Lana Del Rey

thanks for the kind words everyone, and yes i was totally thinking of the cristina 'is that all there is?' when i wrote that last graf

well then.

first thing: everyone on the production side of this should be ashamed of themselves--it's a terrible sounding record. portishead by way of a st vincent depaul thrift store with no polish, no cohesion, no ideas. it seriously sounds like it was put together by a bunch of old guys who have no idea what is cool and what might actually sound good. after it was over i immediately put on the precedent for what this record should have sounded like: mono - "life in mono" c. 1997 which at least had some *style* not a bunch of dorky mashed together beats and strings.

second thing: ldr herself. i think we all agree that she's talented but she is either not comfortable with singing, or not comfortable with singing this music, or she just doesn't have much of a natural ear. i heard so much odd phrasing and timing, when she would slip into and out of different voices it was just awkward. she's best doing the deep droll-y voice but they also try to make her sing high and breathy and then like a big pop singer and then doing some weird pseudo-rap thing that i don't even understand. like the production, this all could have been fixed with time and effort but no one seemed to really care.

last thing: there were times where i could close my eyes and try really hard and see the trashy/kitschy fun of some of this (and that's an aesthetic i strongly dislike to be fair) but the album just vacillates too much between that and moments of legitimately embarrassing material and moments that are just so joyless and po-faced that i can't imagine how someone would enjoy this as a pop record. oddly my fav track is "this is what makes us girls" which is kind of awful but is at least *about something* and seems to wink a bit unlike most of the other songs which seem to be the lyrical embodiment of that video where ldr doesn't do anything except embrace the guy with tats.

have Wu Lyf REALLY got a song called Videogame Sandwich Diamonds? about 5 years ago Manchester clubs, bands, etc were *drowning* in Talking Heads references so it wouldn't surprise me.

r they wu-affiliated idgi

did you watch the letterman clip? seems likely

is the the drummer papa wu i think maybe

what this record should have sounded like: mono - "life in mono"

yes!!! have been reading the "this sounds like 90s trip-hop" criticisms everywhere but none of them were very specific, and a lot of the bigger trip-hop acts seem way off-base as comparison points. but this, yeah - cuz i think mono were also aiming for a kind of lynchian vibe here too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2aa1tEh82I

talking of lynch though, i think this record could've been a lot better if it had been really stripped down à la julee cruise's first album - most of the songs have the hooks to survive that treatment.

i think that's true--nothing about the songwriting seemed objectionable to me tho it was almost totally oversahdowed by bad arrangements, weird singing, or stupid lyrics

FWIW, Siobhan de Maré of Mono hit the Lynchian vibe perfectly once she hooked up with Robin Guthrie.

i'd totally forgotten about violet indiana and had definitely forgotten it was the same girl - i really liked their first EP

her singing is the weirdest thing about the album because at times she absolutely nails the character and the emotion but at other times it's just so weirdly tone-deaf. it's kind of like she's only got a handle on half of what she's trying to convey

Mono is such a great, specific reference. I would have dropped them into my review if I thought people would know who the hell I was talking about.

probably time for triphop comebacks in general anyway.

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

"her singing is the weirdest thing about the album because at times she absolutely nails the character and the emotion but at other times it's just so weirdly tone-deaf. it's kind of like she's only got a handle on half of what she's trying to convey"

i don't know how many times people have posted a variation on "she really isn't ready for the big time yet" on here, but it's a lot. i think i've done it 20 or 30 times myself by now.

Man now I really want to listen to that first Mono album again.

As for Wu Lyf, what the fuck

yeah I kept thinking of lamb when I listened to the record. it's too bad they don't let baz luhrmann make movies anymore, think of the mileage he could get out of lana.

xp

xp yeah it's pretty rare to run into someone who is being marketed as a pop singer by a major label where you can call the competence of the singer and/or producers into question! but it's really the only explanation i can come up with for some of the stuff on the record

wu lyf explained

All the best bands walk off after a groundbreaking peroformance, take nirvana for example when they did territoriality pissings, they just all fucked off after, WORLD UNITE!

