· Write a 1000-1500 word analysis of the construction / representation of Lana Del Rey as an “indie” artist. Your analysis should include:
· Some textual analysis of her music videos
· The identification of recurring themes / images in her music videos and lyrics
· Some analysis of the effect of media “hype” on the construction / representation of Del Rey
· Links / quotes / images from articles, interviews, reviews etc.
· A personal opinion on the success of Lana Del Rey
Five Pieces of Life Advice from Lana del Rey
http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/11/27/ldr-advice/
Lana del Rey confuses me. Where did she come from? How did she get so popular so quickly? Why does she remind me of Daisy Buchanan if Daisy had spent at least six months in Stepford? Why do her lyrics make me so uncomfortable? What are all the things she wants to do? Why did she ever pen the line “my pussy tastes like Pepsi-Cola”? Why did I listen to a loop of that lyric for twenty minutes alone in my room two Saturdays ago? Why do I put on Born to Die whenever I need guidance in my life? Why do I feel compelled to share this advice with others? Why won’t my friends talk to me anymore?
Put your Pabst Blue Ribbon on ice. Nobody likes a warm beer, especially if it’s PBR. The subtle aromas and nuanced bouquet of America’s premier beer are ruined completely if the cans lose their chill. Plus, it has been rumored that if you stand in front of a mirror and whisper “Pabst Blue Ribbon on iiiiiice” three times, LDR herself will appear and make over-the-shoulder doe eyes at you until you die.
Do a lot of cocaine. Drugs are really cool. Lana del Rey does a lot of them. She’s also really into guys who do them. LDR especially likes when you do so much cocaine that it literally turns your heart into cocaine.
Don’t play your video games. She even put her favorite perfume on.
Kiss her on her open mouth in the pouring rain. On Born to Die, LDR makes no less than three references to kissing her on her open mouth. She is remarkably specific about this, so it’s clear this is important to her—and by extension to all girls, as Lana is the epitome of femininity. Do not kiss her on her closed mouth. Do not kiss her on the neck. Do not kiss her anywhere other than in the pouring rain. Do not leave without kissing her, on her open mouth, in the pouring rain.
Keep your genitals clean. As previously mentioned, Lana del Rey’s pussy allegedly tastes like Pepsi-Cola. This is probably a bad thing, and could be potentially lethal if she does not visit a gynecologist in the near future. Perhaps she is just playing a character in order to demonstrate the importance of genital hygiene. Perhaps she is crying out for help. Perhaps I am crying out for help. Help.
—Matt Watson is the current and future blog exec, the incoming comp director, and an aspiring corpse. His spirit animal is Paula Deen riding a bald eagle made of butter.
Lana Del Rey Talks Childhood Alcohol Addiction In British GQ October 2012
Getting ready to drop seven new tracks on her "Paradise" reissue of "Born to Die" in November, Lana Del Rey garnered herself a little added exposure by landing on one of five special edition covers of the October 2012 issue of British GQ magazine.
The 26-year-old singer strategically posed naked for the Mariano Vivanco front page shot wearing nothing but sapphire and diamonds by Chopard while dishing about everything from her career to her childhood addiction to alcohol.
Highlights from Miss Rey's interview are as follows. For more, be sure to check out British GQ!
On becoming a successful artist:
"Just to have someone acknowledge the material I write is incredibly touching. It's an affirmation of sorts. I just didn't think that this was going to happen. Not any of it."
On her alcohol addiction:
"It's been nine years since my last drink. That's really why I got sent to boarding school aged 14 - to get sober. A lot of the time when I write about the person that I love, I feel like I'm writing about New York. And when I write about the thing that I've lost I feel like I'm writing about alcohol because that was the first love of my life. Sure, there have been people, but it's really alcohol."
On her "stranger searching" hobby:
"It's still my passion. I would just walk out of my front door in Brooklyn or Manhattan with an intention to meet someone who has the same energy. You just put it out there."
Read more at ONTD: http://ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com/71801008.html#ixzz2XJkyWQmt
Put your Pabst Blue Ribbon on ice. Nobody likes a warm beer, especially if it’s PBR. The subtle aromas and nuanced bouquet of America’s premier beer are ruined completely if the cans lose their chill. Plus, it has been rumored that if you stand in front of a mirror and whisper “Pabst Blue Ribbon on iiiiiice” three times, LDR herself will appear and make over-the-shoulder doe eyes at you until you die.
