ReportWire

Tag: Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd

  • Harry Nilsson Being the Devil on John Lennon’s Shoulder Doesn’t Prevent Lana Del Rey From Saying “I Just Wish I Had A Friend Like Him”

    Harry Nilsson Being the Devil on John Lennon’s Shoulder Doesn’t Prevent Lana Del Rey From Saying “I Just Wish I Had A Friend Like Him”

    Lana Del Rey is no stranger to name-checking white male musicians from the 60s and 70s in her music. It’s become something of a barometer for whether or not the song in question is truly “Del Rey-crafted.” From Bob Dylan to Dennis Wilson to Crosby, Stills and Nash, Del Rey has exhibited her reverence for these white male “gods” time and time again. With no signs of slowing up, either. For two of her recent singles, “Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd” (also the name of her ninth record) and “The Grants,” each refers to Harry Nilsson and John Denver, respectively. While the latter is a slightly “purer” soul (mainly because of his humanitarian efforts), Nilsson was nothing if not “problematic” by today’s standards. But everything was so much more forgivable back then when one was a “genius.” A word doled out far too easily for people who spin a poetic turn of phrase more effortlessly than the average.

    Of course, a person’s underlying “badness” can’t truly be invoked without some sort of catalyst. In Nilsson’s case, that was John Lennon in the years of 1973 and 1974. Or maybe it was Nilsson who brought out the worst in Lennon—it depends on who you ask. Having descended upon L.A. after a rift with Yoko Ono, Lennon would later refer to that eighteen-month period as his “Lost Weekend.” But it didn’t take him very long to find a constant companion in Nilsson, a man as fond of drinking as most British “working class heroes.” Along for the ride was Yoko Ono’s former personal assistant, May Pang, given the sanction by Ono to be Lennon’s de facto concubine. Night after night, it was Pang who bore witness to the duo’s social gracelessness/enjoyment of the privilege that came not just with being a white man, but a famous white man. For few other sects of humanity could have gotten away with their brazen hijinks, most of which occurred at the Troubadour in West Hollywood.

    The collision of Nilsson and Lennon was perhaps first decided by the Fates in 1967 when Nilsson attracted the attention of The Beatles’ publicist, Derek Taylor, with his song, “1941,” which Taylor heard on his car radio while waiting for his wife to finish shopping in a supermarket. Compelled to buy “a case” of the album from which “1941” hailed, Pandemonium Shadow Show, the four Beatles were among the recipients of the record that Taylor felt obliged to distribute as an unasked advocate for Nilsson. Fittingly, Nilsson had covered two Beatles tracks on that album: “You Can’t Do That” (incorporating other songs from The Beatles’ oeuvre to make for the first “mashup” before anyone knew what that was) and “She’s Leaving Home” (the original from Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band being released in May of the same year as Nilsson’s cover). 

    From the moment The Beatles heard Nilsson’s music, his status as the “the American Beatle” was all but assured. Especially for John, who was looking for someone to lean on while Yoko insisted he sow some oats away from her for a while (she being the “progressive” one between them and all). Nilsson was only too happy to accommodate Lennon’s need for a jovial “good-time boy.” But that didn’t come without its worrisome caveats. As Larry Kane, the writer of Lennon Revealed wrote, “Harry drank, a lot. But Harry was the type of guy that if you go out drinking with him, he’d be sure at the end of the night that there would be a big brawl and that you are the one who’s in trouble, even though he started it. Harry would keep feeding John drinks until it was too late.”

    This included the illustrious Brandy Alexanders that Lennon was supposedly introduced to by Nilsson on their apex night of “acting a fool in L.A.” The combination of milk and alcohol in the beverage perhaps made Lennon and Nilsson feel like it was an especially fun idea to heckle the Smothers Brothers at their show at the Troubadour on March 12, 1974. This was after Lennon had already been embarrassed on a recent evening out prior to this random Tuesday, so drunk out of his gourd he emerged from the bathroom (presumably the women’s) of a Santa Monica restaurant with a Kotex pad stuck to his forehead. The lore goes that it managed to stay on all the way through to the next stop of the night: where else, the Troubadour.

    Varying accounts purport that Lennon snapped at the server either at the Troubadour or the one at the first restaurant where he had initially placed the Kotex on his head. Whatever the milieu, that server called him out for not leaving a tip, prompting Lennon to growl, “Do you know who I am?” She allegedly retorted, “You’re some asshole with a Kotex on his head.” But that was positively dignified compared to March 12, 1974, when the heckling of the Smothers Brothers prompted both Nilsson and Lennon’s ejection from the club. Lennon would later defend, “It was my first night on Brandy Alexanders, that’s brandy and milk, folks. I was with Harry Nilsson, who didn’t get as much coverage as me, the bum. He encouraged me. I usually have someone there who says ‘Okay, Lennon. Shut up.’” Presumably, Yoko would have been that person, but she was taking a break. Lennon also added, “So I was drunk. When it’s Errol Flynn, the showbiz writers say: ‘Those were the days, when men were men.’ When I do it, I’m a bum.”

    Talking of the days “when men were men,” as men clinging to the past like to call it, these are the very ilk that someone such as Del Rey still can’t help but romanticize in her music (not to mention manifest in real life with her dating track record, e.g., Sean Larkin, Jack Donoghue). Drawn to the “bad men” that make for such interesting lyrical fodder, Del Rey has also allowed that to bleed into her work via the name-checking of musical icons with polarizing personal backgrounds. Incidentally, she never had to mention John Lennon because she effectively did so by collaborating with his (more beloved) son, Sean, on 2017’s “Tomorrow Never Came.” Oh, the sting Julian must have felt to be further reminded that he was somehow the “bastard” child despite being Lennon’s legitimate firstborn.

    Bearing all of this in mind, Del Rey is a former alcoholic. And the last thing she would probably need is a friend like Nilsson. Despite expressing on the aforementioned, “Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd,” “Something about the way he says, ‘Don’t forget me’/Makes me feel like I just wish I had a friend like him, someone to get me by/Leaning in my back, whispering in my ear, ‘Come on, baby, you can drive.’” Likely encouraging her to do so while she’s drunk. The “Come on, baby, you can drive” line may allude to Nilsson’s cover of the Shirley and Lee song, “Let The Good Times Roll,” from his seventh studio album, Nilsson Schmilsson, during which he sings, “C’mon baby, let’s ride some more/C’mon baby, let the good times roll.” Or even “Driving Along,” from the same record, for the only thing honorary West Coastian Del Rey loves more than a white male reference is a reference to cars and driving.

