Born to Die - Post-Release Discussion Thread + Poll

[American Whore 51,090]

HBD God Bless America aka BTD we love you

[theviolence 5,837]

9 years! 

 

I still vividly remember when it was 4 years old and Lana made her Darling born to die post... and its been 5 years since then?! 

[Beautiful Loser 48,618]

I listened to it in full yesterday. In fact, I think BTD is the album I replay the most, at least in recent years. (if we don't count new album releases, I stream them like crazy for a couple of months) I don't think I'll ever get tired of it.

[FallingCherry 7,731]

I feel like this is a really unpopular opinion but BTD just doesn’t do it for me anymore. It is a legendary album for sure and will always be legendary, but I just don’t really like the music as much as I used to. I became a fan in 2016, and BTD was the first Lana Del Rey album I heard. I loved it, but as the years went on, I realised how overproduced this album was. The lyrics are pretty deep, Lana evokes some serious topics on this album, drugs and alcohol abuse, abusives relationships, the difficulties a teenager or a young adult may face during their life... But I hate how the seriousness of these topics is hidden behind a grand and theatrical production. The whole album is drown in such fakeness that I can’t stand anymore. It doesn’t feel... raw but way too polished. For people that became fans during the BTD era, I can understand how important this album is to them. But for people like me who became fans during or after the HM era, I feel like this album doesn’t really hold any value other than it made Lana what she is today (I’m not generalising, that’s just the impression I get).

Video Games still makes me cry to this day, but that’s probably the only song I’ll have an easy listen with. It makes me feel nostalgic, and happy, in a way. Truly one of the songs I never get bored of.

Anyway, happy birthday, BTD, you’re still a special one 

[DCooper 36,719]

5 minutes ago, FallingCherry said:

I feel like this is a really unpopular opinion but BTD just doesn’t do it for me anymore. It is a legendary album for sure and will always be legendary, but I just don’t really like the music as much as I used to. I became a fan in 2016, and BTD was the first Lana Del Rey album I heard. I loved it, but as the years went on, I realised how overproduced this album was. The lyrics are pretty deep, Lana evokes some serious topics on this album, drugs and alcohol abuse, abusives relationships, the difficulties a teenager or a young adult may face during their life... But I hate how the seriousness of these topics is hidden behind a grand and theatrical production. The whole album is drown in such fakeness that I can’t stand anymore. It doesn’t feel... raw but way too polished. For people that became fans during the BTD era, I can understand how important this album is to them. But for people like me who became fans during or after the HM era, I feel like this album doesn’t really hold any value other than it made Lana what she is today (I’m not generalising, that’s just the impression I get).

Video Games still makes me cry to this day, but that’s probably the only song I’ll have an easy listen with. It makes me feel nostalgic, and happy, in a way. Truly one of the songs I never get bored of.

Anyway, happy birthday, BTD, you’re still a special one 

 

I do agree that it's overproduced at times but I think that's kind of the point in a lot of ways. She's singing about these heavy topics but she's purposely hiding them behind the grand theatrical production, because in this album Lana is walking the fine line between fun and danger and not yet ready to grow up. It's has the most "immature" mindset of all her albums but only because she's setting up the story of growth that she goes on to develop with each album, and despite the production, she manages to fill the album with deeper moments and hints of what's to come from her.

 

Commercially, its production also helped demand its presence be known by the public and it worked wonders. Truly an iconic album. 

[SlowGinFizzzz 15,354]

The most important and impactful music era of the 2010s, easily. It's incredible how massive she was with this album, especially considering what the music landscape looked like back then. Over here, she had a number 1 with the album, a number 2 with Video Games, and two more top 10 hits with the title track and Summertime Sadness (the original version, not that ugly remix); and Blue Jeans and even Dark Paradise were radio hits, too. 

 

I know people throw this term around a lot, but with Born To Die, Lana really did pave the way for today's artists (both in pop and in alternative music) in terms of sound and aesthetics. The album itself remains incredible and hasn't aged a bit, thanks to Lana's captivating storytelling and Emile Haynie's timeless, cohesive production. 

