Lana del Rey's new album is now completed:
https://tidal.com/album/282316060
Lindsay Zoladz writes about this album, which both covers and references a number of very specific songs (and/or name-checks a number of specific artists), in her
NYT newsletter "The Amplifier" this week:
Del Rey’s music is both vividly intimate and highly referential. She writes like a devoted but conversational fan of music history — talking back to the modern songbook and to many of her favorite artists, guided by popular song to her own personal epiphanies. |
Del Rey’s old-soul reverence collapses the distance between generations, too. People listening to Harry Nilsson’s “Don’t Forget Me” when it first came out — on “Pussy Cats” from 1974, the notorious chronicle of his “Lost Weekend” with John Lennon — were just as likely to be moved by that wrenching part when his voice breaks, but they probably wouldn’t have known its precise time stamp. Del Rey’s homage speaks the language of digital-era listening (“his voice breaks at 2:05”), but her emotional connection to Nilsson is so deeply felt, it seems to transcend time and turn him into a peer. |
Here's Zoladz's
playlist (that's a link to Spotify), “Lana Del Rey Talks Back to the Songbook”:
Track 1: John Denver, “Rocky Mountain High” (1972)
Track 2: Lana Del Rey, “The Grants” (2023)
Track 3: Tex Ritter, “Froggy Went a Courtin’” (1945)
Track 4: Father John Misty, “Goodbye Mr. Blue” (2022)
Track 5: Lana Del Rey featuring Father John Misty, “Let the Light In” (2023)
Track 6: Leonard Cohen, “Anthem” (1992)
Track 7: Lana Del Rey, “Kintsugi” (2023)
Track 8: Harry Nilsson, “Don’t Forget Me” (1974)
Track 9: Lana Del Rey, “Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd” (2023)