Vertimus

Joan looks amazing for her age. Two legends. I cannot wait to see the written content. I am especially looking forward to Joan's comments on Lana's music, hopefully with some specificity.

I was referring not to her voice overall, or her voice overall on 'OB,' but on certain songs, and on specific parts of those songs. So please don't misunderstand what I said or mistake the context. A lot of 'the problem' has to do with the recording, the production, and the mastering, though certainly not all of it. When I hear her straining and her voice going sharp, I can't agree that her voice sounds 'angelic' or particularly 'beautiful.' Overall, if I had to select one or more of her albums on which I thought her voice sounded best, OB would not be one of them. I don't think 'White Dress' is a good example to use, because clearly the vocals on that song are not standard or typical of her, and I don't think anyone knows why she decided to sing that song that way. It's too early to tell, but her voice may be in the process of genuinely changing, as many vocalists' voices do as the get older, and sometimes in a fairly short timeframe.

‘Thin’ is also a good word for it. ‘Rich,’ ‘full,’ it is not.

But it's not a matter of a 'heavy' voice, just one without strain. To me, it sounds very awkward and it jumps out at me every time. I can hit that note better than she does.

But, on both the '3 white butterflies...', why does her voice sound so thin and strained? To me it sounds as if she either can't find the note or can't hit it, or it's just a very bad choice of notes, period, for her voice.

For the first time on any LDR album, I hear a shrill quality in Lana's voice, especially on 'Grandfather,' 'The Grants,' and 'A&W,' but also a little on 'Fingertips.' Does anyone else hear this? We're all such audiophiles here, I'm constantly amazed at the number of things different members are able to pick out, from annoying sounds to clicks and different instruments in the arrangements. Classic female vocalists like Laura Nyro and Kate Bush also occasionally had a shrill quality to their vocals--but Nyro sang in the loose, 'live' Amy Winehouse style, which made it tolerable, but when Bush goes shrill, as she does on several of her later albums ('The Sensual World' and 'The Red Shoes'), to me it's unlistenable.

Honestly, is there any objective way to tell what her best album is, or which is most loved, most valued, most underrated, most overpraised, most decried? We know that NFR! received the most critical praise from the music establishment, but other than that, there's just a cacophony of Stan and fan voices shouting, arguing and disagreeing all over the internet. And that includes us here.

A lot of people do love themselves in a healthy manner, and thus do not relate to that line, though they can understand it.

I agree about the production and the general sound, which I think could have been so much better overall on OC. How much further can she go in this sleepy direction?

OB is project stemming from Lana's early middle age. We saw some of that on COCC and BB too--all the humdrum, but no doubt sincere, lyrics about meeting for coffee, walking to the mall, watching television, and doing the laundry. She's well over the 'fantasy life' she lived during the BTD/P period, long over it. She's got marriage, children, and family on her mind. She's looking back and looking forward, taking stock of her life, figuring out where she is at 37. I don't know how old you are, but I think we're going to see less and less 'youth music' as she continues to record, assuming she will continue. 'A&W,' 'Peppers,' and 'Fishtail' are clearly attempts at reaching a younger audience, just as, in some ways, 'Dealer' was. I think 'Kintsugi' and 'Fingertips' are more sincere attempts at experimentation and doing something fresh. My guess is that she's heading in the direction of 'The Grants,' Grandfather,' 'Sweet,' and, in terms of singles, songs like 'LTLI' and 'Margaret,' that, like 'Sweet' are general-audience pleasers. I don't think it's you, personally.

I understand that. I know you don't like 'LTLI,' and I also don't connect at all with at least a third of the songs. Even, say, 'Paris, Texas,' I like it a lot, but is there anything to connect with emotionally? It's just a little oddball ditty. I like 'The Grants' and 'Grandfather,' but I don't connect with them emotionally, and even find 'The Grants' a little cloying.

