Norman Fucking Rockwell - Pre-Release Thread

[Cacciatore 19,346]

Stop clicking it if you don’t want to read it. Period.

 

I'm more worried about y'all sanity tbh

[Black Roses 1,216]

Starting to lose my sanity because of this album 

[Vertimus 8,948]

"Flat out lying" to characterize an entire diverse corpus of songs is a tad harsh. For one thing, the only time I remember her *specifically* saying something like "yeah I lived this" was in regard to the Ride video (not the song). Her response seemed to be needed (imo), because people were just amazed (aka appalled) at the situations she portrayed: being picked up by random strangers after midnight; being a biker chick in a biker gang. Youtube comments were critical about the latter especially, in the sense that being a biker chick almost never turns out well for the chick. It seems to be an empirical fact (if she's not lying about the video), that she was very very lucky finding the specific bikers she found. The other issue is the distinction between lying and acting. She can at least act very well, even if she didn't directly experience the things she sings about, that is she may be able to empathize well and get the experience from others (including literature). Also she doesn't have to act in any particular way now to prove anything about what she experienced back then. Finally, a fair amount of her songs do seem autobiographical and self-aware (National Anthem, This is what makes us girls), and she even parodies her "fakeness" at times: FMWUTTT, MPG, maybe even Gods and Monsters and Cola, but part of the appeal of those last 2 songs, imo, is you don't know how real they are.

She’s not lying. Not all art, by any means, is of the ‘sincere’ kind. Creativity in and of itself traffics in what is imagined , what is reconfigured or conceived or reconceived in a new form, and that involves artifice and distance. It has nothing to do with deception or lying.

 

What I initially said was that she’s been playing roles for well over a decade, assuming, playing in, and then abandoning those roles. Whether that was ‘Jewel-like folkie,’ ‘Mafia princess,’ ‘Lolita in the Hood,’ ‘trailer park goddess,’ international style icon or whatever.

 

Natalie Merchant posed as the various characters from her songs on the album art for her record ‘Ophelia,’ and Tori Amos poses as the different female characters represented in the songs on two different albums—‘Strange Little Girls’ and ‘American Doll Posse.’ That doesn’t make that theatrical approach to the album art ‘deception’ or ‘inauthentic.’

 

LDR is just doing the same thing, but taking the poses much further, adopting them for months or years at a time. And then moving on to something else. It’s a form of acting, of Hollywood, or playing roles. That doesn’t make her ‘fake,’ it makes her a kind of performance artist.

 

Does she probably get tangled and sometimes defeated by her own personas? It certainly appears that way. Are such things easy to juggle psychologically? Usually not.

 

Are we seeing ‘the genuine Elizabeth’ now, with songs like MAC? Or is this just another pose, the pose of ‘the authentic person I genuinely am’? Who knows?

She’s not lying. Not all art, by any means, is of the ‘sincere’ kind. Creativity in and of itself traffics in what is imagined, what is reconfigured, conceived or reconceived in a new form, and that involves artifice and distance. It has nothing to do with deception or lying in the common usage of those terms.

 

What I initially said was that she’s been playing roles for well over a decade, assuming, playing in, and then abandoning those roles. Whether that was ‘Jewel-like folkie,’ ‘Mafia princess,’ ‘Lolita in the Hood,’ ‘trailer park goddess,’ 21st century hippie, international style icon or whatever.

 

Natalie Merchant posed as the various characters from her songs on the album art for her record ‘Ophelia,’ and Tori Amos poses as the different female characters represented in the songs on two different albums—‘Strange Little Girls’ and ‘American Doll Posse.’ That doesn’t make that theatrical approach to the album art ‘deception’ or ‘inauthentic.’

 

LDR is just doing the same thing, but taking the poses much further, adopting them for months or years at a time. And then moving on to something else. It’s a form of acting, of Hollywood, of playing roles. That doesn’t make her ‘fake,’ it makes her a kind of performance artist.

 

Does she probably get tangled and sometimes defeated by her own personas? It certainly appears that way. Are such things easy to juggle psychologically for the person adopting and abandoning them? Usually not.

 

Are we seeing ‘the genuine Elizabeth’ now, with songs like MAC and VB? Or is this just another pose, the pose of ‘the authentic person I genuinely am’? Who knows?

[Vertimus 8,948]

Look at ‘Old Money’ for example—did anyone really believe she was a mature woman in her late 40s, 50s or 60s looking back on her life and failed marriage? Of course not. That was simply the persona she stepped into for the sake of the song.