Do a lot of cocaine. Drugs are really cool. Lana del Rey does a lot of them. She’s also really into guys who do them. LDR especially likes when you do so much cocaine that it literally turns your heart into cocaine.
Don’t play your video games. She even put her favorite perfume on.
Kiss her on her open mouth in the pouring rain. On Born to Die, LDR makes no less than three references to kissing her on her open mouth. She is remarkably specific about this, so it’s clear this is important to her—and by extension to all girls, as Lana is the epitome of femininity. Do not kiss her on her closed mouth. Do not kiss her on the neck. Do not kiss her anywhere other than in the pouring rain. Do not leave without kissing her, on her open mouth, in the pouring rain.
Keep your genitals clean. As previously mentioned, Lana del Rey’s pussy allegedly tastes like Pepsi-Cola. This is probably a bad thing, and could be potentially lethal if she does not visit a gynecologist in the near future. Perhaps she is just playing a character in order to demonstrate the importance of genital hygiene. Perhaps she is crying out for help. Perhaps I am crying out for help. Help.
—Matt Watson is the current and future blog exec, the incoming comp director, and an aspiring corpse. His spirit animal is Paula Deen riding a bald eagle made of butter.
Lana Del Rey Talks Childhood Alcohol Addiction
Lana Del Rey Talks Childhood Alcohol Addiction In British GQ October 2012
Getting ready to drop seven new tracks on her "Paradise" reissue of "Born to Die" in November, Lana Del Rey garnered herself a little added exposure by landing on one of five special edition covers of the October 2012 issue of British GQ magazine.
The 26-year-old singer strategically posed naked for the Mariano Vivanco front page shot wearing nothing but sapphire and diamonds by Chopard while dishing about everything from her career to her childhood addiction to alcohol.
Highlights from Miss Rey's interview are as follows. For more, be sure to check out British GQ!
On becoming a successful artist:
"Just to have someone acknowledge the material I write is incredibly touching. It's an affirmation of sorts. I just didn't think that this was going to happen. Not any of it."
On her alcohol addiction:
"It's been nine years since my last drink. That's really why I got sent to boarding school aged 14 - to get sober. A lot of the time when I write about the person that I love, I feel like I'm writing about New York. And when I write about the thing that I've lost I feel like I'm writing about alcohol because that was the first love of my life. Sure, there have been people, but it's really alcohol."
On her "stranger searching" hobby:
"It's still my passion. I would just walk out of my front door in Brooklyn or Manhattan with an intention to meet someone who has the same energy. You just put it out there."
Read more at ONTD: http://ohnotheydidnt.livejournal.com/71801008.html#ixzz2XJkyWQmt
Lana Del Rey used to have a teenage drinking problem, turns to soft UK press for sympathy + new image
By Carles on 25 Jan 2012
Lana Del Rey is famous 4 tanking on SNL. Now she is in 'scramble mode' to create a narrative that protects her album from tanking. It seems like in an interview with the Telegraph, she took some time 2 'address the haters', and potentially create a sympathy-based narrative. Of course, leave it to some 'soft ass' UK publication to guarantee puff-piece treatment. Say what u will abt mean ass American blogs, but at the end of the day, Americans are better buzz manufacturers, buzz panners, and have better taste in music.
Is this the beginning of a new image 4 Lana Del Rey?
Has she clarified 'who she really is'?
Did u know that she isn't actually a 'rich girl'?
Anyways, she recovered from her serious teen drinking problems and volunteered in the community.
She is just like U.
Lana Del Rey doesn't want to disrepect God, so she cannot comment on internet hatred.
Lana Del Rey wants u 2 know that she knows what u think abt her. She is self-aware, understands what is happening. Srsly though. WHY? Why are yall doing this 2 her?
Will Lana Del Rey rebrand herself?
IS it '2 late'?
Will she sell mad albums in Europe?
Can #LDR 'make it'?
R u starting to feel sad 4 her?
Can #LDR save her career?
Did u have a teen drinking problem, and did it eventually help u to become an internet sensation?