    As for the song by Nilsson that Del Rey specifically talks about, “Don’t Forget Me,” it was on the Pussy Cats record, produced by none other than Lennon and released during the duo’s ignominious year of 1974. The title of the album itself was undeniably tongue-in-cheek, designed to negate the rowdy, perpetually inebriated image they had cultivated during their numerous nights of debauchery over the course of that infamous “Lost Weekend.” That might not have come across, however, if the label had allowed them to keep the album’s original title, Strange Pussies. Luckily, even back then, corporations had no gumption when it came to letting artists run amok with their creative decisions. The same way Del Rey’s original creative decision for titling Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd was reworked from Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd Pearl Watch Me on Ring a Bell Psycho Lifeguard. Like, whaaaat? There’s being an esoteric genius and just being full-stop esoteric for the sake of it. This, effectively, is what Nilsson and Lennon decided to be for almost two years as they caroused together through L.A.’s nightlife like a pair of garish vampires.

    Once more, the question arises, was Nilsson truly the “bad influence”? Or was Lennon just so ready to let the dark side take hold that he only needed the excuse of a “bad seed” of a friend to allow him to let loose? One must admit it was fairly convenient for Lennon to say, as a defense to evade personal responsibility, “It was my first night on Brandy Alexanders, and they tasted like milkshakes. The first thing I knew I was out of me gourd. Of course, Harry Nilsson was no help feeding them to me, saying ‘Go ahead, John.’” Sure, on the one hand, each of us is culpable for the choices we make, yet on the other, Del Rey saying, “I just wish I had a friend like him” sounds incongruous, especially if it had been soundtracked against these nights of drunken spiraling and touching the lowest depths of one’s emotional nadir.

    The irony of Nilsson singing, “Don’t forget me,” of course, is that he probably forgot just about everything as he delved further into a relationship with Alcoholism. Perhaps the same might have happened to Del Rey had she not been a millennial, and her parents had the good sense to send her to boarding school to dry out at the age of fourteen. Del Rey would reflect in 2012 of her kicked addiction, “My parents were worried, I was worried. I knew it was a problem when I liked it more than I liked doing anything else. I was like, ‘I’m fucked. I am totally fucked.’” As was Lennon with Nilsson at his side, and vice versa—the two fueling each other’s darkness under the guise of “having a good time.”

    Del Rey would add in the same NME piece, “Like, at first it’s fine and you think you have a dark side—it’s exciting—and then you realize the dark side wins every time if you decide to indulge in it. It’s also a completely different way of living when you know that…a different species of person. It was the worst thing that ever happened to me.” Which leads one to inquire as to whether or not Del Rey put much consideration into wishing for a friend like Nilsson to “get her by” when, in all likelihood, the two would have been as bad for each other as Lennon and Nilsson were in those “Lost Weekend” months.

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • The Introvert’s Conundrum When Pitted Against the Extrovert’s Will

    The Introvert’s Conundrum When Pitted Against the Extrovert’s Will


    Taylor Swift did a couple things in the span of one award acceptance on Grammy night that elicited polarized reactions. And, considering that Swift, in her role as America’s sweetheart, rarely does anything to polarize people, it was a big deal. Some may automatically assume that what one is referring to is her blatant disregard for Celine Dion’s presence on the stage as she stood there awkwardly waiting to be acknowledged in some way, any way by the Album of the Year winner when she walked up to collect her bounty (which was in stark contrast to how Miley Cyrus gushed over Mariah Carey during her entire acceptance speech for Best Pop Solo Performance). Instead, Swift acted like a frat boy only paying attention to his “homies” as she hugged those she deemed partly responsible for her album’s success. 

    Obviously, Dion wasn’t someone she put in that category. But Lana Del Rey, clearly, was. Which is why Swift performed another polarizing act in one fell swoop by forcefully taking Del Rey onstage with her. Not just because she contributed vocals to “Snow on the Beach” that were initially undetectable until Swift released yet another version of Midnights (ergo, another money grab), but because, per Swift’s assessment, “I think so many female artists would not be where they are and would not have the inspiration they have if it weren’t for the work that she’s done.” 

    She’s not saying that she’s one of those artists, of course. For, after all, Swift was “on the scene,” fame-wise, years before Del Rey, with no one to look to for inspiration except Shania Twain and Faith Hill (and it shows). But at least she can acknowledge that musicians such as Billie Eilish weren’t exactly trying to emulate her. Or Dion, for that matter. Certainly not Swift, who kept looking behind her while onstage at anyone else she could thank except for Dion, grasping at, “I wanna say thank you to Serban Ghenea, Sam Dew, Soundwave…Lana Del Rey, who is hiding.” Ah yes, as most introverted people who didn’t want to be dragged onto a stage in a very public venue against their will tend to do. Something she made crystal clear with her resisting body language. But Swift seemed to realize at the last second that it might behoove her to take LDR up onstage to prove her female solidarity shtick was genuine, knowing full well that many fans of Del Rey’s were praying (and perhaps foolishly assuming) she would win for Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, since she couldn’t even manage to snag any of the other awards she was nominated for, namely Best Pop Duo/Group Performance (for her collaboration with Jon Batiste on “Candy Necklace”), Song of the Year (for “A&W”), Best Alternative Music Album and Best Alternative Music Performance. Thus, briefly remembering the way in which Lana fans treat her like Jesus far more than Taylor’s do, she did a “cover your ass” move by bringing Del Rey onstage. To think otherwise, is more than slightly naive. 

    Before having this “calculated” revelation, Swift momentarily forgot she was at the same table as Del Rey so she could embrace Jack Antonoff, the man who seems to be perennially serving as the middle of a female musician sandwich. But especially this female musician sandwich. The camera itself juggled (or “toggled between,” if you prefer) getting reaction shots of both Del Rey and Antonoff when the award was announced. And watching Del Rey herself juggle the emotions of being upset over losing (for there’s no denying that she genuinely believed this would be the album that would finally get recognized) and trying to bounce back quickly so she can be happy for her friend, it’s apparent that the last thing she wants to do is have to grapple with those conflicting emotions in front of not just an entire room of people, but an entire nation of them watching at home. 

    As Antonoff presumes to take the credit for it all by leading the way to the stage, Del Rey tries to laugh off Swift’s attempt at pulling her up there, trying to resist at the same time so that Swift gets the message: no, this isn’t really what I want to do. Swift, being the alpha that she is, doesn’t take no for an answer and continues to drag her until Del Rey stops fighting it so that the optics on the whole awkward situation don’t look so bad. And, well, very uncomfortable. Because it is uncomfortable to have to watch someone doing something they obviously don’t want to. And when introverts are feeling low, they certainly don’t want to have to have those emotions broadcast, literally, to millions of people. Yet, the dichotomy is that, without Swift doing what she did, Del Rey would have stayed under the radar to a whole slew of people in the “flyover states.” The states, in fact, that she likes visiting the most. 

