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A Decade of Lana Del Rey: The Artist Talks Diarist Pop and Upholding Her Truth — Variety - December 2, 2021

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A Decade of Lana Del Rey: The Artist Talks Diarist Pop and Upholding Her Truth

By Mike Wass

December 2, 2021

 

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Some artists launch themselves into the world with a cautious toe in the water; some make a huge splash. Lana Del Rey’s “Video Games,” which may have been one of the first songs to “go viral,” was more than just a song — it was a statement of intent and a blueprint for everything she’s done since. With loved-up, ominous lyrics cloaked in shadowy production, the baroque ballad heralded the arrival of a songwriter who wielded vulnerability like a weapon. Over the course of seven studio albums, the prolific Del Rey has refined her sound into many different shapes — all unmistakably her.

 

It all started in June 2011, when “Video Games” hit the internet. “I remember being in Long Island with my family and seeing the Weeknd post ‘Video Games’ on Tumblr,” Del Rey says. The song wasn’t her debut — she’d released an album the previous year and an EP under her real name, Lizzy Grant, in 2008 — but it certainly was a lasting and far-reaching introduction to the world. “I can’t say to what extent I’ve influenced anything. But I can say all of my creative cosplay — aka notes from my real life — did widen up the sound in popular music for people to make a departure from a pure pop sound to something more diarist.”

 

From there, she was off and running. In 2012, she unveiled the sweeping, widescreen “Born to Die” album; boosted by a deluxe edition (which included the Rick Rubin-produced “Ride”), it spent 400 weeks on the Billboard 200.

 

She continued to branch out stylistically and seek new collaborators. For the follow-up, 2014’s “Ultraviolence,” Del Rey explored a gritty, guitar-driven sound with producer Dan Auerbach of the Black Keys. “I learned how good it felt to be singing, writing and producing stylistically in a way that felt very natural and detail-oriented,” she recalls. She would push the boundaries further on 2015’s dreamy, soundtrack-esque “Honeymoon,” a controversial curveball at the time that has since been embraced as a fan favorite. “I felt like I might be going in a more jazz-oriented direction, but the music of course did later pivot again,” she says.

Indeed: On 2017’s “Lust for Life,” she widened her net of collaborators. “It felt good to work with other people,” she explains. “I had been doing things in a very insular way up until that point.”

 

Pivoting again, Del Rey then partnered with Jack Antonoff (known for his work with Taylor Swift, Lorde and St. Vincent) on “Norman Fucking Rockwell!” The multilayered, slightly ’70s-flavored opus earned her a Grammy nomination for album of the year. Says Del Rey: “That meant a lot because I knew it was probably my best album. I’m usually almost exactly right on my gauge of what people will probably hate or love. I’m somewhat psychic in that way.” Antonoff also produced her first 2021 album, “Chemtrails Over the Country Club,” but Del Rey largely took the helm for the majestic follow-up, “Blue Banisters.”

 

Yet when looking back at her body of work, Del Rey is hard-pressed to offer highlights. “There were moments while I was making ‘Honeymoon,’ moments while mixing ‘Ultraviolence,’ then writing ‘Norman Rockwell!’ and producing my own album, ‘Blue Banisters,’ that all stand out to me,” she reflects. “But to be honest — and this is the takeaway — my proudest achievement is continuing to uphold my personal truth in a time when truth is often questioned and rarely valued.”

 

https://variety.com/2021/music/entertainers/lana-del-rey-ultraviolence-born-to-die-blue-banisters-1235123179/amp/

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Lana did an interview with Variety because of this :flutter: Hoping we get to see more of what she said during this (if she said anything else)

 

https://variety.com/2021/music/entertainers/lana-del-rey-ultraviolence-born-to-die-blue-banisters-1235123179/

 

“But to be honest — and this is the takeaway — my proudest achievement is continuing to uphold my personal truth in a time when truth is often questioned and rarely valued.”


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She would push the boundaries further on 2015’s dreamy, soundtrack-esque “Honeymoon,” a controversial curveball at the time that has since been embraced as a fan favorite.

 

:true: 


1.jpg  3.jpg  2.jpg 

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"But I can say all of my creative cosplay — aka notes from my real life — did widen up the sound in popular music for people to make a departure from a pure pop sound to something more diarist.” 

let em know :defeated:


i love you, but you don't understand me.

