“Honeymoon” Album Recording/Writing Timeline and Creative Process Discussion

[mybluenectarofthegods389 275]

I’m currently making a writing/recording timeline for Honeymoon! if anyone comes across any information please let me know.

This is what I have so far
 

March 2014 - Sessions for Ultraviolence end

 

 

May-June, 2014: In an interview for Complex magazine, Lana notes: "I actually started conceptually thinking about having a supplement, an addition to this record ('Ultraviolence') that could come very easily. That hasn't happened in a very long time. Not since I wrote the "Paradise" to "Born to Die" that I really liked". Thus, it is likely that Lana's fourth project originally started as an accompanying ep to "Ultraviolence", which probably would have consisted of "Ultraviolence" outtakes and some new songs that were recorded in June-July 2014. But by September 2014, it was clear that the project would develop more, when the first sessions for "Honeymoon" started.

 

June 2014 - She records Music To Watch Boys To (Also titled Pink Flamingos)

• Interviewer: Are You Going To Record Something Tonight? Do You Know What It Is, Or?
• Lana: I do, yes I do, I have an idea for a record called 'Music to Watch Boys To', so, yeah, I'm just thinking about it and what it will mean

 

Lana began writing music for the soundtrack to "Big Eyes," which includes:

1. An “I Can Fly” rework

2. “Big Eyes."

3. “Beautiful People”

4. “The Good Life” Cover.

 

June 2014: She records Beautiful People (Demo 1)

 

July 30, 2014: She records her cover of “The Good Life”

August 2014 - A demo of Big Eyes is recorded

September 14, 2014 - Sessions for the album begin

 

Sep/November: She records Salvatore/Soft Ice Cream and Swan Song? (They were both recorded at Electric Lady Studios and she was seen on New York on those months)

 
Sep-Dec 2014: Dark City, Crazy For You, California, Black Magic Stars, Honeymoon, 24/24 Hours, Dead To Me, Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood, Freak/Freak Like Me, The Balckest Day and a reworked version of I Can Fly are recorded

 

Fun Fact: 24 was originally recorded for the movie Spectre, but was ultimately rejected

 

Latter half of 2014: A new version of Say Yes To Heaven produced by STINT is made, but was scrapped by being "too overwhelming"

 

 

Initially, "Honeymoon" developed more as a pop record, with a return to the "Born to Die" sound. This is indicated by several facts, namely the leaked demos of the tracks "The Blackest Day" and "Freak" (made by the same producer, STINT [Ajay Bhattacharyya]), further, in an October interview for "L'Uomo Vogue," Lana expressed her desire to work with producer Giorgio Moroder, who is considered the father of synth disco and electronic dance music, also one of the mixer/engineers said that the "Honeymoon" demos sounded like the 80s. At the same time, Lana was still searching for a sound: "I'm still looking for something different, with majestic choruses, beautiful orchestrations, '50s-inspired with a little touch of soft grunge." And at some point in the making of the album in 2014, Lana told Rick Nowels, one of the album's two producers, that she wanted to make a jazz album. That's how the tracks "Honeymoon" and "Terrence Loves You" came about, which Rick says are not pure jazz, but her "versions" of jazz tracks (the original title of "Terrence Loves You" was "Jazz and Blues ")

 

She also had this to say on the early process of making the record 

 

“I wrote the biggest part of the record during fall, winter and spring, and it was a beautiful process because I did it with one of my best friends, Rick. My daily activities consisted on swimming on the beach and writing. The album started very easily and fun with songs like Music to Watch Boys To, Honeymoon and Terrence Loves You, and finally, it went through more modern and sexy songs like Freak and Art Deco. But the line that goes through the record has a lot of jazz influence.”

 

Early 2015: Demos of “Say Yes To Heaven” produced by Stephen Kozmeniuk and Tom Neville are made for the album because of a potential Hugo Boss campaign.

Ultimately the song was dropped from Honeymoon because of the campaign and neither version of the song was approved by Hugo Boss.