    With this conundrum in mind, there’s a joke about introverts that gets bandied around sometimes, something to the effect of: “Any introvert you ever met was because they were friends with an extrovert.” Del Rey suffered that phenomenon and then some at the 2024 Grammys, enduring the introvert’s dilemma of hating attention but also wanting to be given credit when it’s due. 

    Pulled onto the stage by a woman with nothing but “good intentions,” it was as though Del Rey became the victim of her own spouted lines from 2020, in the wake of her “question for the culture”: “I’m sorry that a couple of the girls I talked to, who were mentioned in that post, have a super different opinion of my insight, especially because we’ve been so close for so long. But it really, again, makes you reach into the depth of your own heart and say, ‘Am I good-intentioned?’ And of course, for me, the answer is always yes.” Naturally, that’s going to be the answer from anyone’s subjective viewpoint, no matter what they’re doing. Even Putin and Netanyahu think what they’re doing is “good-intentioned” when they reach into the depth of their own “hearts” and ask if they are. 

    At another point, Swift gushed of Del Rey, “I think that she’s a legacy artist, a legend in her prime right now. I’m so lucky to know you and to be your friend.” This adding to a vibe that only served to make Del Rey look pitiable and pathetic rather than praiseworthy. As though Swift was putting more of a highlight on what a “loser” Del Rey was for not getting the award rather than how “cool” she is. With Swift being of the Never Been Kissed philosophy, “All you need is for one person to think you’re cool, and you’re in.” But based on some of the winners that night (and throughout the ceremony’s past), does Del Rey really want to be deemed “cool” by the Recording Academy?



    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • A Lana Del Rey Song Posing As a Bleachers One, Or: The Antonoff-Del Rey Partnership Persists on “Alma Mater”

    A Lana Del Rey Song Posing As a Bleachers One, Or: The Antonoff-Del Rey Partnership Persists on “Alma Mater”

    For those hoping that being a “superstar” producer had left Jack Antonoff no time to remember his own musical “project,” Bleachers, the media regrets to inform you that he has not forgotten at all. And after promising there would be new Bleachers music in 2022, he’s decided to deliver on that vow in late 2023…because time flies when you’re producing Midnights and Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd. And, speaking of the latter, it is Lana Del Rey who joins Bleachers for their latest single, “Alma Mater.” A song title that, in fact, could swing both ways in terms of being either a Del Rey or Swift track. After all, both women still speak as though they’re fresh from their collegiate years. But Del Rey is the more suitable choice for a title like this, what with her schoolgirl fetish and actual college degree (unlike Swift, who merely has an “honorary” one from NYU). 

    Although her vocal contribution is minimal—in fact, little more noticeable than what she brought to Swift’s original version of “Snow on the Beach” before they re-recorded it for Midnights (The Til Dawn Edition)—Del Rey’s influence is all over the track. And that includes the fact that she co-produced it along with Antonoff and Patrik Berger. But beyond that, her lyrical stylings and habits pepper “Alma Mater” in ways that include referencing the titles of other musicians’ work (in this case, Tom Waits’ Heartattack and Vine) and painting the picture of “trashball Americana” (from the white perspective, mind you). This is patent in the lines, “Threw her t-shirt down the pike (alma mater)/Screamin’, ‘Fuck Balenciaga’/Right past the Wawa.” The part where Antonoff mentions how the girl in question screamed “fuck Balenciaga” also echoes Del Rey on “This Is What Makes Us Girls” when she sings, “Runnin’ from the cops in our black bikini tops/Screamin’, ‘Get us while we’re hot, get us while we’re hot.’” Clearly, Antonoff has been listening to (and unwittingly studying) Del Rey’s work over the years so that it has managed to affect his own. 

    This includes Del Rey’s obsession with talking about summer and stating the obvious about its hot temperature. A trope that also shows up in “Alma Mater,” when Antonoff sings, “Well summer’s gettin’ hotter/(Alma mater).” Similar non sequitur/“no shit Sherlock” remarks about the summer season also show up in Del Rey songs like “Without You,” when she announces, “Summertime is nice and hot.” In “Heroin,” she takes it one step further by shouting, “It’s fuckin’ hot, hot.” So perhaps for Antonoff, who sounds more like The National’s Matt Berninger than himself on this track, working with Del Rey requires mentioning the summer at least once. And, of course, anyone who wants to collab with Del Rey should be adept at metaphors. So it is that Antonoff’s gift for this literary device shines through when he says, “She’s my alma mater,” a simultaneously romantic and sexual phrase that refers to how this person is someone he’s known intimately. And presumably, “graduated from.” Which might mean that, as he talks about this woman now, he’s either reminiscing about her or speaking of her from the “friend zone” perspective they’ve now transitioned to. Antonoff certainly has experience with that…unfortunately, with Lena Dunham. 

    But now that he’s moved onward and upward to another nepo baby, Margaret Qualley, it appears as though it was destined to be all along. If for no other reason than it gave Del Rey inspiration to write “Margaret” and collaborate vocally with Antonoff on it. Not only in the studio, but onstage, with Antonoff joining her to perform the track during the All Things Go Festival in Columbia, Maryland (as well as “Venice Bitch”). He also showed up to play the piano on “For Free” (LDR’s preferred Joni Mitchell cover) and “Mariners Apartment Complex” when Del Rey appeared at the Newport Folk Festival. So yes, theirs has been a rich and productive musical partnership both in and out of the studio, with Antonoff doing most of the giving. Which is why Del Rey probably thought she should do him a solid by appearing on “Alma Mater.” A song during which she promises, “I’ll make it darker”—this being an overt nod to Leonard Cohen’s “You Want It Darker.” Not to mention Del Rey’s own 2021 song, “Dark But Just A Game,” itself inspired by a phrase Antonoff said to her about fame. 

    ​​Elsewhere, Antonoff channels Del Rey’s “How To Disappear” (also produced by Antonoff) when he sings, “Point the headlights, flickеr dear/Drive by the old housе, go for a beer.” It’s all very “you just crack another beer/And pretend that you’re still here.” Or even, “Back, back in the garden/We’re getting high now because we’re older.” Indeed, the overall tone of “Alma Mater” is one of millennial ennui…and the resignation to getting “old” as one performs the folly-laden things they once did in their youth with less, let’s say, joie de vivre. Incidentally, on “Margaret,” Del Rey has the audacity to say, “‘When you’re old, you’re old/Like Hollywood and me.” Perhaps Gen Z ageism has infected the millennial mind if Del Rey believes she’s “aged” at thirty-seven (this being how old she was when she wrote the song). At another point, Antonoff’s “secondary” great muse, Taylor Swift, has her lyrical influence flicker in when Antonoff notes, “2003, sad all the time”—a line that channels Swift on Midnights’ “Paris” when she says, “2003, unbearable.” Making one wonder: what the fuck was so bad about 2003?

