Honeymoon - Post-Release Discussion Thread + Poll

[xcx 2,192]

I honestly prefer diversity in an album and that's honestly one of the few good things about HM

At least we both think the album has good things 

[Thunder Revenant 20,695]

I honestly prefer diversity in an album and that's honestly one of the few good things about HM

Serious question, where is the diversity? Ok, HBTB and HM are quite different, but we have only 4 kinds of songs on a 14 track album. The slow, stripped back ones (HM, TLY, GKIT, DLMBM), the slow slightly playful ones (MTWBT, Art Deco, Salvatore, Religion), the slow cinematic ones (TBD, Swan Song, 24) and HBTB & Freak, which take up a little bit of speed and have those TripHop beats. The album has pretty much one tempo and the instrumentation/production can't be called "diverse" aswell.

[slang 1,509]

Serious question, where is the diversity? Ok, HBTB and HM are quite different, but we have only 4 kinds of songs on a 14 track album. The slow, stripped back ones (HM, TLY, GKIT, DLMBM), the slow slightly playful ones (MTWBT, Art Deco, Salvatore, Religion), the slow cinematic ones (TBD, Swan Song, 24) and HBTB & Freak, which take up a little bit of speed and have those TripHop beats. The album has pretty much one tempo and the instrumentation/production can't be called "diverse" aswell.

If you just mean diversity in tempo there's no argument, but diversity in color and mood there's certainly variation in HM. TBD, HM, SS (my top tier) don't seem alike to me. F,AD, R, S, TBD, 24 (a consecutive stretch) seem pretty varied. HM and TLY have varied production (as only TLY is really stripped back). But again if tempo's the lionshare of diversity for you there's no arguing that. It's more useful to compare her to others and ask if the amount of diversity she shows (even in tempo) is less (or more). So how diverse is she relative to Adele, White Lung, Bat for Lashes, to pick some random examples from my pop music consciousness?

 

Ella Fitzgerald is an interesting artist to compare LDR/HM to, given LDR's posturing as a "jazz singer". So, for instance, I have a "best of the songbooks disc 1 CD of Ella, which has some slow, saddish, songs and fewer uptempo ones, and it's on spotify (as well as HM of course). If I create a playlist that alternates songs from that CD and HM, the songs mesh well, imo (can't remember if I altered Ella's song ordering a bit to do that, but it doesn't seem like I did much). Considering Ella is one of the greatest pop/jazz singers of the 20th century and had some of the greatest songwriters behind her (Gershwin, Porter, Ellington), I stan for LDR quite well to say that even if she doesn't blow Ella away in terms of singing or song quality; neither is she blown away (i.e., the plot of Rocky I). Of course, your opinion may differ, but my main point is that it's an interesting comparison (i.e., possibly relevant to LDR's artistic intentions) for determining how much variety (or quality) there is in HM songs. 

 

Here's the playlist, if you'd like to do your own assessment of cross-generational singing. They don't always alternate as sometimes there'll be two shortish tracks of the same artist preceding a longer track of the other. Some of the transitions seem conversational (e.g., HBTB and Miss Otis Regrets are both revenge songs).  Also there are provocative lyrics across *both* generations on some songs (Love For Sale, what the heck is that about?)

 

Something's Gotta Give

Love Is Here To Stay

Honeymoon

Bewitched, Bothered, And Bewildered

Music To Watch Boys To

I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm

Terrence Loves You

The Lady Is A Tramp

God Knows I Tried

I Got It Bad (And That Ain't Good)

High By The Beach

Miss Otis Regrets

Freak

's Wonderful

Art Deco

Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea

Burnt Norton (Interlude)

Religion

Love For Sale

Salvatore

They Can't Take That Away From Me

Midnight Sun

The Blackest Day

Hooray For Love

24

Why Was I Born?

Swan Song

Cotton Tail

Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye

[Thunder Revenant 20,695]

If you just mean diversity in tempo there's no argument, but diversity in color and mood there's certainly variation in HM. TBD, HM, SS (my top tier) don't seem alike to me. F,AD, R, S, TBD, 24 (a consecutive stretch) seem pretty varied. HM and TLY have varied production (as only TLY is really stripped back). But again if tempo's the lionshare of diversity for you there's no arguing that. It's more useful to compare her to others and ask if the amount of diversity she shows (even in tempo) is less (or more). So how diverse is she relative to Adele, White Lung, Bat for Lashes, to pick some random examples from my pop music consciousness?