BommyBum13 2 weeks ago

hahahah ty for that historical perspective bommybum

the drummer likes lightning bolt, the guitarist is a godspeed you black emperor fan, the singer likes coldplay and arcade fire, and...okay, i don't even know what to think about that band.

Thread revived for everyone's enjoyment:

Wu Lyf

the singer seems like a legit strange person

i did not enjoy that band at all no

well i sort of did

he seems like a prat who would like to be thought of as a legit strange person but no he's just a prat

probably time for triphop comebacks in general anyway.

creep!

i could imagine creep ft. lana del rey very easily actually

i think the production is too much, actually - very little is as sparse as "video games", too often the songs are sort of slathered in unnecessary strings and get corny vaguely hip-hop beats and samples tacked on to them.

agreed

the wu lyf perf is similar to LDR's failures in that you can see them reaching for some weirdo indie guy grail but if coldplay is watered down radiohead then wu lyf is watered down coldplay and that is very weak tea indeed

I have "radio" stuck in my head today, that'll teach me to listen to a pop record

wu lyf reminds me of mumford and sons after a bender, when they get to the 'let's just sing drinking songs and bang on shit' part of the night

LOL @ "wu lyf" on letterman.

that mono video -- the 90s really were a while ago huh?

Off to the Races ... holy cow, really the worst ... just like, my jaw was dropping

― dmr, Tuesday, January 31, 2012 8:24 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

fuck ya, horrifyingly bad. shocked that something so painfully wretched would be given the #2 slot on a "major" album.

oh man thank you for reminding me about Mono

xp yeah that one is a low point for sure

i think the production is too much, actually - very little is as sparse as "video games", too often the songs are sort of slathered in unnecessary strings and get corny vaguely hip-hop beats and samples tacked on to them.

― first period don't give a fuck, second period gon get cut (lex pretend), Wednesday, February 1, 2012 7:52 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lex otm. LDR would have been much better served by something sonically closer to the chris isaak/julie cruise/david lynch touchstones she obviously draws on. the best-sounding and least awkward tracks are those that emphasize space, darkness and restraint: "video games" and "million dollar man" in particular. not that the latter is a particularly great song, but the production at least seems suitable.

turns out it's not a terrible album, but nor is it a great one. seems to use a trite distillation of 90s trip hop to sort of split the difference between "modern radio pop" and the retro signifiers in which the singer seems inclined to couch herself. it's a bad move, imo, resulting in an album with no clear sonic identity or personality.

in addition to "blue jeans" and "video games", i kind of dig "national anthem", "radio" (which is just okay, really) and "this is what makes us girls". the rest goes by in a wash.

Yep, definitely a mistake to put Kid Cudi/Eminem's producer at the helm. Too bad Angelo Baadalamenti has been semi-retired for 8 years.

"Off to the Races" is sitting in my recycle bin.

spotted at tesco this morning:

http://f.cl.ly/items/2y1N1e013f02111V0A0J/10_97.jpg

£10.97!!!!!

Actually the deluxe version is 13.97, I know because I went to get it from there on Monday and had to ask someone to do a price check for me. I left empty handed and headed straight home to Amazon where the regular version cost me 8.20 from a seller.

Still really enjoying this album. Radio and Dark Paradise are my two favourite tracks at the moment.

No wonder Tesco are struggling.

Yeah, 69p for Popz Butter Popcorn is daylight robbery

Someone replaced the official round 'Security protected' stickers with bootleg square ones.

we participate in a civil debt recovery scheme

Yeah, this is nowhere near as awful as the narrative would have you believe, but still pretty mediocre taken as a whole.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hr52zTBp3oo

Okay, yeah, the more I listen to this the more the clunky lyrics glare out at me. The awkward chorus of "Off to the Races" makes me think of Annie's "sexy" song in that glee club episode of Community.

Way good.

lol @ the ldr string quartet and dave trying to boost her self-esteem

that was MUCH better than snl though

yeah the talent is unambiguous there, it's just that the material is still kind of terrible