    To “spice it up” a bit, Antonoff provides a white boy version of Megan Thee Stallion rapping, “He say, ‘The way that thang move it’s a movie’” by crooning, “You’re a movie to me, the way you move around me.” Swoon, sigh, etc. These are the reactions Antonoff wants to evoke. And yet, his need to include Del Rey on the song indicates a certain lack of confidence on his part in being able to do that. Perhaps, after so many years spent behind other musicians’ shadows, Antonoff is afraid he might not ever be able to fully come out (and no, that’s not an allusion to his sexuality…though he does look a bit like a lesbian who would give bad head). 

    Thus, what’s most glaringly apparent about “Alma Mater” is that Antonoff would rather save his true best (e.g., Del Rey’s “A&W”) for other artists instead of allowing it for himself. For, no matter how many times you listen to the song, nothing about it truly sticks or “implants” in your mind. As though every time is like hearing it for the first time…which isn’t the mark of praise, so much as genericness and forgettability. That is, within the established framework of music Antonoff has already created with and for someone like Del Rey.

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • Lana Del Rey’s “Candy Necklace” Video Deliberately Blurs the Line Between Fantasy and Reality With Its Meta Framework

    Lana Del Rey’s “Candy Necklace” Video Deliberately Blurs the Line Between Fantasy and Reality With Its Meta Framework

    When an artist reaches a certain point in their career, self-reference can’t be avoided. In Lana Del Rey’s case, that tends to become quite a quagmire in terms of how most of her music and aesthetics were already referencing other people to begin with. This includes not only “paying homage” visually to the “classics” of Americana and 50s-era icons like Marilyn Monroe, James Dean and Elvis Presley, but also more esoteric fare, including instrumentation and intonation from Eleni Vitali’s “Dromoi Pou Agapisa” for “Video Games” (though some have tried to push back on that theory). Then, of course, there’s her signature of randomly throwing in the lyrics of musical heroes like David Bowie (“Ground control to Major Tom” in “Terrence Loves You”), Patsy Cline (“I fall to pieces” in “Cherry”), Bob Dylan (“Like a rolling stone” in “Off to the Races” and “Lay-lady-lay” in “Tomorrow Never Came”), Beach Boys (“Don’t worry baby” in “Lust for Life” and “California dreamin’” on “Fuck It I Love You”) and Leonard Cohen (“That’s how the light gets in” in “Kintsugi”), to name a few. And let’s not forget her tendency toward weaving literary quotes into much of her work, to boot (which is much easier to sneak in and have people assume is one’s own because nobody’s all that well-read anymore, are they?). Many of which take from Nabokov’s evermore problematic tome, Lolita. Hence, the Del Rey songs “Lolita,” “Carmen” and “Off to the Races.” There’s also Walt Whitman in “Body Electric,” T. S. Eliot in “Burnt Norton” and Oscar Wilde in “Gods and Monsters.” With so many people to “inspire” (read: take from), it’s no wonder Del Rey is so prolific.

    But it all makes sense because of how much Del Rey has always represented the millennial gift for pastiche. Themselves having experienced it on overload from the day of conception, thanks to being “cultivated” in a postmodern world. Where society is at now leaves potential for many more “posts” to be placed in front of that “modern” (just how many might depend on who you ask). And maybe that’s why the love of all things meta has taken root so deeply in pop culture ever since Scream came to theaters. Del Rey herself has never much favored playing with the concept too overtly, perhaps deciding it was time to do so after all this talk of her various “personas” throughout album cycles—though mainly the “Daddy”-loving one that sucks on lollipops, sips “cherry cola” and still insists, “He hit me and it felt like a kiss” (another lyric borrowed from someone else: The Crystals). So it’s only right for director Rich Lee (who previously teamed with Del Rey on videos for “Doin’ Time” and “Fuck It I Love You/The Greatest”) to commence “Candy Necklace,” the first single from Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd to receive a video accompaniment, by opening on a klieg light. Everything about such an emblem signifying the grandeur of Del Rey’s music, as well as her ongoing commitment to presenting Old Hollywood glamor as a lifestyle choice people can still choose to make.

    Lee zooms into the shot of the klieg light and then cuts to the man wielding it behind the back of the truck Lana is “driving” on set. One with a screen backdrop that plays footage of trees on a loop to make it seem like she’s actually driving though some woodsy area (“You can find me where no one will be/In the woods somewhere,” as she says on “Sweet”) when, obviously, she’s not. But it’s all part of the “put-on,” innit? That razzle-dazzle that only Hollywood—de facto, Del Rey—still knows how to achieve better than anyone. And where is she driving to but L.A.? Some small-town girl bound for the big city to do “big things.” Much like the woman Del Rey visually emulates in the video, Elizabeth Short. Better known as the Black Dahlia. Like Del Rey, Short shares a name with Elizabeth “Lizzy” Grant and also spent much of her youth on the East Coast (with some stints in Florida, also like “Lizzy”) before ending up in L.A. after various boppings around between her father and some Army and Navy men.

    Rumors of whether or not Short was a prostitute began to crop up in the wake of her murder, tying right in with another favorite topic of Del Rey’s, as explored on “A&W.” Indeed, after so much rejection in her life, it would be easy to imagine Short callously thinking to herself as she prowled the streets of L.A., “It’s not about having someone to love me anymore/This is the experience of being an American whore.” Regardless of whether or not she did prostitute herself at one time or another, there was an innocent aura about her. Which then, of course, brings us to the flowers—dahlias—Short wore in her hair. As Del Rey used to adorn her own hair with a “sweet” flower crown despite talking of subjects like cocaine, older men and being born bad.

    The dichotomy of a woman when viewed through the myopic lens of men—particularly men controlling Hollywood and the narratives that were churned out of it—is embodied by Del Rey as the vixen, the vamp and the lost little lamb throughout the video. Cutting from her in the truck as “Lana” to her as the Black Dahlia sometime in the 40s as she’s guided out of a car by a John Waters lookalike (maybe the real deal wasn’t available), Lee sets the stage for something sinister to build—only to keep taking us out of the moment with constant behind-the-scenes “asides” from Del Rey herself who, as usual, helmed the concept. As she walks into the stately mansion she’s led to by this older gentleman (Johnny Robish), she reminds one of Lana (quelle coincidence) Clarkson being led to the slaughter by Phil Spector. Eerily (and perhaps intentionally) enough, Robish actually did portray Spector in a TV series called Silenced. And yes, one could imagine Del Rey moonlighting as a hostess at the House of Blues and ending up in such a man’s abode had things gone in an alternate direction for her. In fact, one of her chief defenses against those calling her portrayal of the Black Dahlia insensitive (since, by now, everyone is desensitized to Marilyn’s image being habitually plundered) is that, “It’s not insensitive when you started the same way and you could’ve ended up that way, but that hasn’t been how the story played out and no one knows how it will. So, leave if you don’t like the idea.” But obviously, plenty will like it, for Del Rey is not without her devoted legions, even if they aren’t able to move mountains in quite the same way as Swifties or Beyhive members.