 

Ella Fitzgerald is an interesting artist to compare LDR/HM to, given LDR's posturing as a "jazz singer". So, for instance, I have a "best of the songbooks disc 1 CD of Ella, which has some slow, saddish, songs and fewer uptempo ones, and it's on spotify (as well as HM of course). If I create a playlist that alternates songs from that CD and HM, the songs mesh well, imo (can't remember if I altered Ella's song ordering a bit to do that, but it doesn't seem like I did much). Considering Ella is one of the greatest pop/jazz singers of the 20th century and had some of the greatest songwriters behind her (Gershwin, Porter, Ellington), I stan for LDR quite well to say that even if she doesn't blow Ella away in terms of singing or song quality; neither is she blown away (i.e., the plot of Rocky I). Of course, your opinion may differ, but my main point is that it's an interesting comparison (i.e., possibly relevant to LDR's artistic intentions) for determining how much variety (or quality) there is in HM songs. 

 

Here's the playlist, if you'd like to do your own assessment of cross-generational singing. They don't always alternate as sometimes there'll be two shortish tracks of the same artist preceding a longer track of the other. Some of the transitions seem conversational (e.g., HBTB and Miss Otis Regrets are both revenge songs).  Also there are provocative lyrics across *both* generations on some songs (Love For Sale, what the heck is that about?)

 

Something's Gotta Give

Love Is Here To Stay

Honeymoon

Bewitched, Bothered, And Bewildered

Music To Watch Boys To

I've Got My Love To Keep Me Warm

Terrence Loves You

The Lady Is A Tramp

God Knows I Tried

I Got It Bad (And That Ain't Good)

High By The Beach

Miss Otis Regrets

Freak

's Wonderful

Art Deco

Between The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea

Burnt Norton (Interlude)

Religion

Love For Sale

Salvatore

They Can't Take That Away From Me

Midnight Sun

The Blackest Day

Hooray For Love

24

Why Was I Born?

Swan Song

Cotton Tail

Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye

 

I'm not just talking about tempo but the overall mood, production and feeling of HM. The beginning from HM to GKIT is pretty stable, apart from MTWBT which is still not a major break-out. And everything from AD to Salvatore has one ongoing mood and "color", same for TBD/24/SS. And even between those parts of the album, there are not any major differences considering the mood, the atmosphere, the production or the tempo. Of course, they don't sound THE SAME, but speaking about DIVERSITY considering this record seems majorly out of place.

[slang 1,509]

I'm not just talking about tempo but the overall mood, production and feeling of HM. The beginning from HM to GKIT is pretty stable, apart from MTWBT which is still not a major break-out. And everything from AD to Salvatore has one ongoing mood and "color", same for TBD/24/SS. And even between those parts of the album, there are not any major differences considering the mood, the atmosphere, the production or the tempo. Of course, they don't sound THE SAME, but speaking about DIVERSITY considering this record seems majorly out of place.

If that's your perception, fine. But I still think the interesting question is diversity "relative to", with lots of comparison choices. So for instance, if you listen to Adele's 25 or Taylor's 1989 are they more diverse in some way? IMO, no.

[graham4anything 2,859]

UV's last song (IMHO) is "Is this happiness" generally considered to be placed AFTER the bonus songs

and a song so down that it is the actual segue between UV and Honeymoon, the bridge so to say

 

Honeymoon continues and without Honeymoon, and it's epic battle between Lana and Elizabeth how would anyone know

both came out of Honeymoon agreeing to continue onward to the next chapter

 

There is no way whatsoever, that there could be any next chapter without Honeymoon

 

(as one shall see soon as we all hear the next stuff).

 

And a year or so from now, haters of Honeymoon will be saying how great Honeymoon is and why can't (the chapter at that time be half as good)

 

That's my opinion from an adult that agrees with Lana that one doesn't need to get there fast. (put on American and play it loud)

[Thunder Revenant 20,695]

If that's your perception, fine. But I still think the interesting question is diversity "relative to", with lots of comparison choices. So for instance, if you listen to Adele's 25 or Taylor's 1989 are they more diverse in some way? IMO, no.

Both of the album you try to compare HM to are terrible. Taylor is the definition of generic pop and 25 was only successful because everyone overhyped it and praised it without even listening to this take-outs-from-my-last-album-compilation.

[Amadeus 11,293]

let's compare HM to 19 and Back To Black. Both are cohesive albums and yet very diverse. HM is cohesive but does not offer as much diversity as the other two records. One of the main problems with HM is that almost every song sounds as if they used the same instruments repackaged as something else over and over again.