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1 minute ago, Vanilla Icy said:

"But I can say all of my creative cosplay — aka notes from my real life — did widen up the sound in popular music for people to make a departure from a pure pop sound to something more diarist.” 

let em know :defeated:

 

i love how she's fully aware of the influence she's had in the music industry & she's not afraid to speak about it! :true: 


WGe8ynS.gif

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“There were moments while I was making ‘Honeymoon,’ moments while mixing ‘Ultraviolence,’ then writing ‘Norman Rockwell!’ and producing my own album, ‘Blue Banisters,’ that all stand out to me,”

 

wait she produced blue banisters? i think she means co-produced with complete creative control. which..explains a lot ab some of the production choices. icon of individuality


small-sq-lana-del-rey-ultraviolence.gife4d193ad6825522455102e1518efe3d6835b52da

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12 minutes ago, drugmunny said:

“There were moments while I was making ‘Honeymoon,’ moments while mixing ‘Ultraviolence,’ then writing ‘Norman Rockwell!’ and producing my own album, ‘Blue Banisters,’ that all stand out to me,”

 

wait she produced blue banisters? i think she means co-produced with complete creative control. which..explains a lot ab some of the production choices. icon of individuality

I think that's what she means too. Having creative control over her work is something I've noticed is really important to Lana, so I can see why those moments are something that stand out to her. For me it also adds a lot more to the rawness and personality of BB if she did help with some of the production on it 


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Its curious for me to see how she explicitly acknowledges here NFR as her self-considered best own album (back then when she released it, at least).

 

I always was interested to know about how she felt herself about the album, given the fact that the critics were so loud about it, yet she never said anything publicly about it, more than some generic thoughts regarding loving it and so.

 

Maybe that's the reason why she teased its almost entirety before the release. She had never done that with any other record. 

 

Anyways, quite surprised. I always thought that she just deservedly enjoyed the praise, yet wasnt completely full in with it. 

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5 minutes ago, Surf Noir said:

i love how lana kinda considers herself a psychic

kinda-psychic-i-have-a-fifth-sense.gif


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2 hours ago, Super Movie said:

I think that's what she means too. Having creative control over her work is something I've noticed is really important to Lana, so I can see why those moments are something that stand out to her. For me it also adds a lot more to the rawness and personality of BB if she did help with some of the production on it 

Hasn’t she been helping with production since Honeymoon?

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Just now, Nectar said:

Hasn’t she been helping with production since Honeymoon?

I think so, but she still had some limitations (her label wanted her to do HBTB because they wanted a “radio hit”). Especially compared to a lot of artists right now, she has a lot of creative control, and I don’t think that’s something she takes for granted at all 


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3 hours ago, IanadeIrey said:

 

“Norman Fucking Rockwell!” The multilayered, slightly ’70s-flavored opus earned her a Grammy nomination for album of the year. Says Del Rey: “That meant a lot because I knew it was probably my best album."

Well there we have it everyone, NFR! is canonically the best album. :defeated:


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It’s so interesting to hear her outrightly declare what she views her best album to be. I remember in an interview the week leading up to NFR’s release, she said that she really “objectively liked the songs” on that record. And I think there’s so much that goes into informing that opinion — it is very much a modern classic by any standard when you really listen to the melodies, lyrics, and the overall presentation of it that is the golden age of California in a nutshell; it’s like, instantly iconic.
 

What I’ve always loved about Lana is that she can acknowledge how good her work is without attributing that goodness to the fact that it can win over even her biggest skeptics— NFR is an amazing album before the fact because as she has said, what’s there to not like about it? It’s just Lana chipping away at her craft and doing what she does best, and based on the way she talks about it in this interview, she seemed touched that the record she considered to be her best was also perceived that way. It’s not her best because the critics deemed it so. 
 

Nonetheless, it’s a shame that not all her records have experienced that level of acclaim, which they truly are all deserving of. 

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“She wielded vulnerability like a weapon“. This is provocative but I like it. I think it explains the paradox of LDR :flutter:


‘Fucking God bless us all and let’s hope we make it through this.’
~LDR, Flaunt

 

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