    But Taylor and Beyoncé don’t tend to go quite so niche (at least not in ways deemed as polarizing) with their visual brainchilds. In this video’s instance, a key part of the concept is highlighting “what it’s like for those in front of the camera, behind the smokescreen of fame.” Almost like what Britney Spears was doing in the video for “Lucky” as a matter of fact. But, as usual, Brit doesn’t get much credit for her profundity. Del Rey also follows the tradition of movies that serve as a “film within a film” designed to debunk the supposed perfection of it all—totally manufactured by those behind the camera as much as those in front of it. For someone mired in the debate about “persona,” it couldn’t be a more on-the-nose notion. Almost as on the nose as the various “rundowns” of the video that have come out, offering only such reductive “commentary” as, “Lana Del Rey Transforms Into Marilyn Monroe in New Video.” No shit. But, as with most Del Rey videos, there’s much more to it than the surface.

    Considering her collaboration with Lee on the merged videos for “Fuck It I Love You” and “The Greatest” (clocking in at nine minutes and nineteen seconds to make it a length contender with the videos for “Ride,” “Venice Bitch,” “Norman Fucking Rockwell”/“Bartender”/“Happiness Is A Butterfly” and, now, “Candy Necklace”), he actually alludes to it when making mention of her skateboarding down an alleyway in Long Beach for that shoot. An alleyway will factor in during this video as well, but not with such a “fun-loving” tinge. What’s more, it’s worth noting that the lyrics to “Fuck It I Love You” encapsulate the “everygirl”—like Elizabeth Short—who moves to L.A. with “big dreams” (“said you had to leave to start your life over”). Only to fall into the trap of “fast living” (yet again). This apparent in lyrics such as, “Maybe the way that I’m living is killing me/I like to light up the stage with a song/Do shit to keep me turned on/But one day I woke up like, ‘Maybe I’ll do it differently’/So I moved to California but it’s just a state of mind.” And that state of mind can often lead to a dark destiny, hidden behind the oft-repeated phrase: “the myth of California.”

    Del Rey as Black Dahlia starts to slowly uncover it as we see her atop a grandiose staircase, in the home of the creepy older man who takes her there. Another camera cut shows Del Rey overlooking the scene with Jon Batiste, her trusty piano player on the song and also, of course, a Grammy-winning dynamo in his own right. But in this context, the two both appear as outsiders looking in, heightening the meta concept of us as the outsider audience watching them look like outsiders, too. When Del Rey then descends the staircase while “acting the part,” it feels like a callback to Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard doing the same thing after retreating entirely into her delusions.

    Whatever is happening throughout the video, Lee is always sure to keep our eyes on the varying necklaces Del Rey is wearing, with the term “candy necklace” being symbolic of a lure itself. Something women use to “ensnare” by drawing the male gaze to her vulnerable neck and then up to the mouth as she sucks on the candy. It’s also a metaphor for something sweet and disposable—the way most young women are viewed, particularly by men in “the industry” who see such women as mere “perks” of being in it. Ergo, Del Rey’s dissection of yet another disappointing man who she thought she was madly in love with echoes a sentiment expressed in “Shades of Cool”: “I can’t fix him/Can’t make him better.” But by the time she—or rather, the Black Dahlia version of herself—realizes it, it’s too late.

    At the two-minute, forty-eight-second mark of the video, Del Rey is up to her old “National Anthem” tricks again by portraying Marilyn Monroe, but this time with the full-on re-creation of her blonde coif (as opposed to just wearing a replica of the Jean Louis gown that Kim Kardashian felt obliged to destroy for the sake of her vanity). Shot from a movie-within-a-movie perspective again, we hear the “real” Del Rey tell Lee, “I just don’t know, like, how to not be, like, a robot. I just need to shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot.” And shoot she does…in the persona of Marilyn holding a book in her hand (there’s also a book in the background appropriately titled Handbook of General Psychology). While some would write Del Rey’s portrayal of Marilyn off as yet another tired trick in her usual playbook, it bears remarking that her putting on this particular “character” has more significance at this moment in time, with Del Rey currently being thirty-seven—a year older than Marilyn was when she died (or committed suicide, if that’s the theory you’re going with). This meaning she survived past a “scary age” for those who pay attention to the women slain by the Hollywood machine. Which harkens back to Del Rey’s mention of how when she started out as Lizzy Grant taking on the big city and finding herself in precarious situations with men-wolves, her fate might have gone down just as dark a path as Short’s or Monroe’s.

    After talking about being like a robot, Del Rey adds, “I’m not, like, it’s not, like, working anymore for me.” There are two interpretations of this line: 1) the concept isn’t working for her anymore or 2) doing the shoot no longer feels like work to her because she’s so “in it.” In this manner, as well, there is a layer of duality to everything. Transitioning back to Black Dahlia mode, Del Rey offers another behind-the-scenes soundbite in the form of, “‘Cause the whole thing about the video is, like…why it was all supposed to be behind-the-scenes is because all these women who, like, changed their name, changed their hair, like me and stuff [correction: her like them], it’s like they all fell into these different, different, like, snake holes, so the whole point is like how do you learn from that and not fall into your own thing?” Del Rey grapples with that question as she puts on another wig—this one more Veronica Lake-esque. Along with a Red Riding Hood-style cape in white. The Red Riding Hood vibe being undeniably pointed, per the mention of the men-wolves above—the ones that still run most industries. And still make them all a rather scary place to be a woman. Especially a “fragile” one (as Del Rey so often likes to remind people that she is—something Jewel was doing quite some time ago).

    Walking down a darkened alleyway in this glam-ified Red Riding Hood getup, Del Rey finds herself singing—performing—yet again in a club (as she has also done so many times before in videos such as “Blue Velvet,” “Ride” and “Fuck It I Love You”). One where the seedy Phil Spector-reminiscent character waits and watches. A wolf in no sheep’s clothing. As Batiste plays the piano next to her, Del Rey locks eyes with this foreboding male presence…yet another “Daddy” figure in her music video canon (see also: “Ride,” “Shades of Cool” and “The Greatest”). The one to lead her into the proverbial woods, rather than out of them, as she would like to believe.

    Back in the alleyway with this man who will serve as her “date” for the rest of the “evening,” Del Rey rips off the wig she’s wearing to reveal Black Dahlia curls again…or are they Del Rey’s own? As usual, she toys with viewers’ perception on the matter, with wig-snatching as yet another bid to break down the wall of artifice created by Hollywood glamor. Subverting the “real” goings-on “behind the scenes” again by flashing a middle finger at the camera in her dressing room and demanding, “Get out. Seriously.” But is she being serious, or is this a sendup of the difficult diva persona? Once more, the decision is at the discretion of the beholder.

