Tag Archives: lana del rey

Top Five Most Anticipated Albums of 2023

1 Feb

Gorillaz – Cracker Island

Everyone’s favorite digital multi-media band has been teasing their new album Cracker Island since last year, with the release of the eponymous title track that quite caught our fancy. They followed that up with the wonderful “New Gold” featuring Tame Impala, and last month’s classic-Gorillaz, mellow track Baby Queen. As with all Gorillaz albums, Cracker Island is shrouded in a mysterious backstory – this one seeming to involve a cult headed by the band’s “bassist” Murdoc Niccals. Although we would have also been happy with Song Machine Vol. 2, we’re certainly joining in on the anticipation for the full-length Cracker Island, set to release on February 24th.

Jessie Ware – TBA

English singer Jessie Ware’s delectable disco outing What’s Your Pleasure was much-loved in 2020, and she followed it up with the pulsating “Free Yourself” in July of last year. Word on the street is that “Free Yourself” marks the beginning of a new era ahead of her fifth studio album – we can’t wait.

Cardi B – TBA

Yes, we put Cardi on the list last year too. But this time, we have definitive news – Cardi mentioned on the popular radio show The Breakfast Club last month that she pretty much has no choice but to release the album this year. 

Dua Lipa – TBA 

After the worldwide critical and commercial success of her Future Nostalgia album in March 2020 (what a time that was…), Dua apparently hasn’t taken much time off. Joe Kentish, head of A&R for Dua’s label Warner Records, mentioned way back in 2021 that she was “talking about album No.3 when we barely had No.2 done” – hopefully we’ll see the fruits of that soon.

Rihanna – TBA

Rihanna gave birth less than a year ago, but she’s not letting that stop her. She’s back in the news over the past few months – first and foremost, as the Super Bowl half-time show performer in February. She also released a new song (“Lift Me Up”) after many years, on the Black Panther: Wakanda Forever soundtrack – narrowly missing out on a Golden Globe award for it too. Here’s hoping she can ride the momentum to the finish line for her 9th album.

Other notable mentions

  • Lana Del Rey is set to release her new album entitled Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd on March 24th. She released the album’s gauzy, dreamy title track last month – check it out.
  • Miley Cyrus announced the release of her 8th studio album Endless Summer Vacation, apparently an ode to the city of Los Angeles and its year-round balmy weather. The album is set to drop on March 10th, and new track “Flowers” has just been released as the first single.
  • Sam Smith’s new album Gloria released on January 27th, and he’s already scored the hit song “Unholy” (featuring German singer Kim Petras) ahead of the album drop.

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Lana Del Rey – Chemtrails Over The Country Club

5 Apr

So much of art rests on thin margins. Lana Del Rey has made a career out of evocative music, music that conjures a lot out of a few scattered pieces. This understatement was the core of her appeal. With Chemtrails Over The Country Club, the insubstantialness finally takes over and the magic just doesn’t hold and the result is hollow instead.

The biggest failure here is just the music. LDR was always languorous, but here the album is simply mired in tar. She has moved away from the hip-hop that underpinned her debut and suffers for the loss of energy that came with it and her stabs at punk rock are inexecrable. I respect that she loves Joan, so do we all, but the rest of us know to keep our imitations to the privacy of bathroom walls.

Normally, she is cinematic enough with her music that its magnitude gives it momentum. Here, the music is flimsy. The moments of pace and energy that dotted her previous work are completely missing here. Even more damningly though, the album just has far too little emotion.

It does manage some highlights. The title track is quite good and I love the drums at the end and the repeated “My Cancer is sun and my Leo is moon.” “Yosemite” is absolutely gorgeous and there’s a wonderful little Spanish string tilt in there. “White Dress” has the amazing “Men In Music Business Conference,” which I dearly wish she had expanded on more.

