SuppliedLana Del Rey
Honeymoon
Interscope
lanadelrey.com
Think original Alice in Wonderland meets a dingy jazz bar where everyone is high. This most accurately describes Lana Del Rey’s newest album Honeymoon, which was released last week. Del Rey’s airy vocals, muffled percussion, and excessive use of reverb all contribute to a ghostly ambiance that makes the album beautifully haunting. Close your eyes during “Music to Watch Boys to” and picture Alice wandering around the dark forest just as she meets the Cheshire Cat—better yet, throw the movie on and mute it while grooving to Lana. It’s like they were made for each other. The piano-heavy tracks contribute to the sexy jazz atmosphere, while the lonely electric guitar in “God Knows I Tried” sounds like it belongs in a grunge rendition of “Hallelujiah.”
Although she tries to diversify the album by mixing simplistic tracks carried by just one or two instruments with more electronically dominated songs, her sombre tone stitches them all together making the whole album seem a bit repetitive. Del Rey pushes the boundaries of what it means to have a cohesive sound by bordering at times on homogeneity, meaning that by the end of the album the songs blur into each other and none really end up sticking out.
On the whole, Del Rey presents an eerily beautiful sound that is intriguing for about four songs. After that, Honeymoon is still lovely, but doesn’t offer anything new. That being said it probably still deserves a spot in your music collection — somewhere between Pure Heroine and 1989. You may not be able to listen to the whole album at once without wanting to spend the rest of your life in a cave, but it’s great music for a bath in the dark, a lonely dinner in the dark, or really anything sad happening in the dark.
