Lina Del K

Here’s the thing, as much as some of us sometimes want her to be more mainstream or feel that she is more mainstream than she gets credit for - at the end of the day, she’s herself. She’ll do and sing whatever the F she wants. 
 
People respect that. It’s as if she’s gaining mainstream popularity, precisely for the fact that she’s not mainstream. She doesn’t follow the “norms” and expectations. She can write a record like Ocean Boulevard, fill it with the dreamy, laidback vocals of The Grants and Paris, Texas, but still hit you with an A&W or Peppers when you least expect it. 
 
From what I’ve seen over the past year or so, and arguably the past few years if you include Chemtrails and Banisters, she’s in a different era. She’s not going to give anyone a Coachella-esque setlist, not even Coachella. 
 
She’s not going to be forever young and the pacing has slowed down. The h@ting on the setlists is growing old. The board seemed to almost unanimously loathe her setlist from last year. She adds 3-4 new songs and it’s still “bad.” Yet we all keep coming back and the critical reviews from her performance last night seem to be almost universally positive. 
 
It is possible for two things to be true at the same time. We can accept that the playlist is slower paced, her vocals are more subdued, the performance may drag in comparison to other popular artists. But, speaking of art, it is also true that her elegance and beauty are as strong as ever. 
 
The problem with celebrities is everyone has an idealized, sometimes unrealistic expectation. We can try to mold a perfect Lana performance in our head, but at the end of the day, she’s going to do whatever tf she wants. 
 
Is her setlist decision based on comfort? Familiarity? The new era she’s in? It’s irrelevant to me. I’m just thankful that she’s out here giving us art on a regular basis. 2024 has certainly been an active year for her. Things are going to continue to get crazy, for a long, long time. Even if it’s not always in the exact way that some of her fans want. 
 
I’d argue that part of her charm is that she does what she wants. Not what others want her to do or what others think she should be doing. 

2010

 
2024

 
somethings never change  

The mashup was with Kehlani’s Gangsta and the Sickick Remix of Gangsta’s Paradise that features vocals from Jealous Girl

out of the black, into the blue

this whole set was designed almost like a Great Gatsby's party - just like a celebration of Lana's career. and this is where it's interesting:
 
in The Great Gatsby - Gatsby was surrounded himself with the glamour, the parties, the rich, the extravaganza, the wealthy of it all and some how that was what caged him, he was a rich man but he was never free from his own wealth and social status and he died alone, inside of his own big mansion.
 
Here, we see Lana came to the party, partied hard and then get on a biker and just get away from that party while the Yound And Beautiful jazz version fading in the back as the show ends, this shows Lana has "seen the world, had her best cake, had her ball, had her fame and had her time with fame" and at the end, instead of ended up like Gatsby, she managed to escape from all of it on the biker - which means that she can never be prison to that "gatsby" curse and she will always know how to escape from it to find her own freedom - hence why she uses the bikers that referenced the Ride MV at the beginning of the show and when the show ends.
 
Lana - the genius that you are.

With Jon & Jack -
 

I agree her fanbase seems to be predominantly composed of women and "queer men," as you call them. But no one considers Elvis Presely's or Frank Sinatra's music men's music, or Led Zepplin's, Jeff Buckely's, or 21 Pilots'  either. There is misogyny involved insofar as some men seem to automatically think of Lorde's or Lana's music as women's music, when I don't think they would say the same thing about, say, Amy Winehouse. 
 
Unfortunately, too many people think in a kind of cultural shorthand that actually doesn't involve thinking on their part, just the spontaneous acceptance of outdated cultural stereotypes. 
 
Among the young, I'm happy to see heterosexual-leaning male high school athletes unselfconsciously buying and wearing pink shorts, sneakers, or Crocs without even considering "but pink is for girls." 
 
I do think, culturally, we're moving in the right direction in that regard, at least among the young—which is where it counts. 

The motorcycle company they used is @ ryvid_ev on instagram and one of the riders was @/thegrumpyrider. They haven’t posted much yet. But Wally Crowder is posting a lot of videos! 

I don't think Lana's fanbase is any more depressed than others today.
 