It’s a shame that the rest has nowhere near the same quality. Despite “Breaking Up Slowly” being her comfort zone and despite the brilliance of “Are these my good years, or do I have none?/Are there really good years for everyone?”, the song has no substance to it. It’s okay to be vague if you allude to something interesting, and the premise of this song is not. Even so, it’s substantially better than “Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost” or “For Free.” These are unnecessary songs which traffic in the most uninteresting cliches and do so in the most boring manner.

Norman Fucking Rockwell was excellent and showed Lana Del Rey as so much more than just her debut album. This album adds nothing to her legacy. With any luck, we’ll remember this as nothing more than an unfortunate speedbump, but it’s more likely that we just will not remember it at all.

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Monthly Playlist – Apr. 2020

28 Apr

We say this almost every month, but April 2020 was truly one of the best months of music that we’ve ever been through. There was, of course, Fiona Apple’s universally-lauded Fetch the Bolt Cutters; on the very same day, English pop star Rina Sawayama released what is easily the best debut album since Invasion of Privacy (2018). We even got new tracks from reclusive acts like The Strokes and Jamie xx. Read on for a round-up of the best five songs from this month.

5. “Young and Beautiful” by Glass Animals

This is technically not a new song, but we love Glass Animals’ gauzy cover of Lana del Rey’s “Young and Beautiful”, released as part of a growing collection called, fittingly, Quarantine Covers. Dave Bayley’s spindly, whispery voice and bare production lends itself perfectly to the track – the result being a fresh yet respectful cover of a truly classic song.

As a bonus, check out another song in Quarantine Covers – a hypnotic take on Nirvana’s “Heart-Shaped Box”.

4. “Shameika” by Fiona Apple

 Fiona Apple has had a sparse but monumental career, spanning five increasingly unrestrained albums from her debut Tidal (1995) to Fetch the Bolt Cutters (2020). This latest album currently enjoys an unprecedented perfect score on Metacritic. Is it worth the fawning all-round praise? Somewhat – but not entirely (see our in-depth review here).

Perhaps the most widely-shareable song on the album is “Shameika”, a rollicking tale about schoolgirl Fiona getting some tough love from a slightly older girl. The eponymous Shameika tells Fiona that she has potential, and Fiona uses that mantra to get through the bullying and boredom of middle-school life. We particularly love the rolling piano and Fiona’s jazzy storytelling on this track. Fiona recently shared that Shameika, indeed, turned out to be a real person (and not a figment of her imagination as she initially thought), so that’s cool too.

3. “Brooklyn Bridge to Chorus” by The Strokes

On April 10th, the Strokes released their much-awaited sixth album and thankfully, it lived up to expectations. The presciently-named The New Abnormal (in-depth review here) certainly featured some new direction for the band, but there were also some classic, old-school Strokes tracks. The fun and catchy “Brooklyn Bridge to Chorus” falls squarely in the later category. Kicked off by a bouncy, synth-heavy riff, the song features Julian Casablancas singing about the good old days over feel-good guitar work from Albert Hammond Jr. and Nick Valensi. It’s just a great tune.

2. “Idontknow” by Jamie xx

“Idontknow”, a new single from English producer and DJ Jamie Smith (and one-half of The xx), is a revelation in its sheer use of beats. The track starts off with almost African-like beats that are sure to get you tapping along with some part of your body. Just when you think that’s all there is to it, the track ramps up into overdrive at approximately the 78-second mark. And when we say overdrive, we are not joking. The beats double in speed, and Jamie Smith expertly overlays mysterious vocals snippets, with the effect being a frenetic, craze-inducing romper of a track. It’s addictive in its simplicity, and we highly recommend it.

1. “XS” by Rina Sawayama

It may seem like Japanese-British pop singer Rina Sawayama comes to us fully-formed, but the 29-year-old has been working on her sound for some time. She had a couple of well-received tracks between 2013 and 2016, followed by a self-produced mini-album in 2017. This month, she finally released her official debut album – the eponymous SAWAYAMA – and it was well worth the build-up.