    Close-ups on Del Rey’s necklace become more pronounced after this scene, though it’s been accented the entire time that each “character” she plays wears some kind of ornate necklace. The one lured (whether aware of the lure or ultimately uncaring that it is a lure) into the backseat of “Daddy’s” car keeps caressing the “candy” necklace she’s wearing as Lee cuts to Batiste repeating the phrase like a narrator who can only communicate her fate through this ominous pair of words. All at once, there’s a moment when it seems as though the necklace feels to her like a choking hold that she tries to remove before looking around frantically out the window. Is it too late to escape what she herself walked into? As necklaces both candy and jeweled fall against a black backdrop and into blood, we find out what the answer is…and what we knew it to be all along: she can’t escape the gruesome outcome that awaits. This shown dramatically by a shot of the car door open and her white cape strewn from the seat to the floor, covered in blood. The camera pans to the back of the car, where a trunk is attached. The perfect size for fitting a mutilated body. Partially open, the camera closes in on its blood-spattered exterior, zooming into the blackness of the trunk only to then reflect back the POV from within: a bevy of reporters letting their flashbulbs go off in a frenzy, ready to splash the horrid tale all over newspapers across the country. The girl is just a story now. Another cautionary tale. One that tells women: don’t be “loose,” don’t “ask for it.” And suddenly, among the fray of “paparazzi” (a word not yet coined in the Black Dahlia’s time), there’s Jon Batiste, who presently comes across as the A$AP Rocky of the narrative, for Del Rey does so enjoy to portray herself as the romantic fetish of Black men. And the fetish of bad men.

    Another cut made through the flashbulb and into the reality where Del Rey is just a star who was playing a tragic dead girl concludes the video. Or was this the alternate reality Del Rey wants to offer up for all the girls who didn’t survive the wolves of Hollywood? Whatever the case, she poses with her star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (one that doesn’t actually yet exist, but maybe it will soon) with that shit-eating grin of triumph. The black-and-white scene then segues into color, indicating the falseness of it. A few close-ups on some more neck shots of Del Rey wearing her various necklaces are followed by the final frame being Del Rey’s smiling face as seen through the camera monitor. This concluding the meta blending of fiction and reality, with Del Rey happier than ever (to use an Eilish phrase) about confusing the two. For to live in the twentieth century and beyond is to never really know the difference anymore. Just ask Gloria Swanson/Norma Desmond. Or Norma Jeane/Marilyn. Or Elizabeth Short/the Black Dahlia. Or Lizzy/Lana.

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • Lana Del Rey Returns to Her Church Choir Roots With “The Grants,” A Rumination on Memory and, More Subtly, Plath’s Fig Tree

    Lana Del Rey Returns to Her Church Choir Roots With “The Grants,” A Rumination on Memory and, More Subtly, Plath’s Fig Tree

    With a recent interview in Billboard noting that Lana Del Rey found herself figuratively going back to Lake Placid as she wrote Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, that much seems apparent on her third release thus far from the record: “The Grants.” For those who aren’t more than just cursory fans, the title refers to her true last name. Born Elizabeth Woolridge Grant, Lana Del Rey only transformed into her stage name around 2010 (though, back then, it was spelled “Del Ray”). One year later, her “Video Games” single would launch her into the international spotlight. A vastly different space than small-town Lake Placid, which, up until Del Rey, was only really on anyone’s radar because there was a horror-comedy movie named after it (though it’s not actually set in Lake Placid at all).

    The speculations about Del Rey’s background were (and are) rampant upon the debut of Born to Die in 2012—her father had bought her career, she came from money and was getting off on slumming it in a trailer park, she had a fuck ton of plastic surgery, etc. With “The Grants,” if one was hoping Del Rey might clear up some of the rumors about her background, there’s no allusion to any such light-shedding as she proceeds to talk about, essentially, how all the money and the fame don’t mean shit, etc. What matters is family, and the memories you make with people who are important to you (including, of course, romantic love interests). Just as she referenced a white male singer (Harry Nilsson) on “A&W,” she opts for John Denver on this particular track, making mention of his most famous single, “Rocky Mountain High.” Specifically, “I’m gonna take mine of you with me/Like ‘Rocky Mountain High’/The way John Denver sings.”

    She never elaborates on what (or even the way), exactly, it is he sings, but one can surmise it has to do with the lyrics, “And they say that he got crazy once, and he tried to touch the sun/And he lost a friend, but kept the memory.” For Del Rey’s own lyrics on “The Grants” go, “My pastor told me, ‘When you leave, all you take/Uh-huh, is your memory’/And I’m gonna take mine of you with mе.” The “I’m gonna take mine of you with me” part of the chorus comes into focus immediately at the beginning, with an intro featuring a singer correcting the “choir” (it’s a trio) she’s instructing before they proceed “for real. At first, the trio, consisting of Melodye Perry, Pattie Howard and Shikena Jones, mistakes “I’m gonna take mine of you with me” for “I’m gonna take mind of you with me.” It loosely goes back to Del Rey’s form of wordplay on “Not All Who Wander Are Lost,” when she says, “It wasn’t quite what I meaned, if you know what I mean.”

    As for Del Rey’s own personal choir of three, each woman was featured in the documentary 20 Feet From Stardom—perhaps Lana’s nod to being a “backup singer” herself in the church choir…except that she was the cantor. Even so, as the “chief singer,” she undoubtedly knows that you’re nothing without good backup (and that’s kind of what a family is, too). Seeing as how the choir life was part of the past Del Rey is reflecting on, it also makes sense that she can’t help but look to her future as well. Will it consist of “furthering” the family line, or will it be a life of quiet devotion to art? Either way, Del Rey wants to assure listeners that she’ll be spending “Eternity” with the Grants. Even if she’s convinced they might actually live forever (as all rich people think they will). For her real Daddy, Rob Grant, has been staying attuned to the scientific research surrounding the “extinction of death” for years. As Del Rey said in her Rolling Stone UK interview, “Why not have that be the focus: self-preservation. Just to stay around and see what happens, you know?” How vampiric (in fact, “Vampires” is an album concept Del Rey has surprisingly not tapped into).