[bunoner 5,492]

 

Delete it fat

[slang 1,509]

Both of the album you try to compare HM to are terrible. Taylor is the definition of generic pop and 25 was only successful because everyone overhyped it and praised it without even listening to this take-outs-from-my-last-album-compilation.

Bear in mind I'm just trying to make the conversation interesting. I don't have as low opinion of TS and A as you do (although I'm forced to the Ryan Adams version of 1989 for assessing it albumwise). Also TS had Imogen Heap co-write one of her songs (and she won a grammy when Taylor did for AOTY, woo hoo!). But if LDR's HM is more diverse than the two top-selling albums of the recent past, it's at least good for her as an artist. What about most recent Chelsea Wolfe and St. Vincent, and note we're talking diversity and not quality (i.e., both CW and SV are pretty tight stylists on their last releases). What about the most recent Bjork or Kate Bush (also tight stylists)? 

 

 

let's compare HM to 19 and Back To Black. Both are cohesive albums and yet very diverse. HM is cohesive but does not offer as much diversity as the other two records. One of the main problems with HM is that almost every song sounds as if they used the same instruments repackaged as something else over and over again.

Elsewhere I said Back to Black was a great recreation of new exemplars from an older era. 

 

http://lanaboards.com/index.php?/topic/6841-honeymoon-post-release-and-discussion-thread/?p=322310

 

HM being "futureretro" is not so much into recreation of specific era songs but more into synthesis old/new. I don't see as huge a production overlap among songs such as HM, TBD, SS, R, 24, F, AD, TLY as you do. They seem to emphasize different instruments (real or synthetic), though they are all tight and intimate songs. Adele's 19 is really good too; however, I wouldn't say the production or cohesiveness or whatever, as great as it is, is very ambitious or original. For instance, it doesn't have any of the elaborate vocal production (harmonizing and overdubs), nor the vintage strings (HM), nor horns (24), nor soundsamples/vocal distortion (S, MTWBT) that HM has. HM seems more experimental (and LDR is the lead producer).

 

Finally, if you compare LDR to Ella Fitzgerald (at least the songs I suggested), it is also true that they use the same instruments repackaged on songs (essentially piano, sax, bass, maybe even some electric guitar, and big band orchestration) to achieve a variety of songs without overdubbing (everything's live). 

[Thunder Revenant 20,695]

Bear in mind I'm just trying to make the conversation interesting. I don't have as low opinion of TS and A as you do (although I'm forced to the Ryan Adams version of 1989 for assessing it albumwise). Also TS had Imogen Heap co-write one of her songs (and she won a grammy when Taylor did for AOTY, woo hoo!). But if LDR's HM is more diverse than the two top-selling albums of the recent past, it's at least good for her as an artist. What about most recent Chelsea Wolfe and St. Vincent, and note we're talking diversity and not quality (i.e., both CW and SV are pretty tight stylists on their last releases).

 

I'm not familiar with the last SV album, but considering Abyss, it's the perfect example of how you do a cohesive yet extremely diversive album (unlike HM). The album has a pretty ongoing atmosphere, yet the songs are pretty different. Some are soft, some are heavy, some are raw, some are acoustic, some are overloaded with disortion ... I don't want to write an examn about Abyss because this is a LDR thread, but I still think saying HM is diversive just because all songs are not identically the same is wrong, the overall mood/atmosphere/tempo ... just the general feeling and sound of HM is just extremely undiverse. Unlike UV for example, which was cohesive yet had some diversity

[graham4anything 2,859]

not trying to be obnoxious or something but

 

Why compare Lana to the girls, when one should compare her to the boys

as in Elton as in Roy Orbison as in Brian Wilson(Beach Boys) Pet Shop Boys etc.

 

One can over almost 50 years now, recognize an Elton John song, and see the Elton John influences and also see where Elton's music came from (Bach) his lyrics came from Bernie, but it could be said, Elton could have had #1 hits with the phone book as lyrics, and if someone found a time capsule with songs like Philadelphia Freedom, would be hardpressed to understand WTF those lyrics meant (tribute to BJ King)

 

I try not to put down the artists that are directly or indirectly copying or stealing from Lana, however, only so many hours in a day and I would rather spend them with her songs (Lorde's one and only album is great, like a baby sister Lana, but where is the 2nd? How many hands are attempting to put together something that will attempt to sound original and new? We have no idea as it keeps being pushed further and further back.

 

If Lana were vindictive, she should have sued Taylor for outright theft. Taylor should be happy she didn't. I do admire how Taylor did revolutionize the country industry,and forced them to change methology of charting, only to abandon them, move to NYC and keep making money. More power to Taylor I guess.