For me, to see it that way would be a stretch, especially after songs like 'LMLYLAW' and 'Arcadia,' in which she sings about leaving Los Angeles. We don't know if such lyrics actually mean anything in her real life or feelings, and, if so, may only be momentary. How many houses does she have in Los Angeles? Several, correct? It's not easy to get up and leave permanently when you've got that kind of luxury real estate. And she may want to move for a few years elsewhere while keeping the Southern California home(s). I certainly don't see taco Truck x VB as a replacement for or an attempt to improve the NFR! version, because nothing will match or replace the original in all its extended glory.

Thanks for asking. I can only give my preferences at the moment, not any kind of objective ranking, and since I don't care a great deal for 'Fingertips,' and I've never warmed, in the least, to the title track, my ranking is bound to be unpopular. I'm not trying to offend anyone's taste. These represent the general interest I have in the separate tracks when playing the record while out walking. I don't care for the mastering on the record at all. Part of the reason I like 'Fishtail' is because it's clearer and crisper in sound to my ears. I'm skipping the interludes. Let the Light In Taco Truck x VB Paris, Texas Sweet (somewhat redundant maybe, but impossible not to like) Grandfather Kintsugi Fishtail The Grants Margaret (it would be so much better without the spoken part, which, in addition to Jack's singing, breaks up the song too much in the second half) Candy Necklace Peppers A&W Fingertips There's A Tunnel Under (I never listen to it)

'Fishtail' has grown on me a lot lately. I feel that 'Taco Truck' had the potential to be the Top Tier Classic Lana, if only it had continued another 3 minutes before segueing into VB. I like 'Margaret,' but would have preferred Lana's speaking part be eliminated. Between it and Jack's verse, the song breaks up too much for my taste.

Right. It's a matter of crispness and especially clarity, not a issue of volume or loudness.

Live or Die, original version.

Personal favorites, rough order: 1) The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie - 1969; Maggie Smith wins Oscar for Best Actress 2) Blow-Up - 1966 3) I Walked With a Zombie - 1943; Francis Dee; rough reworking of 'Jane Eyre' set in the Caribbean 4) Plenty - 1985 - Meryl Streep, Charles Dance, Sting, Tracy Ullman 5) Blue Velvet - 1986 6) Arturo's Island - 1962, Italian 7) Manhattan - 1979 8) Annie Hall - 1977 9) Pandora's Box - 1929; German; Silent; Louise Brooks 10) The Women - 1939; Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford, Paulette Goddard, Joan Fontaine 11) The Trouble With Harry - 1955; Hitchcock Comedy; Shirley MacLaine, John Forsythe, Jerry Mathers, Ed Gwen 12) On the Waterfront - 1954; Brando at his best 13) Meet Me in St. Louis - 1944; ensemble Cast 14) The Creature from the Black Lagoon - 1954; He needs no introductions 15) Mr. Deeds Goes to Town - 1936; Gary Cooper 16) Sirens - 1994; Hugh Grant; mysticism in the Australian outback 17) Curse of the Demon / Night of the Demon - 1957; British; Dana Andrews, Peggy Cummins 18) Carnival of Souls - 1962; independent Horror film [Lana quotes from in the '13 Beaches' intro] 19) All About Eve - 1950; Bette Davis, Marilyn Monroe in cameo 20) Metropolis - 1927; German; Silent For me, one of the greatest scenes in all of film is when the bratty little girl in 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof' carelessly drops her ice cream on the Elizabeth Taylor character's elegant shoe, and ET picks the ice cream up and smashes it into the girl's face. Wouldn't we all like to do something like that once in life.

I don't think it's her worst album, but I have an intuition that it is sort of an end in a way, or the end of a cycle, or of another cycle. If she is indeed engaged and will marry soon (I'm not 100% convinced of this, due to the fairly large number of men she's been involved with over the last 11 years), I think she will shortly want one or more children, and then inevitably her life will change, including her creative life. If so, then once she has a child, it may be a perfect time to release some sort of career retrospective of some kind, large or small, with a certain amount of unreleased material, or the 'American Standards' album if that was ever completed, or the next poetry record.