Lana Del Rey is famous 4 tanking on SNL. Now she is in 'scramble mode' to create a narrative that protects her album from tanking. It seems like in an interview with the Telegraph, she took some time 2 'address the haters', and potentially create a sympathy-based narrative. Of course, leave it to some 'soft ass' UK publication to guarantee puff-piece treatment. Say what u will abt mean ass American blogs, but at the end of the day, Americans are better buzz manufacturers, buzz panners, and have better taste in music.
Is this the beginning of a new image 4 Lana Del Rey?
Has she clarified 'who she really is'?
Did u know that she isn't actually a 'rich girl'?
Her father is a real-estate investor, her mother an advertising account executive and, while they were comfortably middle-class, she snorts that, contrary to internet speculation, “they’re not millionaires. There wasn’t any money. It was just a life.” Despite the setting, it would appear that Del Rey’s inner life, at least, was anything but placid. “When I was very young I was sort of floored by the fact that my mother and my father and everyone I knew was going to die one day, and myself too. I had a sort of a philosophical crisis. I couldn’t believe that we were mortal. For some reason that knowledge sort of overshadowed my experience. I was unhappy for some time. I got into a lot of trouble. I used to drink a lot. That was a hard time in my life.”Lana Del Rey is afraid 2 die... Then 1 day she realized that she was in fact #Born2die...
Anyways, she recovered from her serious teen drinking problems and volunteered in the community.
In her years in New York, working “odd jobs” and “helping out in the community, in alcohol and drug awareness programmes” and playing the singer-songwriter open-mic circuit, Lizzy Grant reinvented herself as Lana Del Rey.While we have heard that she lived in a trailer for a while, the teen drinking + sobriety angle is a new one. I wonder if she just wants interviewers to ask her about overcoming teen alcoholism instead of being asked, "So... what do u think abt the internet and the things that ppl say abt u on it?'
She is just like U.
At 18, she moved to New York, studied metaphysics at college, and taught herself guitar.Do u think listening to her leaked album 'Born To Die' is sorta like studying metaphysix?
Lana Del Rey doesn't want to disrepect God, so she cannot comment on internet hatred.
What the gossip-mongers and trolls of the internet haven’t seen is the effect all thisDid u know that we are all human after yall?
cyber bullying is having on the person at its centre. Del Rey has made a record that deserves to be heard, but says she doesn’t want to tour, doesn’t want to leave New York, that she wants “to keep things small. All I wanted to do was make something beautiful, and I think I’ve done that.”
Her nervous appearance on popular US TV show Saturday Night Live last weekend led to more internet abuse. But the thing is, Del Rey is nervous, and with good reason. “I don’t want to talk about how it made me feel because I think it’s disrespectful to God to go to a dark place with this kind of thing. People just want to see me go off the rails. That’s the only reason they’re watching. They just want to see what happens.” Her critics have questioned her authenticity, but Del Rey seems all too human. I ask if she is afraid of what she has unleashed. “Do you think I am?” she ponders, voice trembling, hand dabbing at her eyes. “Well, you might be right. But I wouldn’t tell.”
Lana Del Rey wants u 2 know that she knows what u think abt her. She is self-aware, understands what is happening. Srsly though. WHY? Why are yall doing this 2 her?
It gets colder in the room as the interview progresses, as the New York chill penetrates. “I know what people think about me,” says Del Rey, pulling her suede jacket around her shoulders. “I don’t understand it, I don’t see why that’s the angle. And I’m a smart person. I mean, like, why that?”'Get a new fucking angle, bloggers. I am a person.' -Lana Del Rey
Will Lana Del Rey rebrand herself?
IS it '2 late'?
Will she sell mad albums in Europe?
Can #LDR 'make it'?
R u starting to feel sad 4 her?
Can #LDR save her career?
Did u have a teen drinking problem, and did it eventually help u to become an internet sensation?
Lana Del Rey
Alternative Celebrity, Buzzband Lana Del Rey is a hot female indie singer. She is 'mad controversial.'
Lists: potentially fake lips, slutwave, QTs, it girls, curly hair, critical darlings, 2k11 buzzbands
Read more>>>>Lana Del Rey and Angel Haze duet stopped by label
Record label complications forced stars to scrap release of collaboration on 'Blue Velvet' remix
American rapper Haze published the lyrics for the verse on twitter, saying "Sucks that you guys can't hear it," because the label 'didn't like it'. Haze wrote additional lyrics for Lana Del Rey's cover, but her label (Island
) were unwilling to let Del Rey's label (Polydor) release the track.Lana originally covered the famous 50's song during a H&M advert last year, after she became the new face of the fashion
brand's 'LA Noir' collection.The track also appeared on the Paradise
Edition of her debut album, Born To Die.