Lana does not make us depressed with songs like Hope, Yosemite, 13 Beaches, Wildfire Wildflower, or Old Money; these songs free our depression and sadness, frustration,  anger, and occasional hopelessness. 
 
It's a long tradition going back to the birth of rock n' roll, and, before rock n' roll, blues and folk music.
 
Very few artists from Elvis Presley, Sam Cooke, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Velvet Underground, Marianne Faithfull in her 60s era, Bob Dylan, the Supremes, Smokey Robinson, Tim Buckley, Joaz Baez, Al Green, and Nico to James Taylor, Carole King,  Joni Mitchell, classic Elton John, David Bowie, Queen, the Patti Smith Group, Bruce Springsteen, the Dead Boys, Fleetwood Mac, Kate Bush, the Pretenders, the Clash, Elvis Costello, Lene Lovich, Blondie, early Ultravox, the Police, Red Hot Chili Peppers, R.E.M., Sade, Tina Turner, Tori Amos, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, Jeff Buckley, Fiona Apple, Natalie Merchant, Lloyd Cole, Amy Winehouse, Kassidy, Anderson East, 21 Pilots, Lord Huron, Rayland Baxter, Father John Misty, Paul Cauthen, the Ruen Brothers, Billie Eilish, etc. have not sang sad songs. 
 
Sadness and all that comes with it--alienation, frustration, loneliness, anger, jealousy, envy, etc.--is a big part of life. Thousands of people take their lives because of it every year.
 
Lana's sad songs are meditations on a theme and cathartic and freeing, not the opposite. I don't buy the "Sad Girl Shit" argument, or the "Women's Music" label, which I find incredibly stupid. 
 
 

i can almost guarantee you kehlani is friends with or is mutual with an artist or celebrity who's way more problematic than lana is... people love to pick and choose lol

FRIENDS- the Lana re-uploads keep getting taken down, but don't worry. I downloaded the set in full HQ quality and I'm going to upload it to Dropbox shortly.

interestingly, Billboard compared the set with a Gatsby Mansion, and I think they're right
https://www.billboard.com/music/pop/coachella-2024-lana-del-rey-festival-headliner-recap-1235655739/

has anyone else noticed how well "hope is a dangerous thing" with lana's hologram replaced the first part of A&W? you know, before the "jimmy jimmy coco puff" starts, she sings "I'm invisible, I'm invisible, I'm a ghost now" and also in hope she sings "calling from beyond the grave", and I think that's why they used the hologram

I never understand this term, shouldn’t be the other way around, locals of a place knowing more than tourists?

So apparently at some point during the set the keyboard broke and also hadn’t been tuned correctly & ofc issues with her mic and ear-ins, reported by Jen Stith’s sister who heard this from Jen x

Holy shit, some of these really feels like 2011 Lana... its mindblowing

I am speechless  the dress, the hair, straight out of born to die era, the make up, omg she was perfect 

45 gorgeous HQ pics - 
 

some professional photos

Pole dancing, vocals, the adlibbing. She looked like was really enjoying herself!

her second dress was dolce & gabbana!

I hated this show so much… however it is iconic for three things and three things only
1. Her look/hair. This is possibly top 3 Lana look of all time it was just perfect, and she needs to keep it for Lasso rollout. 
 
2. The intro. Wow… when I saw that intro I thought we were about to get a performance of a lifetime. I thought we were about to get an entirely new setlist, unreleased songs played live, lasso announcement etc. Obviously that didn’t happen but the intro was so amazing it made me think that it would. 
 
3. The section with Billie. I’m not a Billie fan but this was really cute and I loved how their voices harmonized together.

people are saying that she sounded better live, the youtube livestream was a bit off apparently 

guys she's number one trending on twitter and it's back to back tweets calling her an icon

despite all of the sound and setlist issues that was a motherfucking gag idc, I'm literally floored right now. she looked so 2011/2012 that it was just kind of a surreal feeling to see it. like she had entered a time machine and transported herself to 2024 straight from that time, so I caught myself getting a bit emotional multiple times because I really got to be her fan for that long and it made me realize how time really does fly.
the entrance and the exit were fucking iconic and for the books. I will never recover from them  and ofc the glam team, styling team, stage design team, the pole dancers, the backup dancers, the background singers, the band... every one of them did their parts so well