2012 - USA
Alt-Pop, Chamber Pop, Trip-Hop, Dream Pop
Few artists have managed to encapsulate the sound of a generation the way Lana Del Rey did with Born to Die. At a moment where Adele, Katy Perry, Rihanna and David Guetta were topping the charts, Video Games arrived in a completely new apparatus. It was sold as a love song, played over and over on the radio, showing a whole generation of young people what it felt to experience longing and melancholia in the most precious way possible.
With Blue Jeans, Summertime Sadness and Born to Die, every single became a timeless hit, then Ride and Blue Velvet lengthened the journey. That was also the time when fans started to form their own circles, against all criticisms. Because as soon as Lana Del Rey turned into a music icon, she became the ideal target. Glamourizing abuse, using plastic surgery, tarnishing feminine emancipation with her music videos full of older men and sensual camera angles in slow motion, etc. Were all those criticism true, or was it nothing but misogyny? Maybe a bit of the first, and surely a whole lot of the second.
All of sudden, Lana Del Rey gained that strange status of a modern icon and an unwanted starlet. Never have I seen so much love and so much hate poured at the very same time. But here I was in my bedroom, travelling beyond her most popular songs, in an album with no images, just with the most comfortable feeling possible, Lana Del Rey’s voice floating in the air to pop and trip-hop melodies. Diet Mountain Dew, Million Dollar Man, Off to the Races, it felt like a million kisses getting together to form a gigantic storm that swooped down on you to take you as high as possible. And it’s during these moments, when you’re finally all alone with the music, that you truly meet it. All the parasite thoughts, voices and opinions were gone, all that was left was the essential. And, again and again, for probably forever, Video Games was reigning at the center of it all. There are songs that grew off you because of how much you’ve heard them. But it’s been thirteen years and I can’t think of another song that feels as undamaged as Video Games.
The only frustrating thing on Born to Die was its ending. After the splendid, baroque opening Born to Die, ending with the somewhat flat This Is What Makes Us Girls was a tad underwhelming to close this mythical reunion. This is precisely where the Paradise Edition comes in. Eleven new songs (and one remix) like a whole new chapter within the very same book. Of course it has not the same consistency as Born to Die, but it features some of Lana’s best songs, and some of her most unique as well. Outside this project, it would have been impossible for us to hear her take on the Lynchian classic Blue Velvet, to rediscover the sublime ballad Yayo (even though the original version remains better) or to get lost in the tender dream pop of Bel Air.
Listening to Born to Die (Paradise Edition) already feels like travelling back in time, to a very specific moment. It was 2012, and the days were lit by a bright red lipstick and flashy spotlights, all of that enwrapped by a super 8 kind of grain. Lana Del Rey’s sound and image has done nothing but evolve since then. She keeps embracing America, but her portrayal goes deeper, more complex, with numerous layers of intimate experiences reinventing the landscapes she used to paint. But even with all those changes, rather that turning her old sound into something dated and out of touch, she turned it into a time capsule. And despite its flaws, there’s nothing else quite like it.