See the lyrics Angel Haze posted below:
Earlier this month, a previously unheard track by Lana Del Rey leaked online. 'Beautiful
Player' was believed to have been recorded in 2013, and is the second time that this has happened this year - after last month when another new track,'Queen of Disaster', leaked online.Lana Del Rey – review
SECC, Glasgow
Curves-and-chrome Americana … Lana Del Rey. Photograph: Ross Giilmore
The elaborate stage set for Lana Del Rey's European tour is an art deco marvel framed by a pair of lion statues that look as if they were half‑inched from The Great Gatsby. Yet the 26-year-old glides out to a very different movie theme: Giorgio Moroder's grim synth madrigal from Scarface. Perhaps it shouldn't be that surprising. Both are classic American texts about glamour, excess and reinvention.
Since her breakthrough in 2011, Del Rey has been roughed up by critics obsessed with her authenticity, unwilling to be seduced by her sultry repackaging of curves-and-chrome Americana. If the artist formerly known as Lizzie Grant is indeed a ruthless gloom-pop replicant perfected in a record industry laboratory, the public seems unbothered. Del Rey's debut, Born to Die, has shifted over 3.5m units.
She begins with the sullen Cola, a track with an already notorious opening line that the audience sings along with her, although their reading is far less aloof. Perhaps most striking is how poised Del Rey remains, highlighted by continuous video close-ups. She sings huskily, adopts characters, throws in some Spanish – but every frame projected on to the giant screens could double as a cover shoot. It's a remarkably controlled performance. She even manages to keep a straight face while singing, on Body Electric: "Elvis is my daddy, Marilyn's my mother, Jesus is my bestest friend."
There are missteps. Any subversive David Lynchian subtext is made text during a soporific cover of Blue Velvet. But Young and Beautiful, her contribution to the Gatsby soundtrack, sounds magnificent. After an enthusiastic reaction to Video Games, National Anthem initially seems an underwhelming finale. But then Del Rey hops down from the stage to facilitate cameraphone portraits with dozens of fans. She gives great Gatsby but takes even better selfies.
C- | 01.31.11 | Interscope | MP3 | CD | Vinyl
Most people — let’s call them The Lucky Ones — live in blissful ignorance of Lana Del Rey and the insufferable debate she has ignited. If you know her name, you’ve already entered the fray, however unwittingly. As is the case with too many music blog hullabaloos, the Del Rey controversy has nothing to do with music. How could it? When her most frothing detractors pummeled to judgment earlier last year, only a couple of her songs were even public. The blogosphere instead roiled over the notion of her status as an indie artist (pop singer?) as such. “Authenticity,” that tired shibboleth of rock criticism, whizzed about as if Del Rey already warranted her own NYU American Studies seminar. Lines were drawn. Tempers blazed. Fingers wagged. We will not stand for this, shrieked the internet. Oh lord, here come the vapors!
The issue at (fiercely wrung) hand is trivial and, sadly, perennial. It’s the nerve struck whenever “coolness” and “calculation” collide. You see, Lana Del Rey was born Elizabeth Grant. Her father, an active participant in her rise to notoriety, is a wealthy investor. She went to boarding school. Her stage name was seemingly chosen by committee. A recent SNL appearance was her version of a cotillion. Del Rey’s self-described “gangsta Nancy Sinatra” persona, which is characterized by gauzy press photographs, aloof interviews, and winking hipness, only fuels the rage. (To be fair, the ridiculous term “gangsta Nancy Sinatra” is redundant, if not utterly unintelligible.) To her haters, Lana Del Rey is the construct of dirty cash, the product of unscrupulous corporate marketing, a rich brat swathed in Anthropologie, a gilded Rebecca Black, a phony-hipster Wicked Witch to be doused with bucketfuls of righteous indignation.
