Lana Del Rey - Chemtrails Over The Country Club (2021)

yes it's a duet

After much listening and re-listening, I've made a playlist of my fave (pre-Banisters) Lana Keepers (sorry, Ultraviolence fans... it's not represented).

Her career has such an "upward arc"; I can't think of another modern artist with a catalog like that. Feels more like the way artists would develop back in the '60s or '70s(?) – lots of albums, and increasingly finding their footing after a shaky first few tries. (I think "Terence Loves You" is her first really great song.)

I’ve made the same argument with certain Lana naysayers for sure. I was head-over-heels for “Video Games” and then extremely disappointed with the SNL appearance and the overall ‘thing’ with the following singles. But: an incendiary performance at Coachella in 2014, songs getting better and better, she’s now one of my favorite contemporary artists, for sure

I asked a coworker, with sometimes overlapping taste, if she's an LDR fan, and she said – "I've never forgiven her for that SNL performance"(!) (I went back and watched it, and yeah, it was mighty stiff, but... guess it's just as well I wasn't paying attention back then, the LDR "discourse" seems like it was sure gnarly.)

I think the reaction to the SNL appearance was so harsh because people were essentially trying to figure out what her deal was immediately after "Video Games." There was skeptical press about how she had changed her name and image, and also the debate about how the lyrical content wasn't exactly feminist-leaning. So when she bombed on SNL the people who hadn't heard of her until then were like "what the fuck is this," and many of the people who had heard of her thought, "I guess she stinks after all," and they were done with her.

Chemtrails has grown on me... it's def an album you can listen to all the through (despite some weaker tracks on the 2nd half). The playing is really strong – the music has this kind of languid but focused quality; with horns hovering softly in the background, and piano swelling up and receding, following its own train of thought. (It looks like Antonoff did a lot of the playing, in addition to (co-)producing, which makes me see him in a new light... I didn't realize that sounds like this were in his toolbox.)

3. Her choices of cover songs seem really bad to me!

...amending this to note that her take on "Season of the Witch" (from a 2019 horror-movie soundtrack) is pretty groovy!

i really love NFR ... i'm ambivalent at best to essentially the rest of her music ("white dress" is also great)

but this thread makes me feel like i should listen to blue bannisters

It is a lowkey masterpiece (…if I haven’t adequately made that point!)

The melodies set against that monochromatic production wore me down, especially against two albums. No doubt I could assemble a playlist comprising the good stuff. I loved NFR too.

I think I’ve recommended BB to five (5) ppl IRL so far…

I definitely went through that thing with Blue Bannisters where I listened once or twice when it came out, decided it was more of the same, and then 6-8 months later put it on while driving around and was blown away. I think it's very likely her best or at least should be a big part of that conversation.

New song is out

Someone please set her piano on fire

Holy sh!t... this album is gonna be amazing

How did she just like casually decide, in mid-2021, to become the world's greatest artist(?)

(I'm hyperbolizing obv - but goddamn, these new tracks)

yes to this song, album shaping up beautifuly.

s-s-springtime madness

https://www.themodernhouse.com/sales-list/evelyn-road/

I feel like the Violet Bent Backwards over the Grass poetry album/book, while not all that notable in itself, might have really loosened her ideas about sound and words on these two albums. "Wildflower Wildfire" is hypnotic in its layering of vocal and instrumental textures.

“Dark But Just a Game,” a Del Rey/Antonoff tune on Chemtrails, reminds me a little of “Death by a Thousand Cuts" (the Swift/Antonoff joint). It’s one of the few instances where I can maybe hear the Antonoff in the songwriting, on one he co-wrote.

what am I missing about that house listing?

I assumed it was posted in the wrong thread (or it’s an inside reference I’m not cool enough to get)

The stack of LPs under the table.

Good spot. Was hoping it would have blue banisters.

The turntable isn't hooked up to anything and some of those covers have water damage or something. Who could live in such a dump?!?

Good spot. Was hoping it would have blue banisters.

They’re now green and grey.

I somehow completely missed Blue Bannisters – the title track is incredible.