 

Reminds me of Led Zeppelin they stole Stairway from Randy California, his family long after he died sued, Led Zep won, yet the judge just said Randy's heirs do NOT

have to pay the $800,000 court costs and Zep has to pay. They should have for cheaper given Randy a credit of say 1/2% for royalities this date forward and come out ahead.

 

As a major Kate Bush fan from day one, sorry, but her latest stuff is not the same level Kate. And I had a ticket for her show had I wanted it (all it took was money and a plane ticket),

but when I heard her set list, I said no, I do not want to see it (this is a comment for those that insist Lana should do away with BTD or Paradise songs in her show

and only play newer stuff. HELL NO.  that's all. (and she never toured in America, so I never had a chance to see her, except I was in the audience at SNL live)  And I like both Wuthering Heights recordings

 

Like Lana, Kate as she grew older was able to reign her voice in and control it better than the carefree kid when she started

[Flipflopfan 254]

I would really love to hear from Lana and her team the reasons behind releasing HM one year after UV without promoting it. HM is "cohesive" only because is slow, monotone and dwells around Lana's main tropes. Ok, I still use some of the songs from HM (MTWBT,  AD, HBTB, TBD and HM minus that lyrically awful bridge). The main problem is with Lana's relentless lethargic delivery which is both pointless and jarring listening to through 14 songs. I think that HM had some good ideas and melodies but it was rushed. Released one year after the equally non-commercial UV, carrier-wise it was a pointless move, it just alienated further the GP diminishing even more her commercial potential.  HM, like UV, was another release to please the critics and they weren't nasty towards her just bored, in the end it's obvious that she paid too much attention to their opinion. Unfortunately HM isn't the quality masterpiece that we thought that she's capable of (UV it's better lyrically and sonically) and commercially was an undeniable flop. The negative effects of HM will be seen at her next release when she will struggle to sell 350.000-400.000 copies globally and she'll fail to open number 1 or 2 in any market. The only viable route for Lana is to come out with that quality masterpiece some of us are hoping for, she has to improve further her live vocals and stage presence and then she has a shot  to stabilize her career as a quality artist (she still has some rabid fans left and some flip-flops like me).  

[slang 1,509]

not trying to be obnoxious or something but

 

Why compare Lana to the girls, when one should compare her to the boys

as in Elton as in Roy Orbison as in Brian Wilson(Beach Boys) Pet Shop Boys etc.

 

One can over almost 50 years now, recognize an Elton John song, and see the Elton John influences and also see where Elton's music came from (Bach) his lyrics came from Bernie, but it could be said, Elton could have had #1 hits with the phone book as lyrics, and if someone found a time capsule with songs like Philadelphia Freedom, would be hardpressed to understand WTF those lyrics meant (tribute to BJ King)

 

I try not to put down the artists that are directly or indirectly copying or stealing from Lana, however, only so many hours in a day and I would rather spend them with her songs (Lorde's one and only album is great, like a baby sister Lana, but where is the 2nd? How many hands are attempting to put together something that will attempt to sound original and new? We have no idea as it keeps being pushed further and further back.

 

If Lana were vindictive, she should have sued Taylor for outright theft. Taylor should be happy she didn't. I do admire how Taylor did revolutionize the country industry,and forced them to change methology of charting, only to abandon them, move to NYC and keep making money. More power to Taylor I guess.

 

Reminds me of Led Zeppelin they stole Stairway from Randy California, his family long after he died sued, Led Zep won, yet the judge just said Randy's heirs do NOT

have to pay the $800,000 court costs and Zep has to pay. They should have for cheaper given Randy a credit of say 1/2% for royalities this date forward and come out ahead.

 

 

 

The interesting thing about comparing her to a male is how hard it is to do, given the femininity of her music and the fact that males tend to run in packs (bands). Chris Isaak has been brought up frequently, probably mostly on the dimension of his lyrics. On the sedative dimension of singing (which I don't abide by as characterizing LDR's singing) I ran into some vocal Chet Baker recently, and think I see why LDR likes him (if she does), but he seems pretty bland (and sedating) by comparison. LDR is closer to Elton, especially if her unreleased bops are considered. It's also possible to compare LDR albums to certain *male* albums that you are reminded of because of abstract similarities (or just idiosyncracies in your taste and way of grouping albums, idk). This way of doing it at least gives people specific targets to listen to, although this is probably a topic for Lana Thoughts (and I seem to remember a thread on "male LDRs" there, though it wasn't restricted to musical dimensions). As a for instance, for some odd reason I see BTD as similar to Electric Light Orchestra's (Jeff Lynne's) Eldorado. I haven't really studied the lyrics of the latter (which seem to be about some guy carousing about in some fantasy world with some dangers) but the quality/similarity of the melodies within the album on most of his songs suggest the quality/similarity of melodies of BTD, notwithstanding the great difference in male/female perspectives (and the actual type of melodies) on the two albums. As for HM, what male albums are similar to it? That's a tough one. A sad Frank Sinatra (e.g., When no one cares), Elvis Costello's North?,  Steely Dan's Gaucho or Don Fagan's Nightfly?

