Vertimus

So remove the real cover and replace it with attached art instead. If you have an iTunes account, it takes 30 seconds.

Two songs that would be great for LDR to cover are ‘So In Love’ by Cole Porter—listen to the great K.D. Lang version—and the 1950s Classic ‘Ebb Tide,’ which has a wonderful beach/surf/ocean theme and series of metaphors. I don’t think anyone can top Isaak’s version of ‘Wicked Game,’ so I wouldn’t want LDR to try, especially after her flat cover of PDLMBM.

When HM came out, she claimed TLY was her favorite track on the album, so it would be a mystery as to why she would dislike it now.

Ignore those posters who bully and intimidate others here. They’re legion. There’s about three dozen who feel they essentially own this site and endlessly harass those they dislike. Block them. There should be free expression here and no bullying or harassment. If someone doesn’t like or agree with something, ignore it.

True, but at the same time Lust for Life was lyrically incredibly corny and faux-woke with its half assed message of "hope" and subtheme of "PoLiTiCaL cLiMaTe". I don’t feel we can trust ANYTHING LDR says about her political affiliations, at any time. Songs like ‘American’ certainly don’t seem to celebrate the Democratic-Liberal POV, so initially I considered her to be conservative or a Republican, even if only vaguely so, as if politics were no a big concern or interest for her. Subsequently, after a good deal of attacks from the Left, she’s come out as a Democrat and also as something of a liberal, insofar as she’s expressed unwavering support for several liberal causes as well as her great dislike for Trump. However, lately she’s redefined herself yet again, as “a moderate.” So who the hell knows what her genuine political ideology is, if any?? I feel she just kisses whatever ass she feels pressured to kiss at a given time or moment. I don’t think she’s in any way politically astute, or even knowledgeable. There’s the cop, there’s that church she’s affiliated with, there’s her witchcraft spell against Trump, and so on. Let’s not forget she once described herself as a ‘chameleon soul.’

Because for some, anything analytical, critical in the original sense of the word, or well-reasoned is perceived as ‘negative’ and clearly ‘triggers’ them and makes them ‘feel bad.’ So they want to shut down thought and speech they don’t like. Which is absurd. If you read a sentence of a new post and don’t like its character or content, just SKIP IT, the same way many of us skip the ‘what color vinyl do you think LDR9 will be in 2023, chartreuse, cerise, or taupe?’ posts, or the ‘What season is UV to you?’ posts.

The way I see it, LDR seems to have thought that there is something powerful, interesting, dramatic and moody about the NFR title song, when for me, it’ comes off as little more than a trifle. I feel that LDR perceives it as having the depth and mystique of something like ‘Suspicion,’ when in fact it hardly goes anywhere, is unremarkable, and is over before it even seems to get started. The same with CG and several of the others. To me, most come across as demos of half-written songs.

I never claim any opinion of mine is fact. Not everyone here understands what a fact is anyway. Obviously, ‘LDR worked with Jack Antonoff on NFR” is a fact, ‘Cinnamon Girl is the best song ever written’ is not.

You and I think A WHOLE LOT ALIKE. I agree completely about HIAB. It’s the mash-up quality that ruins the song. It’s like she tried to make one jigsaw puzzle out of the random pieces of three different puzzles, and didn’t know what the completed picture was supposed to look like regardless. My feelings exactly about VB. Without the outro, there’s very little song at all, and only something any of us could have written; Antonoff should probably get the lion’s share of the composition credit, and probably filled out the song because otherwise it would barely be a useable track at all, unless only a kind of brief interlude like the T. S. Eliot one on HM. You express yourself very well in terms of your ability to define what you like and don’t like about the instrumentation and music. I also agree that LDR is moving away from everything that made her interesting, original, and visionary. What happened to the humor, satire and genuinely clever social commentary and asides? It’s as if she’s been replaced by a Pod Lana, a Woke PC Clone who wants to appease those on the Left who criticized her so harshly over the last five years. She’s been tamed or has self-tamed. It’s funny that NOW she seems to think she’s ‘breaking all the rules,’ when it was actually the BTD/P LDR that broke all the rules with songs like ‘Cola’ and ‘Gods and Monsters.’