 

It was not ‘fake,’ ‘inauthentic,’ not a lie or a deception of any kind.

[GeminiLanaFan 45,852]

delusion

 

in all seriousness i’m wondering if NFR is even coming anymore or whatever is next is gonna just be random singles she feels like putting out. “the album is done but who knows when it’s coming out”

 

Jesus... Let's all calm down.

We are still in the projected timeframe release Universal announced back in January, when Hope was released (they said it was probably mid-year, so May to August).

And did any of you who suffer from scrap phobia have relistened to the lyrics of the snippets? Her «introspective sad girl shit» isn't super summery. It's best suited for end of summer or early fall. 

The whole «album is scrapped or reworked» argument might be considered if, by September, we have no news. Before that, let's all stream Doin' Time and have too many drinks by the pool. 

[GeminiLanaFan 45,852]

I'm really tired so excuse my wording in this post.

 

I really wouldn't be surprised if she is feeling insecure about the album. As you said, we discussed pages ago about how the reception to Hope was probably not what she was expecting, but when you stop and think about it, I think it might've been the same with LFL, which adds even more weight to the theory.

 

I really feel like Coachella might've been her favourite track on LFL. I don't think she ever named an outright favourite (I think she said WM was one of her favourites and I'll get to that), but she did mention it in almost every single interview in 2017/18. How she wrote it in a week or whatever, how she was inspired by North Korean missiles, etc ... I got the impression that she was really proud of it and pretty much everyone feels that it's the weakest track on that album.

 

And even White Mustang - fans have such a love/hate relationship with it, and in that recent interview she said that White Mustang was one of her favourite tracks on that album. She also said, "oh, barely anyone has heard it" which was very what the fuck.

 

So given all of that, plus the fact that Hope is usually placed behind VB and MAC (even in streaming numbers) ... I get why she might be second-guessing. It's just a theory.

 

Whatever the reason: I think we can all agree that, at some point, she's definitely had a change of heart in terms of the release schedule. Nobody releases 3 songs in relatively quick succession and then fucks off for 5 months and counting. 

 

And re: the comments - I realised that she probably just set up keyword filters (eg: "NFR") to filter out any comments containing those words. That's not as dramatic as manually deleting, but it still indicates ... sensitivity.

 

1. Her 3 faves from LFL, when she dropped the album, were Heroin, Yosemite and Tomorrow Never Came. In further interviews, she did say she loved the production of Coachella, and loved White Mustang and that's why she put out a video for it (probably not the entire truth, but she can't admit the whole thing publicly, I guess).

 

2. Maybe she had a change of heart, when it came to promo. Maybe there is something else going on in her life (everyone blames her LA friends, but nobody ever said anything about her new love interest, who is supposed to be toxic for her. again, this is pure speculation and we have no proof, except a tabloid report lol). I guess we'll never have the full story on that. However, I prefer to connect the dots with what we know from her. She admitted the 3 songs out are her favorites of NFR; maybe she doesn't have the urge that much to release the rest of it, even if she loves the record, with her 3 faves already out.

 

3. She is shit at estimating how long things take to get made. She said she wanted the poetry book out before NFR, and it surely took her longer. NFR was recorded over time, no rush and all, and it was a fun process for her, which she wanted to continue with the release (especially after the big era LFL was). But now, she has a super introspective record, a poetry book she is self publishing and that everyone over the world is expecting in the fanbase, a poetry book that is done but not physically finished... So she has a super personal  record ... and it's early summer. Not the kind of record you put out at the moment (listen to the tracks out now or albums, everything is super breezy), unless you really the album to flop. 

 

Anyways, this is all speculation at this point, and overanalyzing the reasons proved wrong over the last months. 

[honeycookie 1,032]

Jesus... Let's all calm down.

We are still in the projected timeframe release Universal announced back in January, when Hope was released (they said it was probably mid-year, so May to August).

And did any of you who suffer from scrap phobia have relistened to the lyrics of the snippets? Her «introspective sad girl shit» isn't super summery. It's best suited for end of summer or early fall. 

The whole «album is scrapped or reworked» argument might be considered if, by September, we have no news. Before that, let's all stream Doin' Time and have too many drinks by the pool.

 

i hope you’re right, but her behavior surrounding it + releasing her art unenthusiastically a year later when she doesn’t even relate to it anymore doesn’t make me too hopeful. but maybe by september (christ that’s far away) you can smack me and say “told ya so!” until then though i’m allowed to be pessimistic about it.