 

Happy birthday, Born To Die!

[rightofjupiter 16,493]

37 minutes ago, FallingCherry said:

I feel like this is a really unpopular opinion but BTD just doesn’t do it for me anymore. It is a legendary album for sure and will always be legendary, but I just don’t really like the music as much as I used to. I became a fan in 2016, and BTD was the first Lana Del Rey album I heard. I loved it, but as the years went on, I realised how overproduced this album was. The lyrics are pretty deep, Lana evokes some serious topics on this album, drugs and alcohol abuse, abusives relationships, the difficulties a teenager or a young adult may face during their life... But I hate how the seriousness of these topics is hidden behind a grand and theatrical production. The whole album is drown in such fakeness that I can’t stand anymore. It doesn’t feel... raw but way too polished. For people that became fans during the BTD era, I can understand how important this album is to them. But for people like me who became fans during or after the HM era, I feel like this album doesn’t really hold any value other than it made Lana what she is today (I’m not generalising, that’s just the impression I get).

Video Games still makes me cry to this day, but that’s probably the only song I’ll have an easy listen with. It makes me feel nostalgic, and happy, in a way. Truly one of the songs I never get bored of.

Anyway, happy birthday, BTD, you’re still a special one 

 

i'm 100% with you– i rarely listen to the album, or even any tracks from it. the production (i could not hate it more tbh), lana's babydoll voice– it irritated me then and still does now. BUT it introduced me to lana's artistic vision and obviously something resonated, bc despite not loving it as a whole when i came out i still listened to it a ton. i think i always appreciated her melodies, songwriting, and storytelling, and felt sure that she'd release music i'd like a lot more in the future– and with paradise and UV that hunch was confirmed. it changed the pop landscape and gave lana the freedom and ability to do whatever she wanted with her music and releases, and for that i'll be forever grateful.

[ShadesOfFool 20,112]

Happy birthday born to die you are everything to me

[West Coast 45,790]

Happy birthday to the album that started it all! The way this is one of the most influential pop albums of the 2010s. A trailblazer record that was not exactly rightfully appreciated upon its release, but people have come to their senses over the years. Iconic. 
 

When I first played it in full, sometime in the summer of 2012, from the first notes of the strings, I knew I'd be into something grand and unforgettable. Incredibly thankful for the memories this album has gave me. 

 

PS: 'Off to The Races' is one of the greatest pop songs ever released and 'Radio' is severely underrated. 

 

[Fingertips 72,034]

Happy birthday, Born to Die! I remember the first time that I heard "Video Games" and "Blue Jeans" before the album was released, and knowing that I came across a trailblazer. While I have moved forward from the lyrical atmosphere of this record, I must say that every track still feels unique and fresh to this day. A timeless classic. 

[necessary sacrifice 8,865]

Happy 9th birthday to the album that changed everything. Lana already cemented her place in history with this album. I still listen to this album weekly and it still feels as fresh as the day it was released. I never really connected with an artist so deeply before until I heard this album. Born to Die will always have a special place in my heart.  

[rabbit 5,224]

Happy birthday, BTD  I'll never forget how I felt the first time I heard Video Games, it most definitely changed my life. That song still gets me to this day, it's magical and transformative, a moment in time that I don't think anyone but Lana could have truly captured and sent out to us, in the way it was done 

While it's the Lana album I revisit the least, it holds some of the most potent memories, and is simply iconic in every sense of the word. The current state of music would be SO different without BTD, and it's very very gratifying as a longtime fan to see this work get the praise and acclaim it absolutely deserves! 

Thank you for changing music and our lives, BTD! 