I agree, MXDH. ‘Negative’ comments, intelligent and thoughtful or otherwise, make some people ‘feel bad.’ I am for free, if civil, expression. On a site like this, we would only HOPE some people would be analytical, perceptive and critical in the best sense of the word. Anyone who doesn’t want to read a specific post any further can just stop reading, ignore it, or skip ahead.

Understood. I feel the same way. We fell in love with and were seduced by a phantom. Thus, the ‘Vertigo’ references on my part. It’s interesting how her ‘glamour’ period actually seems to have reflected the original meaning of glamour: a spell placed on something by elves or fairies to give it another, better and more attractive appearance. I’ve made a playlist called ‘BOLDR’—‘Best of Lana Del Rey’—and most of it is from her early LDR period, including unreleased gems like ‘Angels Forever’ and ‘Hollywood.’ It also has a smattering if tracks from HM and LFL. I added CG and TG from NFR to it, but found I felt irritated and like I was fooling myself every time they came up in rotation, so I have removed them.

I think ‘The Greatest‘ should have returned to the refrain once more after the instrumental section...but that wouldn’t have given it the same ‘artistic credibility’ it is credited with by critics having the slow fade instead. I agree the record is boring: that’s exactly right. There’s not a lot of ideas present and so it all seems rather ho-hum. Where would VB have been without Jack’s long long outro?? ‘Love Song’ and ‘California’ are things she could have written in her sleep. I certainly can’t take HIAB seriously, that with the serial killer section mashed in. I definitely prefer LFL to NFR, as at least some tracks have the verve, vision and originality of her earlier work, though clearly she had begun repeating herself with tracks like ‘Cherry.’ I agree with you about the production and engineering on NFR. Why it is the way it is is another matter, and whether it’s that way by intent, accident or a combination of both, I assume we’ll never know. I feel like the LDR that I fell in love with is receding and disappearing more and more all the time, and probably never really existed, a la ‘Vertigo.’ THAT LDR interested me, the subsequent LDR(s) interest less and less.

Full agree with everything you’ve said here. LDR’s best music on the first three albums was visionary, confident, poised and dramatic/melodramatic...whatever it was, when it worked, it really worked (for me, ‘Paradise’ is the best). I have seen spurts of that same power on HM and LFL, but even the best/better songs on NFR are depthless, empty and hollow. There’s no emotional subtext or underlying reverberations. After you listen to them a few times, they feel used-up and dead. So it’s sad to me that LDR seems to think these are among the best she’s written. In terms of songwriting and performance, I will take ‘Yayo,’ ‘Ride,’ and ‘Old Money’ over anything on NFR any day. And certainly something as scalding and unruly as the original version of ‘Live or Die.’ I don’t see anything special about Looking For America.’ Anyone, probably any one of us, could have written it. It’s a very modest little B-side at best. Just because a song arises from a tragedy, or is protest song, doesn’t make it inherently good as a song, or interesting. Since the 1950s, many people have confused the quality of the song with the nature of the problem or tragedy, which is a big mistake. Yes, ‘Suspicion’ is an under-appreciated and relatively obscure R.E.M. track, and, as you’ve suggested, it has all the mood, depth, subtly and ambiguity that everything on NFR lacks. It’s fully realized, whereas as NFR is largely half-baked.

I still don’t care for NFR as a whole, and never play it, though a few songs are okay. It’s flat and lifeless for me. Some songs, like ‘CG’ and ‘TG’ could have been so much better with just a little tweaking. It’s LDR at her most boring, persona-wise, whether that’s persona is ‘authentically Lana’ or another intentional or semi-conscious pose. I’m glad to know others feel the same way. I was listening to R.E.M.’s great song ‘Suspicion’ this morning, and it occurred to me that something like it was what LDR was trying to create on NDR, but failed.

In terms of the references, they’re now no longer clever, they’re far too numerous and too obvious as well. So I wish she’d only use them when they are genuinely clever and have meaning of some kind within the context of the song.

What were the witchcraft elements you found in the actual songs on LFL? I know a good deal about the subject and am not aware of any.