[GeminiLanaFan 45,852]

Look at ‘Old Money’ for example—did anyone really believe she was a mature woman in her late 40s, 50s or 60s looking back on her life and failed marriage? Of course not. That was simply the persona she stepped into for the sake of the song.

 

It was not ‘fake,’ ‘inauthentic,’ not a lie or a deception of any kind.

 

I agree with you. i aways felt her songs come from authentic feelings and a mix of situations, probably. She simply amplifies them / rearranges her story with a bit of fiction and elements of Americana. I don't think art is 100% authentic... and that's the beauty of it. The emotions that compelled and drove you to write and create are true, but the rest is creation. And there's nothing wrong with that. 

[GeminiLanaFan 45,852]

i hope you’re right, but her behavior surrounding it + releasing her art unenthusiastically a year later when she doesn’t even relate to it anymore doesn’t make me too hopeful. but maybe by september (christ that’s far away) you can smack me and say “told ya so!” until then though i’m allowed to be pessimistic about it.

Honestly, if I'm right, I won't rub it in anyone's face. I don't have the answers, and I have been sometimes right, sometimes wrong , often in-between, over the last months. If I am wrong, I am man enough to write that I was wrong. 

I just don't give in to catastrophe scenarios when there is still hope the album will be out before fall (The limit for me will be when we hit the one-year anniversary of MAC and VB; if nothing is announced or released, then I'll panic).

Anyways, someone her mentioned Doin' Time is promoted by her label to see if she can hit again... Don't expect the album to be announced or have a single drop before a couple of weeks, to let the song live on the charts (if it's possible). 

[Vertimus 8,948]

I agree with you. i aways felt her songs come from authentic feelings and a mix of situations, probably. She simply amplifies them / rearranges her story with a bit of fiction and elements of Americana. I don't think art is 100% authentic... and that's the beauty of it. The emotions that compelled and drove you to write and create are true, but the rest is creation. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Very well said. If only 100% emotionally-sincere music were valid or acceptable, we wouldn’t have any of the music which isn’t feeling-based.

 

Look at something like ‘Meet Me in the Pale Moonlight’—everything about the track—which I love—screeches satire, humor, exaggeration and lack of relationship to genuine emotion. It’s a satire of a uptempo dance track and romantic attitudes that is nonetheless enjoyable in itself, and it can be embraced on different levels, or various levels of it can be ignored. The same thing is true of ‘Making Out.’

[slang 1,509]

She’s not lying. Not all art, by any means, is of the ‘sincere’ kind. Creativity in and of itself traffics in what is imagined , what is reconfigured or conceived or reconceived in a new form, and that involves artifice and distance. It has nothing to do with deception or lying.

 

What I initially said was that she’s been playing roles for well over a decade, assuming, playing in, and then abandoning those roles. Whether that was ‘Jewel-like folkie,’ ‘Mafia princess,’ ‘Lolita in the Hood,’ ‘trailer park goddess,’ international style icon or whatever.

 

Natalie Merchant posed as the various characters from her songs on the album art for her record ‘Ophelia,’ and Tori Amos poses as the different female characters represented in the songs on two different albums—‘Strange Little Girls’ and ‘American Doll Posse.’ That doesn’t make that theatrical approach to the album art ‘deception’ or ‘inauthentic.’

 

LDR is just doing the same thing, but taking the poses much further, adopting them for months or years at a time. And then moving on to something else. It’s a form of acting, of Hollywood, or playing roles. That doesn’t make her ‘fake,’ it makes her a kind of performance artist.

 

Does she probably get tangled and sometimes defeated by her own personas? It certainly appears that way. Are such things easy to juggle psychologically? Usually not.

 

Are we seeing ‘the genuine Elizabeth’ now, with songs like MAC? Or is this just another pose, the pose of ‘the authentic person I genuinely am’? Who knows?

 

Yeah, I mean I agree with you, but the specific issue is whether her singing about being in abusive relationships (and maybe lower economic stratas) is something she has ever experienced significantly and, if not, whether she has said on many occasions that she *has* experienced them (rather than her saying she's role-playing or empathizing). I'm saying that the only time I remember her saying specifically the stuff she depicted happened (in a more mundane and less cinematic way, of course) was the Ride video.  I actually think a lot of her songs are autobiographical (e.g., Carmen, Fordham Road), but I also *don't* think every song is *purely* autobiographical. I don't need an "authenticity certificate" on every song. Finally, in order for the "authenticity" discussion to really get somewhere, we need to know what the most triggering songs are.

