“This is the reason for half of you b*tches’ existence’- Billie Ellish Coachella 2024
When deciding what the first post on my new blog should be, my mind kept coming back to one topic and one topic only, Lana Del Rey. If you know me in person, this will be no surprise. I have been a die-hard Lana fan since the age of 12, I am now 17 and my love and admiration for her art as only grown, and I genuinely belief that she is the greatest talent of this generation, nobody does it quite like she does. Now you may have read the title to this blog and thought that I am just another crazed teenage fangirl, well you would be right, yet I do not exaggerate when I say that Lana Del Rey’s music has forever changed my life.
Who is Lana Del Rey?
Now if you are wondering who Lana Del Rey is, first of all I would ask ‘do you live under a rock?’ and secondly, I would tell you that once you discover her work, you will forever be grateful and will have a new appreciation for music and art. Elizabeth Woolridge Grant, born in in 1985, is a song writer and signer (and an absolute genius) from America. Elizabeth moved to New York city in 2005, to peruse the passion for music she has had since growing up. Lizzie, through the early years of her career, performed her songs in small bars across the city, sharing her work with anyone who would listen. Alongside this other than her love of music Lana Del Rey also perused her interest in philosophy, she graduated from Fordham University with a degree in metaphysics and philosophy. When tracing Lana Del Rey’s music career, her first demo album ‘Sirens’ is always forgotten, this was recorded in 2006 under the alias May Jailer. The first studio album that had been released in 2010, under the name Lana Del Ray (which was eventually changed to Lana Del Rey) was called ‘Lana Del Ray AKA Lizzy Grant’. Then in 2011, came her breakthrough with her song ‘Video Games’ which lead to her signing to a record company and then the creation of the Album ‘Born to die’ in 2012, marking the start of her infamy. Since 2012, Lana has a total of total of Nine Studio albums and an EP: Born to die, Born to Die (The Paradise Edition), Ultraviolence, Honeymoon, Lust For Life, Norman F*cking Rockwell!, Chemtrails Over The Country Club, Blue Banisters and Did you know there is a tunnel under Ocean Blvd as well as her poetry book: Violet Bent Backwards Over The Grass
Lana del Rey is known for her melancholic sound and her poetic lyrics or as many have described it, her ‘sad girl vibe’. Her music is unlike any others, her voice and aesthetic remain unique and personal to her. Lana does not just create music, but she makes art. Her work is a process, it’s a story you must digest and understand, to transcend to another world. The most admirable quality with Lana, is that she does what she wants, how she wants, she does not care to follow trends or make music that will make her money, but she does what is right for her, something very rare in the current industry. For Lana her ‘life imitates art’, her projects are important to her as they reflect a period in her life that she does not want to hide or lie about but uplift and remember, her music is an imprint of this.
A criticism of Lana is that she romanticises toxic relationships and abuse and as a result rejects feminism. Yet this remains far from the truth. I believe that the music that is reflective of these topics is not a romanticisation of them but an honest re-telling, her songs reflect her past and present emotions that she may have flet in the dark parts of her life. These topics are not being sung about to glamorize them but because she went through it. This realness is what I believe to be the reason she is unlike any other. Her music is not solely ‘love songs’ about heartbreak and falling in and out of love (what is expected of most female artists), she digs deeper. She sings about the darker aspects of femineity and sexuality; she gives an honest expression of what she has experienced. This is not for everyone and hence leads to a misunderstanding of the meaning behind her songs and that is what makes her one of the most criticised female artists out there.
My first encounter with Lana Del Rey was the song ‘Diet Mountain dew’, it connected to me on a whole other level, not because I related to it or even truly understood what she was signing about but because it made me feel a way I have never felt before. It changed my life. This song was on repeat constantly, this vibe and energy that was packed into this single song, was unexplainable. After that day I have been obsessed, I dived into the album ‘Born to Die’ and from there the rest of her discography. The older I have got and the more of life I have experienced, the more her music relates to me. When listening to her music or reading her poetry I feel understood. This is what attracts people to her art, she gets it and is not afraid to express it.
My introduction to Lana changed my appreciation of art and how I viewed the world around me. I found myself dressing differently, reading books I never would have read and engaging with media that I previously would have avoided. This change in my personality was a strive to finding out who I was as a person. For most of my childhood, I acted accordingly to what was going to make me fit in or what everybody else was doing. When I discovered Lana, I discovered my individualism. I no longer wanted to do what everyone else was doing but I wanted to be myself. This has led me to become the person I am today; I remember being told Lana’s music was ‘too depressing’ yet I no longer cared that my interests were seen as niche and different, but I embraced It. Since then, I have found that I enjoy engaging with media that is reflective of Lana Del Rey’s energy, anything that has been deemed as controversial in the film industry or ‘too much’ always peaks my interest. I enjoy watching dark and thought-provoking films, like David’s Lynch’s, who I think perfectly embodies Lana Del Rey’s not caring what people think. This is why Lana Del Rey changed my life. I have a new way of admiring music, film and books, I don’t just see them for face value but really try to understand the art and true meaning behind the work.
Lana Del Rey in the last few years, has become much more mainstream then when I first started listening to her, which is what she deserves. She is finally being apricated for what she is, a genuine artist. Many singers, new and rising or who have been in the game just as long are commending and celebrating Lana Del Rey for the impact she has made on the industry, and the legacy that she will leave behind. And so, I will once again reinforce the fact that not just the trajectory of mine, but so many other’s lives have been altered by the one and only Del Rey effect.
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lana_Del_Rey
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sirens_(May_Jailer_album)
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