songs because it's Lana, but I definitely have my least favorites especially "Big Bad Wolf". Be that as it may, I do try to find something to appreciate about the songs I am not the most fond of, whether it's their sound, their lyrics, or if there's a story about the song and/or references to works that were a source of inspiration (I love seeing artists do that.)

The lyrics are cute, but not much else (though I could have definitely done without the pre-choruses and bridge,) the chorus is catchy. The verses...I don't know, maybe they're why the chorus is the best part, but I just...I don't know. The way Lana sings them and the music itself, just can't get into them, but the change of pace and style for the choruses makes it worth it. Still makes me think of something I'd be listening to when I was in fourth grade. "Butterflies Pt. 2" definitely stands superior. I am so glad she did a part two.

Is it bad that I kind of want that grill? Makes sense! I could just never imagine Lana with someone wearing a grill, let alone kissing them; I've heard it usually ends up getting very funky.

... I'm going to like, overload the Entertainment forum right meow after seeing so many amazing musicians and groups not having topics here. So now I'm popping some cherries, starting with Anna Calvi, whose voice is just so raw, strong and dare I say arousing. Happy listening! This is just the beginning for some of you...

Talking about "golden grill" being a recurring thing in Lana's songs, I had an idea for the past two weeks that's been really eating at my curiosity. I'm not the only one who isn't taking it literal, right? Like... Not that, right? She so doesn't mean the FLAAAAAAAAAAAVA FLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAV grill, right? More like, just talking about her guy's grin and how radiant it is? Grill's slang for actual teeth, too, right? I think I listened to enough Nelly and 50 Cent during my childhood. I'm pretty sure I caught the drift with getting knocked in the grill. But no, really, I hope I am not the only one who hopesthinks she's just being slangtastically poetic as always.

The lyrics are the awkwardly beautiful lovechild of MadLibs and 90% of Maury Povich's guests, but... The lyrics are just too out of place for me, maybe if she sang with a little more attitude over a more hip-hop/jazz style, I'd take a liking to it, but this raw style definitely warrants lyrics of more substance. Definitely was expecting more of "Methamphetamines," LOVE the song and sound altogether, I just can't identify or appreciate the lyrics. But it's an extra track for my collection, and she at least sings it lovely, so there's something to appreciate.

I wrote a really long and informative rant on why my answer is "no" though we all know I'd still buy Lana's for Lana for why I avoid buying celebrity fragrances/products, but I got so excited to click the post button that I just clicked a bookmarked page and lost everything. I'll bitch another time, but for now, I'll just leave it at no; too early to go that route, too good to consider it for a while, too much risk with ended up with something of unreliable quality, and I honestly cannot see Lana releasing a fragrance, I'd find something very odd about her doing that.

TIME TO ANALYZE SOME LYRICS. [And I am awfully sorry for post-spamming BUT GODDAMN I LOVE THIS SONG THO] "Methamphetamines" makes me think of Lana and her lover being tweaked off meth, laying out on the veranda, playing music from the record player (maybe it'd be outside, maybe it'd just be near the window, playing loud). They're being sad together, getting high about being sad together just to be high and sad together, letting the routine run its cycle. Every day. They'd be quiet at first, relying on each other's physical presence for some solace. Once they started feeling the meth, maybe the lover would tell Lana about a dream from the night before that made him feel more disconsolate and disoriented than any other day. The both of them would exchange more of their recent sad dreams, how it seemed the happier dreams only poured salt on open wounds. They'd segue into talking about older dreams and aspirations, both shared and separate, but hardly anything that would get them smiling. Other than feeling some kind of sadness, love and yearning, they are just zombified; they're stripped of the people they used to be. Whatever daydreams they had, and probably spoke of on the veranda looking out to Ocean Grove, they're gone. Ocean Grove just grew barren gradually, and then suddenly. Nothing left but a epitaph of all those hopes they had for their life in the Jersey Shore together. The mention of neon palms swaying could be Lana and her lover having a visual hallucination while on meth, trying to find something left within their sight of Ocean Grove that was still beautiful and thriving despite how dead it was in their reality. Maybe Lana's question of going to Coney Island was her trying to get them both to share another hallucination for entertainment. Maybe they met there and she was trying to reminisce about it. Maybe it was her indirectly saying she wanted to return to simpler times, happier times, and maybe that was the "dream/big dream" she was reminding him of: happiness and simplicity. Maybe he'd be too tweaked and swamped in his own sadness to pay that much attention to or even answer Lana's question, maybe he'd fear that Lana no longer wanted for nothing but being together. Maybe it broke his heart to hear about a place they felt they couldn't return to just as much as it would have broke his heart to say "That'd be nice, we can do that," all along fearing that going there would mean preparing for the present to soon become history. No one would know, he'd only respond by handing her the makeshift light-bulb vaporizer, keeping his eyes on all the shapes made by the meth residue and burn marks from the lighter along the glass, letting out an ambiguous "hm." But no matter what he thought, no matter what he would've said, Lana would have understood. Happier times, even the possibility of living in happier times again, would only make them sadder to think about, and so they would get higher until they just couldn't be bothered getting up from laying on the veranda to stop the record from repeating, to change the music to something happier; until they couldn't be bothered doing anything else together that wouldn't make them sadder. But it wouldn't stop them from talking more about the dreams, about happiness and their lack of it; the only time they weren't disconnected was when they were high on meth and/or sharing somber moments with each other. The disconnection almost didn't even matter because they shared their woe like a telescope; they always saw through the same lens even if they weren't always looking at the same things. They took comfort in knowing that the other knew and felt sadness and hopelessness, what it was like to feel the world around had become desolate. They took those feelings and built an empire on that veranda with them, creating a world for themselves within the one they already inhabited. A world where the broken could know they were broken and self-destructing, love it and be loved for it in every way, something that they can be confident in each other about. All there was to live for was every tomorrow that guaranteed coming back to that world together; the rest of the world would tear itself asunder, nothing more would have mattered, nothing less. There was no need to tamper with each other's thoughts or emotions, no need to feign any of them either, because all that was felt then and there was understood, welcomed, and adored. It was a very "let all be and just love me" way of living, and that was all it was about. They were sad, they were hopeless, but they were harmonious. And that made that life a little less lonely. Maybe this moment on the veranda was Lana feeling like there just was nothing left of that life anymore, even with her lover. Maybe that farewell is her thoughts of leaving soon after that, going back to New York, reconsidering what to do with who she became, what she was. Maybe it was her saying farewell to their happier selves and their dreams, laying with her lover, watching the neon palms, feeling her body being pulled into the abyss the veranda kept long hidden inside its mouth of wooden planks, slowly opening wider and wider every day to accommodate for its increasing appetite for Lana and her lover's happiness. They'd sink into that abyss together in Lana's mind, and there would be the most sad-but-content look on her face while they fell asleep where they lay, only to rinse and repeat the next morning. ... And that's what it's like to be in my head while listening to Lana Del Rey except I usually imagine myself in Lana's shoes. OH. And here's a treat for those who made it up to now... Consider it what I think would have been the lover's perspective. That, and I fawn over Father John Misty like CRAZY and just wanted an excuse to listen to this song again.