Talking about Lana Del Rey requires you wander into an infinite regress. It’s uncertain if the controversy is the result of tastemaker cynicism or the cunning of Del Rey’s people, a ploy to get us to ponder a nobody. If so, this review is a sign that it worked royally. Figuring out who is the chicken and what is the egg in this scenario is mind-numbing and fruitless. After all, we now have a hotly anticipated album to evaluate.
Born to Die is neither a fiasco nor a triumph, but a sometimes competent, mostly mediocre album, unworthy of the tidal wave of infernal nattering it rides in on. In other words, it is a goosed-up disappointment. The mea culpa doesn’t belong to Del Ray and her people, but to those who worked themselves into such a lather over this. Apart from containing the genuinely terrific “Video Games,” Born to Die should have come and gone with the fanfare of a shrug. The collective and unbridled hate of Del Rey’s antagonists had the opposite effect: it didn’t bury Born to Die; it only imparted more and more importance on an unexceptional work.
If you’ve heard the Lana Del Rey EP, you already heard the best Born to Die has to offer. The four-track EP opens the album, a move that, it turns out, guarantees the rest of Born to Die will be a slog. The stifling melodrama, swelling strings, and cooing Del Rey vocals found throughout are only tolerable when the material can muster their burden and transform them into engaging songs. “Video Games,” a standout among slouches, establishes Del Rey as the bored chanteuse. All doubts of Del Rey’s talent momentarily evaporate when she’s carried into the chorus on a crescendo and delivers the phrase “Honey is that true?” with fragile falsetto. It’s a miraculous touch. Savor it. She never gives us better.
If the rest of Born to Die matched the skill of the remaining EP tracks, Dey Rey’s talent wouldn’t appear so tenuous. The title track is silly; Del Rey’s invocations of mortality are superficially applied like mascara to the lashes, but there is a palpable sexuality in her brooding. Same goes for “Blue Jeans,” where the sartorial is made sensual. It’s a tired trope, but the song’s fractured sonics and sprightly refrain work to temper Del Rey’s dourness. “Off to the Races” sounds like Del Rey’s pop take on PJ Harvey’s vamping, especially when she squeaks about her lover, calling him the “fire of [her] loins.”
After “Video Games” ends, Born to Die settles into a funereal march of overwrought dirges that make four minutes feel like twenty. Even when Del Rey takes loopy detours (“Diet Mountain Dew”, “National Anthem”), Born to Die sinks fast, a calcified hunk of lugubrious atmospherics, glottal vocal performances, boilerplate pop melodies, and games of naughty girl dress-up. As I listened to Born to Die, I realized the shouts that gave birth to Del Rey will eventually undo her. It puts her wooden SNL performance into context. Lana Del Rey wasn’t prepared for fame.
One sound overcomes the cacophony of argument and analysis that surrounds Lana Del Rey, and encapsulates my opinion of Born to Die: the noise of my hand, scraping the top of my head.
- Lana Del Rey
- Hammersmith Apollo,
- London
- On 19 May. Then touring
- Box office:
0844 249 1000 - More details
She begins with the sullen Cola, a track with an already notorious opening line that the audience sings along with her, although their reading is far less aloof. Perhaps most striking is how poised Del Rey remains, highlighted by continuous video close-ups. She sings huskily, adopts characters, throws in some Spanish – but every frame projected on to the giant screens could double as a cover shoot. It's a remarkably controlled performance. She even manages to keep a straight face while singing, on Body Electric: "Elvis is my daddy, Marilyn's my mother, Jesus is my bestest friend."
There are missteps. Any subversive David Lynchian subtext is made text during a soporific cover of Blue Velvet. But Young and Beautiful, her contribution to the Gatsby soundtrack, sounds magnificent. After an enthusiastic reaction to Video Games, National Anthem initially seems an underwhelming finale. But then Del Rey hops down from the stage to facilitate cameraphone portraits with dozens of fans. She gives great Gatsby but takes even better selfies.
Reviews
Review: Sigur Rós - Kveikur Album Review: Lana Del Rey – Born To Die
C- | 01.31.11 | Interscope | MP3 | CD | VinylMost people — let’s call them The Lucky Ones — live in blissful ignorance of Lana Del Rey and the insufferable debate she has ignited. If you know her name, you’ve already entered the fray, however unwittingly. As is the case with too many music blog hullabaloos, the Del Rey controversy has nothing to do with music. How could it? When her most frothing detractors pummeled to judgment earlier last year, only a couple of her songs were even public. The blogosphere instead roiled over the notion of her status as an indie artist (pop singer?) as such. “Authenticity,” that tired shibboleth of rock criticism, whizzed about as if Del Rey already warranted her own NYU American Studies seminar. Lines were drawn. Tempers blazed. Fingers wagged. We will not stand for this, shrieked the internet. Oh lord, here come the vapors!