Anyone who knows even a fair amount about the broad history of American and British folk music in all its myriad forms and sub-genres recognizes that NFR is not a folk album of any kind, though it may have been folk-inspired, especially by the early 1970s ‘Laurel Canyon Sound’ that LDR seems to be fascinated with at present. Clearly, on NFR she’s taken a few cues from Joni Mitchell’s ‘Ladies of the Canyon’ and ‘Blue’ albums, both musically and lyrically. A sub-sub genre of American folk music, a sort of estranged cousin of the ‘Laurel Canyon Sound,’ is the early 1970s ‘Singer/Songwriter’ genre, which encompassed everyone from Carole King, Jackson Browne and Cat Stevens to James Taylor, Carly Simon, Melanie, Paul Simon, Karla Bonoff, Kris Kristofferson, John Denver, Janis Ian, Maria Muldaur and many others. If anything, NFR is much more of an attempt at a ‘Singer/Songwriter’ album than a legitimate folk album of any kind.

How many times must I come to these threads and see everyone trying to invalidate each others opinions instead of discussing them like adults. You’re all children that think you’re “right” so you can’t drop the fact that some people like an album and some people don’t. I’m not referring to one specific side of this argument either. It’s always the same handful of people. I don’t do that, attack people for what are, yes, ‘mere opinions.’ Almost everything expressed here IS mere opinion, and it makes no sense to attack others for having differing opinions. That is childish. Obviously, there’s a vast and much wider social context to all of this and the endless personal attacks and counter-attacks on individual tastes. We might hope for a fairly mature, ‘adult’ and restrained dialogue, but this is a pure democracy, and everyone gets their say, ‘adult’ or not.

For me, NFR remains flaccid. I agree with Max. NFR is like a pancake that looks properly cooked from the outside, but, when you cut into, turns out to have a lot of uncooked batter in the middle. Even if NFR was nothing but a collection of B-sides or outtakes, I would consider it flat, bland and mediocre as a whole.

My reaction has been exactly the opposite. I didn't care for it upon release and I still don't. For me, it has no center, no subtext, no substance or 'meat'. It certainly isn't a 'folk' record. She said it was what she wanted to do now, and I'm glad for her that she did exactly what she wanted. But it doesn't do a thing for me. CG would be a much, much better choice, especially if slightly remastered and amped up a bit. It had so much potential, music-wise, but they blew it with weak production and badly-recorded and muffled vocals. Still, if it's what LDR wanted, great. I'm glad she did it her way.

I'm glad LDR's performing Joni Mitchell songs--she did a serviceable job on the one verse of 'For Free' she sang in her concert--and dueting with the likes of Joan Baez, but she sounds terrible here.

'White Hot Forever,' if taken literally, certainly doesn't describe the sound of NFR. Since I'm a general non-fan of NFR, another 'similar' album is the last thing I want.

Several people have said the same thing here, including me, over the last several months. The chorus is beautiful and deserved something connected to it that was a lot better. I consider it the nadir of her songwriting on NFR. If I were not a fan of LDR's or didn't know her music at all, and heard HIAB, not only would the mashed-together quality still jump out at me, but I'd think she was an amateur or flash-in-the-pan, not the person who was capable of writing 'Ride,' ‘Yayo,’'Old Money,' 'Black Beauty,' 'Terrence Loves You' and '13 Beaches.' I'm surprised Jack allowed himself to be associated with it. The 'ba-a-bies' and 'oh-who-whos' are so forced and lazy.

Honest and well said. 'CG' is too much in the style of 'Religion,' but with a few highs and lows, fewer dramatic turns.

maxdenhaag Also, I understand that a lot of people regard Venice Bitch as one of her best songs, and while I really like it, I just don't feel like the 6 minutes instrumentals adds much to the song. Just really weirdly recorded guitar licks and the "woah wha-ever, wha-ever, beautiful" or whatever. I'm not going to pretend like this song is a masterpiece just because it's 10 minutes long. It just has this really dry/flat tone that I cannot get my head around, it lacks bass and beats (except on Cinnamon Girl and How To Disappear), but as for the rest of this album it's flat. Think of it this way: what would VB have been without the six minutes of instrumentation? I think Jack or someone said, "It's not much of a song as it is, we'll have to do something to beef it up." I agree 100% about the dry/flat tone.