I hear the "For the big dream" bit that Miss Daytona said, as well, I definitely hear the "b." That "one day among" line is begging for an extensive search of a 50s blues ballad because it's driving me batty not knowing what ballad she's mentioning. Also, about that veranda line... At first I thought Lana was saying something about the veranda looking "ocean gold," but I have no idea what that would even mean. Which is why I'm almost positive she mentions Ocean Grove twice in the song. Only because I figured about five or six different words and it's the one I hear the most. It's hard to tell because the only part that doesn't really get drowned out by the background noise is the "( r )oh" sound; she does get softer when she says it, so it could just be that the quality and noise cover the "gr" and "ve" sounds. I could be wrong, but it fits the rhyme-scheme she has going. I'm going to see if filtering out the noise and tweaking the song a bit can help with hearing Lana's voice more. But I'm certain. You can use "look" as an intransitive verb in many ways, one of them to indicate that something outlooks or views in a specified direction. which in the case of the veranda line (if Lana is saying Ocean Grove,) "looks" would mean that the veranda she's talking about faces Ocean Grove. "The veranda looks Ocean Grove, Neon palms sway..."

We. Are. SO on the same page. Also, just listened to this personal throwback while floating about. NO ONE can say no to that. No one. If you don't think about it, it's almost like listening to her. I swear. You all can staple my ears to my cheeks if I am wrong. Which I'm not. I'm feeling very smug and fulfilled having had this moment and giving birth to this idea from my cerebral womb. EDIT: Also, um...am I going to be the only person that also says a Lana-fied cover of "Too Much" by Spice Girls would also probably complete my life? AND, AND, AND pretty much ANY Anna Calvi song, especially "No More Words," "First We Kiss," "Desire," and Calvi's cover-style of the Shirelles' "Baby, It's You."

I skimmed over this so many times just because it takes a lot for me to listen to Selena because of all the nostalgia that hits me, but I'm in that mood today, and this was one of my favorite songs from Selena of all time. Lana would nail it. I keep getting her "I can speak Spanish," line from "Back to tha Basics" stuck in my head whenever I think of this. SHE WOULD JUST...GAH. Her unreleased stuff shows how raw and emotional she can really get with her singing; there are sometimes where the emotion is just so there with Lana that it can either really pump me up or really fuck me up for a bit. And Selena was always the same way, especially all throughout "Como La Flor." And the way she sings those last two notes of the chorus...gah. Throw in some of Lana's summery-toned styles, her emotional delivery, and blend it with a little Tejano flair, and we got Lana's next single/cover. English OR Spanish. It doesn't matter to me. Hell, it does, I'd rather her release both versions. I don't even care if the English was loosely translated or spot-on, she'd make a killer English tribute and a sexy, bright Spanish cover. I WILL SPEND THE REST OF MY LIFE TRYING TO GET LANA TO DO THIS. FOR BOTH OF US, CLEO. FOR. BOTH. OF. US.

"And ocean grow" should probably be "and Ocean Grove," which is a small community in New Jersey. Totally changes the impact of the last few lines.

In "Ooh Baby," I thought I heard, "Ooh-ooh, baby, what good are your high male friends?"

Your first kiss was at eleven and you were a beard for four months. I never learned how to ride a bike. I eat Starbursts with the wrapper still on. My stomach occasionally makes the rumblies that only hands can satisfy.

Also, pretty damn sure that Last Girl On Earth is pretty underrated. "Chariots of gold, I'm sittin', sippin' Cherry Cola/Caesar said he'd fall in love with me if I was older." I cream when I hear that part. Every time.

BACKFIRE! FUCK. FORGOT ABOUT THAT ONE. I got duct tape so it's all gucci.

My brain while trying to make the fairest and most spot-on list doe...