    Eerily enough, it also speaks to something Del Rey said early on in her rise to fame: “When I was very young I was sort of floored by the fact that my mother and my father and everyone I knew was going to die one day, and myself too. I had a sort of a philosophical crisis. I couldn’t believe that we were mortal.” Maybe she still can’t—and doesn’t have to if this whole “extinction of death” thing is workable. Which would be a load off Lana acolyte and fellow family lover Billie Eilish’s shoulders too. Even if it would make her a liar for putting out a song called “Everybody Dies”—for that reality is actually more of a comfort to her than a phobia, remarking of the track, “I don’t know why [but] I’ve talked about it since I was a kid. It makes me happy that all things end. It’s also very sad and sentimental. This song is really just about knowing that you only have so long to do what you want, so just do it. Enjoy your life.” Del Rey is ultimately saying the same thing on “The Grants,” albeit in a far rosier package.

    With regard to others before her who couldn’t fight the reaper and “stay around,” the callouts of Harry Nilsson and John Denver on these past two singles bear an especial significance considering that the former was born in New York (i.e., Brooklyn) and had major commercial success without much touring or regular radio airplay and the latter was a lauded folk singer-songwriter billed as an emblem of the American West. Del Rey has certainly become that in the years since she correctly decided to defect from NYC in favor of Los Angeles. More and more, it’s difficult to remember a time when she could have ever been branded as a “Brooklyn Baby,” with so much of her work rooted in the inspiration she’s derived from L.A. and its outlying areas (e.g., Arcadia, Rosemead, Newport, Long Beach, et al.).

    Still, her nostalgic look at her family lineage undeniably forces her to recall that period of her existence, along with, most especially, the early years spent in a town of roughly a thousand, where, per Del Rey, “the trajectory was: school, junior college, trade school… get married?” Del Rey still has yet to cross that particular threshold, though it’s not for a lack of trying. Her trail of boyfriends far outweigh any body count Taylor Swift has, yet she manages to fly under the radar on this front largely for possessing a “mystical ordinariness,” as Rolling Stone writer Hannah Ewens calls it, that figures heavily into this particular single. A track that most other artists probably wouldn’t have chosen to be a single. And where that has served her well in the past with lengthy numbers like “Venice Bitch” and, more recently, “A&W,” it doesn’t quite carry off without a hitch in this instance.

    This is likely because of its decidedly “Christian” timbre (it’s giving “This Little Light of Mine” for sure). In point of fact, it’s the type of song one could categorize as part of the “Katy Hudson” school of rock…except far more passable as secular (and mainstream chart-ready). Because, without question, pop music is no stranger to accommodating religious tones and themes (just look at most of Madonna’s work). And Lana, too, has frequently incorporated Catholic motifs and images into her songs (and “aesthetics”) in the past. Yet something about “The Grants” is schmaltzier than all the others. Most likely attributable to the specificity of Del Rey talking about her family of origin—which is probably a topic she thought would resonate, based on another recent quote from Rolling Stone, in which she noted, “Everyone has these nuanced but specific stories that are so universal to people…” But not quite so with “The Grants.” Maybe because, in actuality, Del Rey doesn’t get specific at all, offering general terms like, “My sister’s firstborn child/I’m gonna take that too with me/My grandmother’s last smile/I’m gonna take that too with me.” Then there’s a very “Easter eggy” nod to her uncle, David Grant, who died climbing the Rocky Mountains (thus, the name-check of the John Denver song). Apart from these mentions, nothing about “The Grants” are really acknowledged, least of all their source of income prior to Lana’s fame (where’s the callout to Rob being a domain developer, huh?).

    But as for the concept of someone’s memory living on with you once they’re gone (whether through death or simply extricating themselves from your life), well, that’s fairly sweet—another song title on the record, by the way. Or maybe “bittersweet” is the word, especially for Del Rey in this case, whose now ex-boyfriend, Mike Hermosa, co-wrote the song with her. Along with another tragic number about loss and memory, “Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd.” It’s almost as if she knew it was going to end between them, based on these tracks alone. And maybe turning every relationship into a song/album is one surefire method of ensuring she can never truly be forgotten—not by her exes or the public.

    As for the reason why the subject of romantic love more often than not creeps into her work, Del Rey commented to Ewens, “Everybody finds themselves in a different way. Some people really find themselves through their work, some people find themselves through travelling. I think my basic mode is that I learn more about myself from being with people, and so when it comes to the romantic side of things, if you’re monogamous and it’s one person you’re with, you just put a lot of importance on that.” In short, she really is The Love Witch that her face is so often being superimposed over (much to Samantha Robinson’s annoyance). So it is that even on a track supposedly about her nuclear family/lineage, Del Rey references her failed relationships in lines like, “So you say there’s a chance for us/Should I do a dance for once?/You’re a family man, but/But…”

    The incompleteness of that sentence touches on Del Rey’s Sylvia Plath-oriented fear/metaphor about the figs on the fig tree. If she chooses the life of wife and mother, will she be forced to lose her career? The thing that drives her, ostensibly, more than anything. And yet, knowing that fame is fickle, at best, Del Rey increasingly wonders if she should secure her legacy in some other lasting way—by continuing the Grant lineage. This, too, is addressed on “Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd,” when she asks, “When’s it gonna be my turn?” A bold demand for any white person to make, in their inherent position of privilege, but Del Rey seems to be suggesting that the sight of all friends and siblings making their own families has her pondering when (or if) she’ll be next. To that end, it becomes harder to be so “choosy” about her boyfriend du moment, asking whoever it is, “Do you think about Heaven?/Do you think about me?” (because, apparently, Del Rey views herself as Heaven—e.g., “Say yes to heaven/Say yes to me”).

    And yet…obviously, she remains particular as ever. Perhaps it’s all part of the latent eternal commitment to/battle with art over family (see: The Fabelmans). More precisely, the obligation most feel to perpetuate their family line. But because of Del Rey’s unique position as a “cultural icon,” she’s already technically done more than any of her other breeding siblings possibly could to ensure “eternal” clout. Or has she? For the only thing that means more to society than fame, particularly where women are concerned, is spawning. That is, indeed, why more and more pop icons are doing just that where once it never would have been a consideration that they could “have both”—the family and the career. The expectation formerly being that once a woman reaches “a certain age,” she hangs up fame to have kids. Not so anymore. Hence, the likes of Rihanna and Beyoncé expanding their broods, as the latter sings things like, “My great-great-grandchildren already rich/That’s a lot of brown churrin on your Forbes list/Frolickin’ around my compound on my fortress.” But one gets the sense Del Rey wouldn’t be as “gung-ho” about continuing with singing if she surrendered to la vita di famiglia. That she would instead devote herself entirely to said “purpose.” And, lest anyone forget, she did once claim, to Kim Kardashian of all people, that if she hadn’t become a singer, she might have pursued becoming a doula (because, sure, that’s the natural fallback career).