The issue at (fiercely wrung) hand is trivial and, sadly, perennial. It’s the nerve struck whenever “coolness” and “calculation” collide. You see, Lana Del Rey was born Elizabeth Grant. Her father, an active participant in her rise to notoriety, is a wealthy investor. She went to boarding school. Her stage name was seemingly chosen by committee. A recent SNL appearance was her version of a cotillion. Del Rey’s self-described “gangsta Nancy Sinatra” persona, which is characterized by gauzy press photographs, aloof interviews, and winking hipness, only fuels the rage. (To be fair, the ridiculous term “gangsta Nancy Sinatra” is redundant, if not utterly unintelligible.) To her haters, Lana Del Rey is the construct of dirty cash, the product of unscrupulous corporate marketing, a rich brat swathed in Anthropologie, a gilded Rebecca Black, a phony-hipster Wicked Witch to be doused with bucketfuls of righteous indignation.
Talking about Lana Del Rey requires you wander into an infinite regress. It’s uncertain if the controversy is the result of tastemaker cynicism or the cunning of Del Rey’s people, a ploy to get us to ponder a nobody. If so, this review is a sign that it worked royally. Figuring out who is the chicken and what is the egg in this scenario is mind-numbing and fruitless. After all, we now have a hotly anticipated album to evaluate.
Born to Die is neither a fiasco nor a triumph, but a sometimes competent, mostly mediocre album, unworthy of the tidal wave of infernal nattering it rides in on. In other words, it is a goosed-up disappointment. The mea culpa doesn’t belong to Del Ray and her people, but to those who worked themselves into such a lather over this. Apart from containing the genuinely terrific “Video Games,” Born to Die should have come and gone with the fanfare of a shrug. The collective and unbridled hate of Del Rey’s antagonists had the opposite effect: it didn’t bury Born to Die; it only imparted more and more importance on an unexceptional work.
If you’ve heard the Lana Del Rey EP, you already heard the best Born to Die has to offer. The four-track EP opens the album, a move that, it turns out, guarantees the rest of Born to Die will be a slog. The stifling melodrama, swelling strings, and cooing Del Rey vocals found throughout are only tolerable when the material can muster their burden and transform them into engaging songs. “Video Games,” a standout among slouches, establishes Del Rey as the bored chanteuse. All doubts of Del Rey’s talent momentarily evaporate when she’s carried into the chorus on a crescendo and delivers the phrase “Honey is that true?” with fragile falsetto. It’s a miraculous touch. Savor it. She never gives us better.
If the rest of Born to Die matched the skill of the remaining EP tracks, Dey Rey’s talent wouldn’t appear so tenuous. The title track is silly; Del Rey’s invocations of mortality are superficially applied like mascara to the lashes, but there is a palpable sexuality in her brooding. Same goes for “Blue Jeans,” where the sartorial is made sensual. It’s a tired trope, but the song’s fractured sonics and sprightly refrain work to temper Del Rey’s dourness. “Off to the Races” sounds like Del Rey’s pop take on PJ Harvey’s vamping, especially when she squeaks about her lover, calling him the “fire of [her] loins.”
After “Video Games” ends, Born to Die settles into a funereal march of overwrought dirges that make four minutes feel like twenty. Even when Del Rey takes loopy detours (“Diet Mountain Dew”, “National Anthem”), Born to Die sinks fast, a calcified hunk of lugubrious atmospherics, glottal vocal performances, boilerplate pop melodies, and games of naughty girl dress-up. As I listened to Born to Die, I realized the shouts that gave birth to Del Rey will eventually undo her. It puts her wooden SNL performance into context. Lana Del Rey wasn’t prepared for fame.
One sound overcomes the cacophony of argument and analysis that surrounds Lana Del Rey, and encapsulates my opinion of Born to Die: the noise of my hand, scraping the top of my head.
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