 

 

January 6 2015: She says she has written 9 songs, “four of which “the production is perfect; I’m looking for a few more songs to tie everything together” and I’m doing a cover of “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood.” She also reveals the tile of the album

 

January 13, 2015: Lana records Paradise
 

Jan-Feb 2015: Art Deco, Burnt Norton, Terrence Loves You, Come With Me, If I Die Young, Religion, God Knows I Tried/God Knows are recorded 

 

January 28: She is seen entering a recording studio with Mr. Brainwash

 

Jan - February 2015: Lana writes “High By The Beach”, “This was probably one of the last ones on the record”

 

Sometime in 2015: Lana sends a list of songs that need additional production, they were

Crazy For You

Freak

High By The Beach/Get High

God Knows I Tried/God Knows

Honeymoon

Salvatore/Ice Cream

Music To Watch Boys To/Pink Flamingos

Religion

Say Yes To Heaven

Swan Song

 

This means that Crazy For You and Say Yes To Heaven were serious contenders for the album

 

 

February 16, 2015: Lana says to a fan that she was done with Honeymoon

 

March 31, 2015: On an interview with Mark Ronson he states “I’m going to do some recording with Lana Del Rey today and tomorrow. I found this cool old studio out here.” “She has some songs and I said I had some demo ideas, and if they are any good, then maybe she’ll like them and we’ll go from there.” Later in a Reddit AMA he said “we did an early version of Terrence Loves You which i still love.”

 

June 24, 2015 - She posts a photo on honeymoon with the caption “So tired in the studio”

June 2015: She records Cry Kill Die and all additional songs are completed

In an interview, Lana revealed that she had written about sixteen songs for "Honeymoon," which turned out to be:

- "Honeymoon"; 

- "Music to Watch Boys To"; 

- "Terrence Loves You."

- "God Knows I Tried"; 

- "High by the Beach”

- "Freak";

- "Art Deco."

- "Religion." 

- "Salvatore." 

- "The Blackes Day"; 

- "24";

- "Sawn Song." 

- "California"

- "Crazy for You”

- "Paradise"

- "Come with Me"

- "Dead to Me".

- "If I Die Young"

- “Cry Kill Die”

- “Black Magic Stars”

September 2015: She records the first demo of “Lust For Life”

 

September 18, 2015: Honeymoon comes out

 

Somewhere in 2015: She records Gucci

[Pico Ocean Boulevard 41,210]

The way she  & Rick created such an amazing body of work,  a literal masterpiece with perfect production in such a short amount of time is insane 

Omg and thank you so much for doing this timeline 

[Embach 43,629]

We need Mark Ronson and Dan Heath outtakes/demos!!!!!

 

Absolutely timeless masterpiece, my all-time favorite album forever and ever!!!!!

[SoftwareUpgrade 19,349]

LOVE this album!

[peachlipgloss 3,094]

honeymoon is so special

[TheBoss 13,514]

best album ever yup!

btw we need that I Can Fly demo! And Pink Flamingos is a must!

[americangothic 1,716]

I was so shocked when I found out that 'If I Die Young' and 'Cry Kill Die' were considered for 'Honeymoon'. They sound more like 'Lust for Life' to me.

[Veinsineon 77,217]

We need more info about 24 

[Unknown 3,176]

Honeymoon sessions

September 2014 - December 2014

• California
• Crazy For You
• Honeymoon
• Freak
• Soft Ice Cream (Salvatore)
• 24 Hours
• Swan Song
• Blackest Day
• Pink Flamingos (Music To Watch Boys To)
• Dark City 
• Dead To Me
• I Can Fly (rework of original 2013 demo)

2015 songs (completed by June 2015)

• High By The Beach
• Terrence Loves You
• Cry Kill Die
• Come With Me
• Paradise
• If I Die Young
• Religion
• Art Deco
• God Knows I Tried 

Other Info

Big Eyes demo is from August 2014

Terrence Loves You had 2 alternate titles, "Jazz N Blues" and "Violet Sings The Blues" 

 

[Veinsineon 77,217]

Violet Sings The Blues ? 