Sawayama’s sound is a beguiling mix of late-90s pop (think Britney and Mariah) and early 2000s moody rock (think Evanescence): nostalgic in its components parts but wholly original in its combination. The best song this month was definitely “XS”, a commentary on late-stage capitalism with a killer pop hook (we told you it’s original). “Luxury and opulence, Cartiers and Tesla X’s / Calabasas, I deserve it,” says Rina, before begging for “just a little bit more, little bit of excess”. Even if you don’t listen to the words in detail, you just can’t miss the pop sounds from the millennial Rina’s 90s / early 00s childhood.

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Lana Del Rey – Norman Fucking Rockwell!

7 Oct

To some degree, you know what you’re going to get with each new Lana Del Rey album. Actually, to a very large degree, you know what you’re going to get with a new LDR album. She’s taken her aesthetic of Hollywood sadcore and mined it thoroughly, albeit skillfully. There’s a grab-bag of images that come with any of her albums and they are the same fast cars, Gatsby, bad relationships, Hollywood glamour, nostalgia, Los Angeles style that you should expect by now. However, this iteration is her at her best. She’s brought a sharpness here that’s unprecedented and delivered one of the strongest albums of the year.

The opening track drops the one-liner “Your poetry’s bad and you blame the news” with a wonderful casualness and follows it later with the clever and scathing stanza “Goddamn, man-child / You act like a kid even though you stand six foot two / Self-loathing poet, resident Laurel Canyon know-it-all / You talk to the walls when the party gets bored of you / But I don’t get bored, I just see it through / Why wait for the best when I could have you? You?” and has an interesting pause for breath before the second you, before she cuts loose to sing it and this expertly transitions the song from the storytelling to the music. The schtick of the self-aware, submissive woman is becoming a little too routine, but she has mostly has the chops to still pull it off.

However, it falls apart for the less expert of her songs. “Mariners Apartment Complex” has a couple of very sharp lines (like the opening pair of “You took my sadness out of context / At the Mariners Apartment Complex) but it just doesn’t do enough of anything. It starts out with very strong storytelling, but then doesn’t deliver on it and is too laid back musically. Similarly, “Love song” is trite both musically and lyrically. “Cinnamon Girl” and “How to disappear” at least save themselves from the hyper-dramatization of the storylines with very well done music.

In the same way, “Bartender” manages to overcome the self-indulgence of the story with the fact that it’s just excellent music. Her voice works very well against the piano and song’s minimalism works very well. Unfortunately, it’s sandwiched by “The greatest”, which is just air and “Happiness is a butterfly”, which is as self-indulgent as “Bartender” but not as skilled. Mostly however, her missteps are saved by her ability to make very good music. “Doin’ time” is a fascinating cover and manages to match the album’s aesthetic, but is still incomprehensible as it is neither clever in itself nor as a part of the whole. It sounds good though. Her voice does a real number on the song.

When things come together though, the album really shines. The aforementioned title track is able to match her A-game lyricism with strong music and she is able to pull off the complete package fairly regularly. The trip-hop opening of “Fuck it I love you” is very strong and then she picks up the pace just to let it drop as she croons the chorus. Her lyrics are razor sharp as well. She’s pushes complex thoughts and detailed pictures with a remarkable economy of actual words.

“California” is the LDR aesthetic at its best. It has awkward slang, doomed relationships and space for her voice and the result delivers on the promise. Similarly, “The Next Best American Record” puts everything together.
The true highlight though is the single “Venice Bitch.” It’s slow, woozy dream pop done very, very well. It’s effortlessly ethereal and it’s got that good American imagery that she thrives on. It plays hard on the sadness of Americana and finds space for an amazing electric guitar squeal in the middle. It really does it all.

The album finishes with “hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have – but I have it.” It’s a shockingly risky song to make. It’s stripped down too far for comfort and that puts a lot of weight on the song and you can see it buckle under that weight repeatedly. However, the distillation of the song, the album and her entire body of work into the couplet “Hope is a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have / But I have it” is extremely powerful and done beautifully by her.