I’ve been digging into A&W, which begins as somewhat standard LDR ballad before going completely sideways 2/3 of the way through into some weird electronic nursery rhyme breakdown chant about drugs and sex (worth noting for audiophiles, this has a really terrific surround Dolby Atmos mix). So ... still kind of a standard LDR tune, all things considered.

This is kind of my LDR experience these days – new single or album pops up in my feed, I check out some of it, am usually really impressed by a track or two, rinse, repeat. I’m not sure I’ve dug into a whole record of hers since Lust for Life – about half of which I loved and the other half mostly just strutted on past.

I think this is kind of what happens when you emerge onto the scene a fully formed artist. Everyone wants to work with you and you’re game – so you go from being rough n’ ready where some stuff soars and others crash and burn to where the overall quality improves but the highs are maybe less risky and weird and the whole thing, in her case, is buried in a sea of strings, piano and tape echo.

At this point, she’s done so many production, genre and formal experiments that it usually takes a really killer melody for any of it to stick. Thankfully, she still has those. In general, since the rules haven't really applied to her since Born To Die—let’s put a clompy hip hop beat here, let’s make this song 7 minutes long and make it a duet—I find she benefits from when she abides by a few anyway.

Has anyone listened to her very first album – the one that was pulled from iTunes when Born to Die came out? Despite its non-availability (except on YouTube), she seems to count it as a core part of her catalog; a promotional T-shirt for Ocean Blvd refers to the new one as "the ninth studio album by Lana Del Rey" (all Tarantino style).

^^I figured out how to listen to "LDR1" on the big speaker, via YT Music. It's pretty good! Better than Born to Die...

(The highlight – besides "Yayo," which later made it onto the Paradise EP – is "Brite Lites," which is v proto–Billie Eilish.)

It's kind of fascinating how she went from her first album – a batch of nimble and fresh-feeling songs, all written solely by her – to an overdetermined and (IMO) pretty corny major-label debut, which feels weighted down with a lot of "input." Maybe she got what she wanted with it, I dunno...

(I wonder if it's a coincidence that "Video Games" includes the line "Heaven is a place on Earth with you" – even though that's not one of the songs co-written by Rick Nowels, the Belinda Carlisle songwriter.)

I happened across this (highly interesting/recommended) recent interview in Rolling Stone (UK), that actually addresses a few of the questions I raised above – what went sideways with BTD (in her opinion); but also my half-joking thing about what suddenly shifted for her in 2021. Turns out, a few things did...

(I like this a lot – it’s very generous):

“If people think my music is good it’s because there’s other people involved in the songs and in the process of making it. So many people,” she says, with a smile at just how good it is.

last track on the new one is an early version of "venice bitch" apparently, huh

And the album is 77 minutes long, which is...too much.

Looks like there are a few (spoken-word?) "interludes," which may be eventual skips (bringing down the functional runtime)?

I cannot wait for it to come out!

It's kind of fascinating how she went from her first album – a batch of nimble and fresh-feeling songs, all written solely by her – to an overdetermined and (IMO) pretty corny major-label debut, which feels weighted down with a lot of "input." Maybe she got what she wanted with it, I dunno...

I had a conversation with a friend today about The Male Professional Songwriter & Why All Women Stars Apparently Need Them.

Obviously, there's a long, sordid history here where it went from dudes writing songs for women singers (ie, Dusty Springfield), before evolving into the proverbial singer-songwriter era with Carole King/Joni Mitchell writing the songs they performed themselves.

But it seems like maybe around ... Madonna maybe(?) that women singers began receiving some credit for songs for which they weren't the primary songwriter (kind of an interesting reversal from how the Morris Levy's of the world used to just assert credit for songs they had nothing to do with outside of making mob payments). My guess is that the justification was something along the lines of "if the woman vocalist is going to be the brand responsible making these songs valuable that they deserve a cut of the publishing royalties."
At any rate, that seems to be the standard now, where labels utilize professional songwriters to approach a lot of women artists with songs and the artist receives some kind of writing credit, often one of many.