[Lindsay Lohan 10,614]

2 minutes ago, Unknown said:

Honeymoon sessions

September 2014 - December 2014

• California
• Crazy For You
• Honeymoon
• Freak
• Soft Ice Cream (Salvatore)
• 24 Hours
• Swan Song
• Blackest Day
• Pink Flamingos (Music To Watch Boys To)
• Dark City 
• Dead To Me
• I Can Fly (rework of original 2013 demo)

2015 songs (completed by June 2015)

• High By The Beach
• Terrence Loves You
• Cry Kill Die
• Come With Me
• Paradise
• If I Die Young
• Religion
• Art Deco
• God Knows I Tried 

Other Info

Big Eyes demo is from August 2014

Terrence Loves You had 2 alternate titles, "Jazz N Blues" and "Violet Sings The Blues" 

 

 

Violet Sings The Blues 

I felt something reading that... WHYYY was it changed

[mybluenectarofthegods389 275]

8 minutes ago, Unknown said:

Honeymoon sessions

September 2014 - December 2014

• California
• Crazy For You
• Honeymoon
• Freak
• Soft Ice Cream (Salvatore)
• 24 Hours
• Swan Song
• Blackest Day
• Pink Flamingos (Music To Watch Boys To)
• Dark City 
• Dead To Me
• I Can Fly (rework of original 2013 demo)

2015 songs (completed by June 2015)

• High By The Beach
• Terrence Loves You
• Cry Kill Die
• Come With Me
• Paradise
• If I Die Young
• Religion
• Art Deco
• God Knows I Tried 

Other Info

Big Eyes demo is from August 2014

Terrence Loves You had 2 alternate titles, "Jazz N Blues" and "Violet Sings The Blues" 

 

THANK YOU

[MakingOut 2,337]

8 minutes ago, Unknown said:

Honeymoon sessions

September 2014 - December 2014

• California
• Crazy For You
• Honeymoon
• Freak
• Soft Ice Cream (Salvatore)
• 24 Hours
• Swan Song
• Blackest Day
• Pink Flamingos (Music To Watch Boys To)
• Dark City 
• Dead To Me
• I Can Fly (rework of original 2013 demo)

2015 songs (completed by June 2015)

• High By The Beach
• Terrence Loves You
• Cry Kill Die
• Come With Me
• Paradise
• If I Die Young
• Religion
• Art Deco
• God Knows I Tried 

Other Info

Big Eyes demo is from August 2014

Terrence Loves You had 2 alternate titles, "Jazz N Blues" and "Violet Sings The Blues" 

 

thank you so much babes you’ve been feeding us and educating us before we get the leaks 

[Eugene 26,670]

15 minutes ago, Unknown said:

I Can Fly (rework of original 2013 demo)

are there differences between the 2013 version and the released version? 

[americangothic 1,716]

I always found the name "Terrence Loves You" really intriguing, but "Violet Sings the Blues" is just... wow.

[palemoonbaby 15,182]

thank you for making this timeline

[syrup amour 2,954]

This is so interesting. And I thought about how the last song she recorded to the album was High By The Beach, which is the most hip hop influenced song on the album, which also makes me think of lust for life, which is one of her albums that have the most hip hop influences. So in this case the last song she recorded hinted at the next albums sound. Does this also apply to ocean boulevard and LDRX?

Also Violet Sings The Blues is one of the most gorgeous song titles I’ve ever heard. But I love Terrence Loves You too.

[SoftwareUpgrade 19,349]

20 minutes ago, Unknown said:

Honeymoon sessions

September 2014 - December 2014

• California
• Crazy For You
• Honeymoon
• Freak
• Soft Ice Cream (Salvatore)
• 24 Hours
• Swan Song
• Blackest Day
• Pink Flamingos (Music To Watch Boys To)
• Dark City 
• Dead To Me
• I Can Fly (rework of original 2013 demo)

2015 songs (completed by June 2015)

• High By The Beach
• Terrence Loves You
• Cry Kill Die
• Come With Me
• Paradise
• If I Die Young
• Religion
• Art Deco
• God Knows I Tried 

Other Info

Big Eyes demo is from August 2014

Terrence Loves You had 2 alternate titles, "Jazz N Blues" and "Violet Sings The Blues" 

 

 

 And I lost myself when I lost you

 

 

[americangothic 1,716]

She must truly love "I Can Fly", if she considered for both "Honeymoon" (2015) and "Blue Banisters" (2021), even AFTER she already released it for the "Big Eyes" soundtrack.

[Ethel Cain 9,034]

I'm loving this spillage  But we still need to know the real title of "Get Dark"