Review Summary: This is another flop from Lana Del Rey, but an ever so modest improvement.
I don't know if there is much that can be said about Lana Del Rey that hasn't been already. She is an incredibly polarizing figure in contemporary Pop, and because of that is often subject to high levels of hyperbole on both sides. Fans often reference her as being the most significant Pop artist of the decade, while detesters very vocally use her name in an array of similes relating to feces. I don't subscribe to either side completely, but I have certainly found my self leaning more towards the latter in the past. Her major-label debut "Born To Die" was a pretty rocky start for our relationship, and one that was only made more unbearable with the release of her sophomore effort (if you can justify the use of the word "effort") "Ultraviolence" last year. While I appreciated the attempts at creating a sonic pallet of Baroque Pop, Trip Hop, Psychedelic Rock, and Dream Pop, it was handled with such lack of grace or texture that it became an aesthetic hodgepodge of half-backed ideas. And when matched with her impressively limited vocal range and narrow lyrical content it made for a less than satisfying experience. I found her indulgences in vintage Pop more stale and uninteresting than celebratory and unique, so when I heard she was returning to said sound on "Honeymoon" I had no reason to be excited for new material.
But the tides did change a little when the album's title track dropped a few months ago. The strings that intro the song, and resurface during the choruses, are a little thin and artificial, but the ones that sit ethereally in the backdrop during the verses do a really sufficient job of building tension and coming across quite organic. I can't say Lana makes great use of this build up since she keeps things formulaic and just falls back on the chorus (missing any sort of grand or climatic crescendo), but it was a step in the right direction. So after hearing this track I felt a bit more open to the idea of new music from Lana, and with all of the luck in the world avoided hearing any additional singles before digesting this album in its entirety. So as a warm welcome the aforementioned "Honeymoon" introduces its parent LP and acts as a pretty nice opener. Unfortunately the levels of enjoyment immediately plummet with track 02 "Music To Watch Boys To," because the only boys I could see anyone watching this song to are that of the most shallow, emotionless, and without a single interesting idea running through their head. The mix on this cut is swallowed in washes of syrupy reverb that don't allow the instrumental to breathe whatsoever. Moments of brightness like the flute melody or subtle steel percussions are lost in the background behind this wall of overstated vocal effects. I don't understand her motivation for this at all. If she wanted to make an album that implemented so much extra instrumentation and attempted to act vintage and baroque, then why would she opt to drown it all out by smothering her vocals in modern production techniques and make them way too loud in the high frequencies of the mix? It doesn't feel like she's trying to find a happy medium for her sound, but rather is too afraid to leave her comfort zone and fully commit to her ideas.
"Terrence Loves You" trodes along so tediously that it becomes painful to sit through, and I'm not even joking when I say that the way my head moves along to the melody of this track unintentionally resembles what it looks like when someone falls asleep and then abruptly wakes up. I can assume I went into this project with more enthusiasm than most of her detesters, because I somehow missed the album's leading single "High By The Beach," and I swear this has to contain the most abysmal chours Lana Del Rey has ever put on a cut (which taking a song like "Sad Girl" into consideration says a lot). The one positive thing I can point out about this track is the infusion of Trap inspired fluttering high hats. Not that they're done incredibly well, but at the very least it's something different from the four preceding cuts, which do little to nothing to vary them selves from one another. Well besides the clean guitar intro on "God Knows I Tried" which definitely isn't a good musical detour given that the guitar's tone sounds extremely flat and packs little residence with its noodly texture. But of course since Del Rey, Menzies, and Nowels introduced a new technique to their pool of sounds they had to quickly exploit it and make it just as stale and overused as the horns, synths, and strings by giving the immediate two following tracks "Freaks" and "Art Deco" fluttering high hats as well. And the mimicking goes even further than that in the case of "Freaks." Its beat is so similar to "High On The Beach" that they're practically interchangeable. There is one instrumental I do fully enjoy on this album, but unfortunately it's on the "Burnt Norton (Interlude)," so I only get eighty-one seconds of it and for most of this track Lana is reciting a T.S. Eliot poem that comes across as being more pretentious than it does insightful.
While I would love to compliment this album and Lana for the lyrical maturity it showcases in comparison to past projects, the notions that she is now less ditzy and naive that are trying to be delivered on songs like "High By The Beach," "Blackest Night," and "Terrence Loves You" are completely thrown out the window with the second to last cut "Swan Song" (which is basically the final track since the song that follows is the lifeless cover of Nina Simone's "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood"). This album's entire arc implodes on its self because Lana decides to end on the note that she would be willing to give up her art and entire career and submit to the needs and wants of a man. Maybe this wouldn't be as big of an issue if she developed this male figure throughout the project and justified this highly irrational idea, but she doesn't. She gives me no reason to believe this guy is any better than the ones she fell for in the past and stood up to on this album.
Overall this is another flop from Lana Del Rey, but an ever so modest improvement over "Ultraviolence" and a more consistent piece than "Born To Die." Neither of those compliments hold much weight being that both of those albums are huge messes in their own rights, but if the question is "has Lana improved?" Then the answer is "yes." I can't really say what simple mistakes needed to be fixed for this album to work, since there are so many monumental ones. But the sixty-five minute run time could have benefited a lot from cutting out the fat, and a tighter focus on how to cohesively sew together the sonic landscape may have made for a more engaging listen. I think what falters this album the most are Lana's philosophies. She seems to still have no idea what her perception of a healthy relationship is. It still comes across extremely melodramatic and increasingly frustrating as the album slowly treads on. I honestly feel that she has gone from making me mad as I try to fight through her projects to so uninteresting and detached from any semblance of genuine emotion that I can't even find the motivation to get emotionally invested my self. I can't get angry, because there's nothing to grip on to. So take that for whether or not it's an improvement.
