Sam Gho

The possibility that Lana might be a year older than what was known widely, for some reason bothers me. The discrepancy is so small that I don’t see any advantage for Lana to unnecessarily lie about it. However as I think about it more, I think I have come up with a possible explanation.
 
One of the most mysterious parts of Lana’s past to me has been the time she spent in Alabama. She has mentioned this consistently beginning with her early interviews and I think it is true. However nothing else in her background really makes sense to explain a sojourn to Alabama. Except that if viewed in a certain way, it probably does make a lot of sense.
 
I think when Lana got into high school in Lake Placid she met a guy who was bad news all around (the mysterious K). I think this is the guy who got her into alcohol and probably drugs later. However her drinking freaked out her parents who sent her to boarding school, mainly to get her away from this guy. However I am sure she kept meeting him, despite her parents opposition, e.g. when she came back home for vacations etc. After she finished school, I think her parents really wanted her to break off this relationship, but instead I think she ran away with this guy to Alabama. Instead of going to college she spent a year with this guy down in Alabama, where this guy kept getting into more and more trouble. This scenario would explain many of her lyrics (being on the run, Officer Brown checking on them, kids living the dark side of the American dream etc., there are many, many references in many songs that fit such a scenario), until this guy finally got caught and sent to prison. Not sure he got the death sentence (it’s too melodramatic, but a long prison sentence is as good as dying), and maybe he is still in prison. She said in an interview that he was still around and she was in touch with his mother, with would also be consistent with him being in prison. Anyway, once he got sent away she woke up and came back home, and finally joined Fordham.
 
However, this scenario means that there is a year missing in her life. So for her friends from high school, her years in Fordham would be a year off. I think she realized in early interviews that this was likely to raise more questions later, instead it was easier to just to pretend that she had come to Fordham straight from Lake Placid. She has always been very reticent to speak about her time before NY probably for this reason. This was probably evident in the Complex interview where the interviewer had picked up some discrepancies about her age. Like many things, once you lie about something, even something very small and inconsequential, it becomes difficult to backtrack later. Therefore, according to the scenario I have laid out, she graduated from high-school in 2003, spent about a year with K in Alabama, and joined Fordham in Fall 2004.
 
I also think that most of her songs are about K, although she does not name him (she hints at that in her My Space interview, where she says her songs are always about the same guy). I think she developed a crush on Jimmy Gnecco once she met him in NYC clubs, but if anything it was a short fling (even though she wrote a few songs about it). Jimmy however exposed her to being attracted to older men, but I don’t think she had any significant relationship until she met Mike Mizrahi (early 2009). Some of the songs that refer to old guys probably are written to him, and songs like Afraid, Damn You are definitely in reference to her breakup with him. However, I think she still obsesses about K, and that might make her a difficult person to have a long-term relationship with (although I hope I am wrong, and I really wish she finds a great guy to be with).
 
I spend way too much time thinking about such stuff, gotta stop!

This is why i love reading your posts and why you’ve always been one of my absolute favorite members!
 
I'd like to add that, despite any perceived simplicity and superficiality, Lana--her persona, her lyrics, the breadth of her recorded output--is complex. I wouldn’t be here right now if i didn’t think that. She's certainly not easy to box in, though journalists seem to love doing just that, while simultaneously singling her out as highly individualistic. What makes her interesting and engaging is that she’s highly idiosyncratic and filled with paradoxes, which she embraces. A lot of her work has an uncomfortable quality to it that can often fill the listener with uncertainty. Lines often get blurred. There’s a vulnerability, a rawness, and ambivalence in the simplicity of a lot of her lyrics and themes. And, you know, she’s flawed. But that’s great--she’s human. Post-feminists and detractors of feminism tend to make the dubious case that women who are seen as feminists should basically be infallible. It’s yet another bogus, flawed, and unrealistic argument aimed at discrediting feminism and oppressing women. Change from within is definitely my stance as well. bell hooks makes that argument a lot. There are clear ties there to the civil rights movement and the progress that came about due to the different “sides” working together. The oppressed obviously need the compliance of the oppressors, it can't just all come from one direction. This is why it’s important not to isolate feminism and designate it as a strictly female mindset/ideology. I also think feminism needs to stop toiling away in academia, but that’s another discussion, though very much related.

I posted this on the MM board, but as this board seems to be more active, I wanted to re-post it here. I don't want to preach, but the unfair way that Lana has been treated really bugs me (I don't recall something like this ever happening before). As we are all here because we care about her, hopefully we can help change how she is portrayed in the media over time.
 
 
I think one of the reasons that Lana is having such a difficult time finding traction in the US, despite her huge international success, is that in most blogs, news sites, forums, she has been made into a punching bag. Any news item about her is accompanied by snarky comments dissing her for stuff that is either irrelevant or clearly not true (e.g. from earlier today: http://thegloss.com/...alia-cover-577/). The tone of these news articles (colored by the writer's bias) also seems to drive the tone of the comments that follow, generally insulting and stupid. One of the worst places has been Huffington Post whose readership seems to include a particularly large group of virulent Lana haters.
 
While generally it is not worth getting into fights with people who write stupid comments, I think it is important for Lana fans to strongly respond to inaccurate, biased, hateful articles/posts, and to do it forcefully and logically. I have been trying to do it for a while (as Sam or Sam Gho) and have found that it makes particularly hateful writers back off, and also changes the tone of the comments that are written subsequently. I am positive that the hater community is relatively small but they seen disproportionately large as they always find time to write nasty comments about Lana. I think if we do stand up for Lana in a organized way it will change the perception about her in the media, and may help this amazingly talented singer/songwriter achieve the recognition, respect and success she so clearly deserves.
 
Just my 2c.