LANA DEL REY: DISCUSSION ABOUT A FAST RISE AND THE PITFALLS OF FAME
John Villanueva, Music EditorIllustration by John Villanueva
Image is the backbone of stardom. For one to achieve a level of stardom within the music industry, this sad reality must be the first thing to set in. Those with dignity are few and far between, separated by a clutter of fake smiles and painted personas. These plastic performers, the anti-Dylan’s and anti-Diamond’s of our day, are sadly the ones we attempt to measure up to. Despite spouting banalities of life and love over froyo electronics or preschool chord progressions, the famous today are measured by how they don a meat dress or tell their heartlifting backstory of a poor Christian upbringing.
Which is exactly why the existence of Lana Del Rey is such a tragic occurrence. Lana, who once traversed the earth as Lizzie Grant, took the route of one miss Stephanie Germanotta, now deemed by little monsters around the world as Lady Gaga. Reinventing herself in a ’50s pin up girl image, Lana now touts her new image, doused in Bond girl sexuality for the worldwide music community. In that part she succeeds, the distribution of her music and the garnering of fans. The music, on the other hand, isn’t tapping into her true calling. Espousing herself “a gangsta Nancy Sinatra,” her music is exactly that. Which isn’t exactly a good thing, because Lana truly can sing. Lana has a voice born for lounge, a sultry coo that occasionally wanders into the almost childlike sexuality of a Monroe-esque whisper. My early viewings of her were promising: her performance of “Video Games” on Jools Holland, backed by a piano and a string quartet, showed the potential; a voice of pure sexuality thinly veiling an underlying fragility. Her tracks, however, lack that same sincerity, that simple, haunting purity. What we instead receive is again the product of the corporate music monster aimed at satisfying the fist pumping masses. Songs like “Off to the Races” and “Born to Die” apparently feel the need to incorporate garish drum tracks and ’90s era vocal samples over perfectly adequate strings. The sickness pervades other tracks like “Blue Jeans” with its Spaghetti Western guitar painting a sunset for Lana to ride off into. The song would have reached its destination too, if not for the cheap handclaps and incessant “yeahs” every couple of fucking seconds. This is what this music is reduced to, the cheap achievements of any basement beatmaker with basic skills in Reason software and a Neon Bape hoodie. That’s a shame, and one that will continue pursue Lana for the remainder of her career unless she chooses to do something. For her sake, I hope she does.
Before Lana Del Rey’s persona was born, she was an artist formerly known as Lizzie Grant. Lizzie Grant was signed to a major record label, but she failed to gain any buzz. So, in order to move Grant into Hollywood territory, her label “rebranded” her image. Grant had lip implants and changed her name and persona to Lana Del Rey. And how is Del Rey’s music different from Grant’s? Not much really. A few tweaks of sound here and there to let her ’50s persona shine through, but Del Rey’s music sounds very similar to Grant’s.
Lana Del Rey’s recent performance on Saturday Night Live was disastrous, awkward, and amateurish. The so-called performance was nothing more than an outcast waddling on stage, like an angst-filled teenager stumbling to ask out the prettiest girl in class.
Del Rey’s American television debut was an uneasy start to fame and glamour, fame and glamour that was given to her on a gold-coated plate. However, Del Rey is not a tasteless artist. She has a vivid ’50s American persona and is jaw-droppingly sexy. Her three singles, “Video Games,” “Blue Jeans,” and “Born to Die” aren’t terrible, but she’s not doing anything musically striking-enough to be the next big thing. With only three songs under her belt and a soon-to-be-released album, does Del Rey have the actual talent to make it big or is she just another average, over-hyped, plastic, manufactured, glamour-created hot shot coasting her way into Billboard charts?
“Deservedness” lingers in the back of my mind when looking at Del Rey’s success. Even NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams had some criticism about Del Rey: “Brooklyn hipster Lana Del Rey had one of the worst outings in SNL history last night—booked on the strength of her TWO SONG web EP, the least-experienced musical guest in the show’s history, for starters.” Brian Williams’ statements about Del Rey are true, but Williams dismisses Del Rey’s star treatment shortcut to fame. Whether we like Del Rey or not, she says a lot about our current music culture and how music itself isn’t sufficient enough for an artist to gain popularity. Much of our culture nods irrationally at how we say if an artist is talented or not, apparently music isn’t the one and only factor to state if a musician is good or not, image is now how we judge our stars. Lizzie Grant decided to wear some new clothes, redo her hair, and inject her lips with collagen and became Lana Del Rey. And we believed every word of it.