    With Del Rey entering a new decade in a few years, however, perhaps the thought of losing out on her chance to have children is on the brain more and more. And how it might ultimately be more “fulfilling” than persisting in relying on “artistry”—ergo, fame—alone. Incidentally, it’s Kesha who freshly wrote as her bio, “There’s a fine line between famous and being forgot” (these being lyrics to an upcoming song of hers). With a child or two, being forgotten becomes impossible. And when Del Rey sings, “I’m doing it for us” on “The Grants” (having already noted as much on “Get Free,” when she announced, “I’m doing it for all of us”), one ponders whether she means she’s holding fast to her career for the sake of the “us” that comprises herself and her fans in a parasocial relationship with her, or if it refers to the “us” that comprises herself and the rest of the Grants, in terms of choosing to “propagate their species.”

    Whatever she ends up “choosing” (or perhaps having it all), the self-reflection process is made apparent on that road to deciding via “The Grants.” But that still doesn’t make the track “single-worthy.”

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link

  • Did You Know That Lana Del Rey Wouldn’t Give Us A Song Without A Bit of L.A. History To It?, Or: “Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd”

    Did You Know That Lana Del Rey Wouldn’t Give Us A Song Without A Bit of L.A. History To It?, Or: “Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd”

    Having recently cited Harry Nilsson’s “Coconut” as one of her all-time favorite songs, maybe it should come as no shock that Lana Del Rey has sampled herself un petit peu Nilsson for the latest song in her repertoire, “Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd.” Note that it’s not a question, so much as a statement of fact—because Del Rey has little time to endure people without at least some cursory knowledge of L.A. geography (remember, her body is a map of L.A.). So yes, once more turning to her great muse, California, the Ocean Boulevard alluded to is the one in Long Beach. And the tunnel in question is the Jergins Tunnel, built in 1927 to connect to the Jergins Trust Building, in addition to providing safe pedestrian access for those who wanted to get to the beach without being run over by the barrage of cars Los Angeles County is known for.

    Within that tunnel, the amount of foot traffic was great enough to warrant vendors setting up shop there (calling it the Jergins Arcade) to pluck business from some four thousand visitors an hour crossing the intersection of Ocean and Pine on the weekend to get to the beach. But, as is the way with big city infrastructure, some poor decisions were made vis-à-vis preservation and, around 1967, the tunnel was closed. Twentyish years later, in 1988, the Jergins Trust Building was demolished, signaling what many rightly believed was the total demise of Long Beach’s once flourishing Downtown.

    But maybe, with Lana’s Midas touch when it comes to drawing attention to things, the Jergins Tunnel might get its day in the sun, so to speak, anew. Moved by people and architecture of the past, Del Rey combines her nostalgia for both in this first single from her album of the same name (which still doesn’t give “hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have – but i have it” a run for its money in word length). Indeed, an opening line from a 1992 Los Angeles Times article about the tunnel could just as easily fit right into the song—with journalist Suzan Schill remarking, “Waiting to be restored or sealed forever, a long-forgotten Art Deco pedestrian tunnel lies beneath Ocean Boulevard at Pine Avenue.” And yes, Lana also has a song called “Art Deco,” so really, the Jergins Tunnel touches on all her inspirational kryptonite points.

    Plus, her affinity for Long Beach was already established on 2019’s “The Greatest,” which opens with the line, “I miss Long Beach and I miss you, babe.” And apparently, the Long Beach she misses is the one of yore. Just like most of the bygone icons and aesthetics she has tried to keep alive by embedding them consistently into her work. This includes rather regular allusions to The Eagles (as she mentioned on 2015’s “God Knows I Tried”), who come up again in the lyrics, “Thеre’s a girl that sings ‘Hotel California’/Not because she loves the notes or sounds that sound like Florida/It’s because she’s in a world preserved, only a few have found the door.” “The door” to that closed-off tunnel under Ocean Boulevard, a portal to the past. When surfer dudes and dudettes only worried about getting high by the beach and working on their tan as they languished on the sand or even headed to the Pike, an “amusement zone” that Lana would probably liken to Coney Island.

    Alas, in yet another instance of poor decision-making by Long Beach city council, the consensus was reached not to renew the amusement zone’s land leases, prompting total demolishment of the beloved area in 1979. Eventually, it became retail outlets (ergo rebranded as the Pike Outlets) with shit like H&M and a Nike store to numb the memory. Making it very easy to forget about what it once was indeed.

    Which is why the entire concept of this particular time period in Long Beach history is so ideal to make the analogy, “Don’t forget me/Like the tunnel under Ocean Boulevard.” However, now that Del Rey has canonized it in song form, there’s no doubt the Jergins Tunnel will probably, at the very least, finally get an official Wikipedia page (and maybe even some love from LBC hometown hero Cameron Diaz). Shit, it could even galvanize the “China-owned, Seattle-based developer” known as American Life that’s been slated to open a massive hotel on the property since seemingly “forever.”

    As though speaking from the perspective of the tunnel itself, Del Rey demands, “When’s it gonna be my turn?/Don’t forget me/When’s it gonna be my turn?” Of course, she is also talking about herself in terms of finding a real love, everlasting. Prompting her to then get extremely 2012/2013-era Lana with the demand, “Open me up, tell me you like it/Fuck me to death, love me until I love myself.” If that isn’t a line straight out of an L.A. girl’s mouth, then nothing is. To be sure, Del Rey has proven herself a more bona fide resident of that town than even the ones born and bred there (*cough cough* Billie Eilish). This comes complete with the poetic ode, “LA Who Am I To Love You.”

    No stranger to mentioning other L.A.-loving icons, Del Rey adds Nilsson’s moniker to the likes of James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, Billie Holiday, Dennis Wilson, Joan Baez and Joni Mitchell. All names that have the commonality of twentieth century nostalgia. Nilsson himself gets name-checked when Del Rey croons, “Harry Nilsson has a song [“Don’t Forget”], his voice breaks at 2:05/Somethin’ about the way he says, ‘Don’t forget me’ makes me feel like/I just wish I had a friend like him, someone to give me five.” It all speaks to Lana once saying that everyone she ever looked up to or admired was dead. Dead as the Jergins Tunnel. “Handmade beauty sealed up by two man-made walls,” as Del Rey bemoans (using a similar conceit of herself as a human extension L.A. that she did in “Arcadia”—this time by saying, “Mosaic ceilings, painted tiles on the wall/I can’t help but feel somewhat like my body, mind, my soul”).

    In that aforementioned Los Angeles Times article that could also occasionally double as Del Rey lyrics, Schill concludes, “To the distress of historians, the empty passageway remains neglected, silently awaiting its fate.” One can now add, “To the distress of historians, Lana Del Rey and LDR stans…” to that sentence. Whatever happens to it next, its beauty being perpetually masked from the world feels like an all but assured enduring phenomenon. And yet, thanks to Del Rey’s roving track, even those who have never been to Long Beach can get a sense of this tunnel’s entrancing effect in all its yesteryear glory.

    Genna Rivieccio

    Source link