[Dark Angel 201,020]

happy 9th birthday to the iconic born to die <3

[pin up galore 18,966]

the way this entire album is still doing incredibly well commercially along with inspiring a whole new generation of artists while cementing itself into the pop cultural landscape proves how before it’s time this album was. BTD could be released today and people still wouldn’t know what to make of it and that is a feat few other albums can accomplish. the dark themes of self loathing, dependence, and fragility paired with the strange yet perfect combination of grand strings and hip hop beats and nostalgic imagery was a perfect re-attempt at a debut album. AKA allowed Lana to realize what it would take to make people notice her and DAMN did she do it well with this project. this album is one of the most influential albums in pop culture history and these past 9 years have proven its worth. ill love BTD till the day i die and can already envision myself blaring it to my future kids in 20 years. and the way its the most sold vinyl released in the 2010s - she really brought a whole music format back into style her power 

[sunday afternoon 1,036]

I'm going to tell a bit about my life, but Born to die came out a day before I turned 19 and I'll never forget it. I bought it on a Friday night when I got out of school, missed my bus so I could buy it, and I did myself violence while waiting to listen to it on Saturday morning. I was horny and couldn't sleep because I really wanted to know what she was capable of coming out of after VG and BJ which had obsessed me for months. I was in my bed, it was snowy and it was very cold outside, but a bright sun was beating down on my bedroom window. Then the album starts to run on my hi-fi system and... it was magnificent, it had been a long time since I had felt such an emotion while listening to an album. I knew Lana would be one of those artists who would follow me all my life. I went over Summertime sadness all morning, the chorus on repeat and started to write heartbroken poems again, it sounded so good. This album gave me so much inspiration to express what I felt deep inside me, but it helped me live the same way it has somewhere. I really had this weird connection with her, and these weird fantasies of rich old men...

 

This album made me have some strange and new experiences that I had inside me, it's weird to talk about it but I started dating men much older than me and having a romance with married men, especially teachers (including a teacher that a friend of mine had in class but she never knew). We went to shabby hotels in the countryside and we were like fiery lovers, hidden, like alone in the world. We ate in front of the sunsets, and I felt special and wanted. I loved being around these older men and Lana was always in my ears, nothing was real and nothing had consequences, it was like living in a novel. It's weird and shameful today, but yes Lana certainly pushed me to do this and I have a positive memory of it (and I did it very discreetly).

 

Paradise had a toxic and addictive flavor at the same time, impossible to forget the first sound of Cola I heard it was poisonous. Fuck this thing I managed to grab it. The album shocked me. Lana has truly demonstrated incredible creative and musical genius, and these albums will remain eternal classics and I'm proud of what she has accomplished.

 

I don't really like the elitist side of fans who say BTD is overproduced, but I understand that. Still it's Lana's DNA, I can't see her without these albums and a Lana Del Rey without these major albums wouldn't be her. After Ultraviolence there was less power and more smoothness, but voila, I always come back to these classics like almost 10 years ago. Impossible to listen to Lana without going through it again. He is a classic. Everything is perfect here, the production through the texts, the American universe a little dirty, adolescent, and sad, a parallel dimension. BTD + Paradise albums are two PERFECT albums.

I dream that she will make us a deluxe anniversary boxed edition with demos, unpublished, outtakes with unpublished photos. And I would ask more if she would show us the moment when she records this masterpiece in the studio with sequences where we see her singing, writing ...

[American Whore 51,090]

i can't with the pretentiousness on twitter about BTD today 

[SlowGinFizzzz 15,354]

By the way, hating on Lolita is NOT a personality trait. It does NOT make you edgy or skinny or pretty. 

[TrashMagiq 58,429]

It's so wild how much impact this album has had on so many people. It hasn't aged a day for me tbh. I don't consider this the best Lana album, or even my fav, but it's the one I find myself listening to a Lot. It has so much replay value for me. It's like comfort music. Whenever I rank my fav Lana albums I got no clue where to put Born to Die, it's just special, it has this energy that can't be recreated imo.

[Vanilla Icy 29,598]

billie eilish posted a selfie today with born to die lyrics as the caption  

[Fireffie 3,663]

Can anyone who has the red target or the blue vinyl of BTD confirm me that they're both standard versions? The deluxe was only pressed in standard black, right?