Which kind of leads us to LDR and Taylor Swift, both of whom are obviously songwriters in their own right but have worked with a ton of professional hacks themselves -- guys like Rick Nowels, Max Martin, Jack Antonoff, etc. I think there's certainly a legitimate question as to whether either of these women "need" assistance in the songwriting department -- Swift's material def. seemed to become more popular once she started working with Martin, but she was certainly accomplished to that point. Meanwhile, LDR wasn't as well known but clearly had incredible skill right out of the box.

I think the biggest thing these hired hands seem to bring to the table, at least with these two artists, is productivity. TS and LDR release a metric shit ton of music -- too much, as I've noted in the case of Lana but also with Taylor. Both produced two records during the pandemic when they couldn't tour. It's legit hard to keep up as a fan, much less a listener. And from what I've read about both artists, my sense is that neither would be able to produce this much material if left to their own devices.

That doesn't answer why it always has to be men working with these artists -- "keeping them on track" and "broadening their appeal." My guess is that it's just good old fashioned Hollywood misogyny (which I think LDR slyly winks at with songs like "Fucked My Way Up To the Top") but who knows.

Here's a Lust for Life-era interview with Nowels that I ran across the other day, where he talks in detail about the songwriting process with Lana (it's kind of cute, he defines very precisely for the reader what a bridge is...).

But it seems like maybe around ... Madonna maybe(?) that women singers began receiving some credit for songs for which they weren't the primary songwriter (kind of an interesting reversal from how the Morris Levy's of the world used to just assert credit for songs they had nothing to do with outside of making mob payments). My guess is that the justification was something along the lines of "if the woman vocalist is going to be the brand responsible making these songs valuable that they deserve a cut of the publishing royalties."

Poor example. Madonna absolutely is the primary writer of her material. (So is Mariah Carey, for those who don't know.)

Also, my (limited) understanding is that when an artist receives credit, they have contributed to the lyrics or melody in some way (just like the other credited songwriters)… it’s not like the credit is just handed out as a sort of consolation prize

Madonna since 2008 has written with phalanxes of writers, but that's the state of affairs in pop in the last dozen years, especially since the "Blurred Lines" case. Up until that point, though, she almost always co-wrote with her producer; in the case of Music it's clear Mirwais had the production ideas and could play guitar but not much melodic talent (as his own album showed). She brought the melodies, song structure, and lyrics.

But I agree with your large point, NTI.

even in those most recent madonna albums a good portion of the tracks are just credited to her + the producers she's working with

fwiw swift's first songwriting partner was a woman (liz rose). she's said she finds it much easier to write by bouncing off someone else's ideas, usually just writing to someone else's instrumental sketch these days.

It’s interesting that Lana was 27 when she finally got her break (after recording EPs and stuff for years)… like, she’s four years older than Taylor, but didn’t get on the map until over 5 years later.

(I started a thread for the new album, FYI: Lana Del Rey - Did You Know That There's a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd (2023))

And the album is 77 minutes long, which is...too much.

This is just her coded nod to ILX.

I fell into a YT/SoundCloud rabit hole with her early demo EPs and other unreleased stuff... holy moly. She has clearly been super talented from the beginning.

Some of the demo tracks are not entirely different from Liz Phair's Girlysound material — just as a point of comparison that I wouldn't have expected, based on Lana's later aesthetic.

This is my favorite of the three(?) extant versions of "Brite Lites"... what a banger:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57oYg3mhJXM

...and here's an example of how strong her earlier acoustic stuff could be:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hecdLBfl8z8

some of those may jailer songs are really good

"Let Me Love You like a Woman" (from Chemtrails) has become one of my favorite songs... like, by anyone. Don't really know why, but it's like my anthem, lol... I don't do karaoke (and can't sing), but it makes me wish I could passionately belt it out in a karaoke booth.

I know this is a trite observation, but I think it's so clever how the first two lines in the chorus –

Let me love you like a woman
Let me hold you like a baby

– are grammatically identical; but "like a woman" and "like a baby" have opposite meanings, in that they're referring to different people (her, and the person she's singing to, respectively). Language, man... far out