[GeminiLanaFan 45,852]

Yeah, I mean I agree with you, but the specific issue is whether her singing about being in abusive relationships (and maybe lower economic stratas) is something she has ever experienced significantly and, if not, whether she has said on many occasions that she *has* experienced them (rather than her saying she's role-playing or empathizing). I'm saying that the only time I remember her saying specifically the stuff she depicted happened (in a more mundane and less cinematic way, of course) was the Ride video.  I actually think a lot of her songs are autobiographical (e.g., Carmen, Fordham Road), but I also *don't* think every song is *purely* autobiographical. I don't need an "authenticity certificate" on every song. Finally, in order for the "authenticity" discussion to really get somewhere, we need to know what the most triggering songs are.

 

Who knows? The UV album is, to me, a capture of all the moments in her relationships (plus a couple of admitted references to her days when she was in a cult), where she felt it might be too much for her, where she knows it's not good for her and yet, she can't help herself but go back. These moments got exaggerated (like the paroxysm of «Am I masochist or what?») Was there real physical abuse? Who knows. But she got out of those relationships. Her songs are probably just a capture of her darkest moments in those relationships. 

I think she is someone who stands by her man when the going gets rough, and she sure seems to get drawn to bad boys. 

[Vertimus 8,948]

Yeah, I mean I agree with you, but the specific issue is whether her singing about being in abusive relationships (and maybe lower economic stratas) is something she has ever experienced significantly and, if not, whether she has said on many occasions that she *has* experienced them (rather than her saying she's role-playing or empathizing). I'm saying that the only time I remember her saying specifically the stuff she depicted happened (in a more mundane and less cinematic way, of course) was the Ride video. I actually think a lot of her songs are autobiographical (e.g., Carmen, Fordham Road), but I also *don't* think every song is *purely* autobiographical. I don't need an "authenticity certificate" on every song. Finally, in order for the "authenticity" discussion to really get somewhere, we need to know what the most triggering songs are.

I don’t think she’s sometimes projected a sad or unhappy POV for no good reason. Which of us have not been emotionally badly hurt, rejected, bullied or found themselves isolated or alone? Or experienced unrequited love or an abusive relationship within one’s family, or without?

 

We know she had a painful, disappointing and perhaps abusive relationship with Barrie. We know she said she fell under the sway of some kind of ‘cult leader.’ Those alone are enough for me, especially since I already know the tragedies most or all people experience in their lives.

[Andreu 384]

its a doin time quote dude wtf :toofunny: :toofunny:

I-

 

 

sorry          I guess the tension with her silence and the hostility some fans have made me paranoid 

[divebarsinger 2,715]

-has gone grey-

 

-stares at clock-

[Cacciatore 19,346]

I'd like to hold her head underwater

 

 

Gurls this is not funny there's no need to be this disrespectful

 

and I know you will reply saying it's a joke but still if you jokingly say you wanna kill someone you admire I can't imagine what you say of people you dislike. 

 

 

its a doin time quote dude wtf :toofunny: :toofunny:

 

 

I-

 

 

sorry          I guess the tension with her silence and the hostility some fans have made me paranoid 

 

This must be the funniest exchange I've ever seen on this site lmao y'all are losing your damn minds and this just furthers my point about why this thread should be locked until we get solid news 

[MahaMaha 1,110]

Look at ‘Old Money’ for example—did anyone really believe she was a mature woman in her late 40s, 50s or 60s looking back on her life and failed marriage? Of course not. That was simply the persona she stepped into for the sake of the song.

It was not ‘fake,’ ‘inauthentic,’ not a lie or a deception of any kind.

Failed marriage? Wtf do y'all hear in that song I think 'the kids' isn't meant literally it's more like saying the kids we hang out with were young and pretty

[Fingertips 72,117]

Failed marriage? Wtf do y'all hear in that song I think 'the kids' isn't meant literally it's more like saying the kids we hang out with were young and pretty

 

I'm honestly screaming

 

The wait has everyone losing their minds

[divebarsinger 2,715]

"the kids we had were young and pretty, now they're old and ugly."     

[MoreCruelThanYou 5,277]

this is the unsweetened unfiltered raw dusty granulated green gray earl tea that we needed injected into our capillaries today. for norman frogging rockwell will come and ascend to like, a sick 4th place in her discography you guess

BREAKING: Lana’s upcoming 7th album “Yosemite” announced

the time on her hands whew

Someone comment “you have time to delete comments but not to release your album?”