THE GREAT KENNETH ANGER. 'Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome' is a fantastic short film, and I'm so glad to have a copy of the original. It's amazing that he's still alive, at 96. He influenced so many people well before more public, multimedia art figures like Andy Warhol emerged.

Here comes my Tori Amos reference for the week: Shortly after she released one of her masterpieces, 'Scarlet's Walk' in 2002, Tori released a live DVD called 'Welcome to Sunny Florida,' which also included a "bonus" DC called 'Scarlet's Hidden Treasures," which contained 6 outtakes from 'Scarlet's Walk.' And that's what everyone wanted, not the live DVD , which was tepid. Some of Amos's best songs are on 'SHT' (excuse the acronym), so maybe Lana could do something like that. Curating the album would take some real thought and decisiveness, and perhaps that's not something she'd feel up to now, as it seems she responds more to her own whims rather than anything planned or preconceived. Imagine a 20-track album of both leaked songs and outtakes that were completed but never used and about which we knew nothing, like 'Dragon Slayer.' If 10 of the songs were 'new' and unleaked, I think her stans would really get excited. She could simply call it 'Lana Del Rey: Outtakes' or 'LDR: Unreleased' and the critics could get the idea through a short press release. Her label could have low expectations for it reaching the general public and generating sales; it would really just be a project for her stans. But who knows, in these days of TikTok? 'Hollywood' deserves an official release. For me, with 'Cola,' it's one of the fundamental Lana songs, sort of a blueprint for so many songs and themes in that era. It has such glamor, such verve, and so much carefree assertiveness. "One day, I'll drive in a gold Mercedes Benz, singing opera on Bel Air Road, hair to my ass will be flying in the wind." That's one of the Lanas I love.

Not at this point--it seems the moment for that has passed. It also raised the question of whether she would release the originals or rerecord them--rerecording seems to defeat the purpose--but after Lana releasing the low quality copies of the leaked songs on BB, would we get more of the same? No thanks. When and if she releases a career retrospective, hopefully that will be the time she'll release high res copies of 'Fine China,' 'Serene Queen,' 'Live or Die,' 'Angels Forever,' 'Hollywood,' 'Dragon Slayer,' etc., as well as a lot of other unreleased, but never-leaked tracks, we still know nothing about.

I'd rather listen to UFB than anything on OC.

And I love LFL for the most part: '13 Beaches,' 'WTWWAWWKOD,' 'White Mustang,' 'Heroin,' 'BPBP,' 'Tomorrow Never Came,' 'God Bless America,' 'Summer Bummer,' 'IMF,' and 'Cherry,' and I've warmed to 'Love' well enough. The rest I don't care for (though I loved the piano-driver original demo version of 'LFL'), but I was more than happy with it then and remain so.

I think that expresses it well.

Did the original member mean, by "converted," the word in the strict sense, people who previously didn't like Lana or had previously written her off as an artist? I can see a lot of reasons why this might happen, some of which have nothing to do with the musical content of OC per se. There's no doubt that some see something risqué in 'A&W,' the same way 'Dealer' caught the attention of so many on Tik Tok for a few weeks. That is, there's a kind of temporary novelty value to a particular track, and the transition and the 'Jimmy Jimmy Coco Puffs' part would certainly help that along. Also, 'OC' has so much Stan energy behind it, and overall positive critical reaction, that a generalized internet buzz might very likely influence a lot of people across the world, a combination of word-of-mouth and trendiness. We've seen how so many here have responded to the title track, so it's likely that millions of others, of 'outsiders' or 'newbies' have as well, have related to it. And for some, who haven't listened to a Lana album since LFL or even BTD/P, its soundscape might not mesh with their negative expectations at all, and so they're responding to it as something new in her catalog.