 

The plaigarism/influence issue:

The reason LDR doesn't sue Taylor or Halsey or anybody else is that she is pretty guilty of the same sort of thing. I mean Big Eyes references Sounds of Silence, Salvatore -- Careless Whisper, Old Money -- Nino Rota, Gramma has a verse melody similar to Ozzy Osbourne's I just want you ....). Some of these are just tonal collisions; some of these are intentional postmodern references. However, sometimes I think she's taking a political position (i.e., Communism) with respect to tonality being a shared and limited resource. I have inferred this from seemingly random acts like choosing Sleepwalk for the intro of her endless summer tour, which sounds remarkably like Born Free, a later song that famously won an Oscar for best song. She also likes Pharell Williams's facebook page on her facebook (and I wish I knew the timing on that). Pharell was successfully litigated for being too close in vibe (#@!) to a Marvin Gaye song (which I think ludicrous), and given the small number of pages LDR likes and the fact that she's never worked with him, I interpret this as a show of support for Pharell's case position. Simply calling a (short) sequence-of-notes-overlap or a vibe similarity plaigarism potentially (and I think actually) "hamstrings" the space of possible pop songs one could write. It also ignores the importance of the unique aspects of a song. However, this is still a difficult issue for me, and my opinion of how much an artist rips off another artist critically depends on the quality of stuff happening outside of the overlap.

 

Oh and if we're still opining on what the original inspiration of Stairway to Heaven is, check out Gentle Giant's Nothing at All. Some suspect a very heavy influence of that song; however, Led Zeppelin did more than enough to generate a distinct song (and both songs are great).

[HollywoodHills 452]

UV's last song (IMHO) is "Is this happiness" generally considered to be placed AFTER the bonus songs

and a song so down that it is the actual segue between UV and Honeymoon, the bridge so to say

 

Honeymoon continues and without Honeymoon, and it's epic battle between Lana and Elizabeth how would anyone know

both came out of Honeymoon agreeing to continue onward to the next chapter

 

There is no way whatsoever, that there could be any next chapter without Honeymoon

 

(as one shall see soon as we all hear the next stuff).

 

And a year or so from now, haters of Honeymoon will be saying how great Honeymoon is and why can't (the chapter at that time be half as good)

 

That's my opinion from an adult that agrees with Lana that one doesn't need to get there fast. (put on American and play it loud)

 

Flipside tho

[graham4anything 2,859]

@@slang

one could say Elizabeth's words should be written on Subway walls, and tenament halls  and whispered in the sounds of silence

 

Sound of silence itself is the ultimate song about her life, isn't it (Paul Simon IMHO is better than Dylan

and his songs resonate with various meanings in different years/decades/eras)

 

how She walks the streets alone (she has said she finds inspiration in walking alone late at night)

 

slang-

it's interesting what you said. Perhaps a separate thread on this?

 

It's why with Lana, it's the words, Lana is a folk singer first, she is writing poems/poetry that become music (ala Paul and Leonard and Bob) and folk singers tend to firstand foremost basically stand

and sing (Pete Seeger never put on a show, he did singalongs)

 

Sound of Silence first was acoustic until a DJ put electric guitar on it and that became the hit, not the original

She want nothing more than to be what I call it collective (you called communist, which in the purest sense of the word it is) accepted by the community of other poets/singers/players

where money has no meaning, it is the words, the music

 

Harry Chapin had a song "Remember when the music" which was a tribute to Phil Ochs and a tribute to the protests of the 60s, the coffee houses, poetry centers, the parks where people came together as one and the music held them together (and most of that was done for no pay at all or very little pay, which is a hard concept for those younger to grasp these days when seemingly everything is made to be about money.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[reesedelrey 576]

The only good thing about Honeymoon is its Metacritic score.

 

/endthread

[PARADIXO 31,623]

The only good thing about Honeymoon is its Metacritic score.

 

/endthread

 

[finalsong 442]

I only just heard her sing Honeymoon, Terrence and HBTB at BBC radio 1. So beautiful. 

[reesedelrey 576]

K??