Norman Fucking Rockwell! is not an album without flaws, and it’s starting to feel like those flaws will follow Lana Del Rey for her entire career, but it is nonetheless excellent. When she puts all the pieces together with the skill that she can sometimes summon, she makes music as good as any out there and this album has no shortage of those moments.

– @murthynikhil

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Monthly Playlist: Sep. 2019

1 Oct

We’re back with another edition of Monthly Playlist! Read on to see the five songs that caught our gaze this month:

5. “Whitsand Bay” by Metronomy

“Whitsand Bay” is an interesting track from English electronic five-piece Metronomy’s sixth studio album, Metronomy Forever. There seems to be a duopoly of emotions at play here. On one hand, the upbeat cymbals and pulsing bass line march the song snappily along. On the other, the melancholic, slightly-above-mumble-volume vocals cast the mood down. What results is an engrossing, vivid landscape of sounds that really catches one’s attention from first listen. Metronomy Forever released earlier this month – do give it a whirl.

4. “Context” by Temples

We’ll admit, we hadn’t heard of English rockers Temples before “Context”. However, through the inscrutable power of Spotify playlists, we were sent this song on a silver platter, and we are now converts to the cause. On “Context”, Temples present a dreamy, slow-burning sound that lies somewhere between Tame Impala and the Beatles. And as you may expect from that description, the song offers its fair share of mysticism. “Fool, carry the wise / Are you divine?” goes the catchy chorus, before delving into a more mysterious couplet: “Are you afraid of being defined? / When you put it context, it makes sense.” Not sure that it does – but this is definitely a great track, lyrics aside. Temples’ third album, Hot Motion, released earlier this week; be sure to check it out if you liked this song!

3. “Psycho” by slowthai and Denzel Curry

From the first few seconds of the song, it’s easy to see where “Psycho” gets its name. Ghastly squeals clash maddeningly against what seem to be a pulp-horror-movie soundtrack, spurring the listener into palpable chaos – and that’s even before a word is said. Great production meets some knife-sharp verses on this ripper of a track from British rap star slowthai and American rapper Denzel Curry.

 Our favorite line on this track, from slowthai’s verse, is a kaleidoscope of emotion: “Spliff is exhaust, I put your friend in the morgue / Olympics, I run with the torch / mum should’ve pressed the abort”. In just one sentence, slowthai veers from braggadocio about a giant spliff (which can be used as an Olympic torch shortly after putting someone to death to boot) to unapologetic self-hatred; it’s either madness or genius, and the line between those blurs quite often. “Psycho” is an exhilarating roller-coaster, and we highly recommend. (Also, if you liked this track, do check out our review of slowthai’s debut album.)

2. “Don’t Call Me Angel” by Ariana Grande, Miley Cyrus and Lana del Rey

Regular readers of Top Five Records are well-aware of our enduring love for saccharine (but immaculately-produced!) pop songs; the likes of Ariana Grande and Marina & the Diamonds have long entranced us. Well, we are unashamed to proclaim our love for this song from the upcoming Charlie’s Angels reboot (which we are sure will be a flop – our love of the saccharine sadly does not extend to the silver screen).

Each of the three superstars on this track excel with a memorable, iconic verse. The merry-go-round-gone-awry sounds at the outset make way to a characteristically-husky verse from resident bad-girl Miley Cyrus – say what you will about her, but girl’s got killer attitude. Ariana Grande churns out an effortlessly powerful verse. Lana del Rey, in the limelight recently due to a fantastic new album, brings up the rear with a heady, R&B-tinged section.

The stand-out star on this track, though, is not Ariana nor Miley nor Lana – it’s the production. The three ladies’ styles and tones are seamlessly matched, both with each other and against a beat that just slaps. It’s a great track.

1. “The Runner” Foals

Foals have been blessing us time and time again this year. The Oxford four-piece rock outfit released a fantastic fifth studio album, Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost – Part 1, just months ago (read our review here); and, happily, the second part of the double-album is set to release in October this year. “The Runner” is the first song from the upcoming album – and judging from what we have here, it looks like 2019 is truly Foals’ year.

From the hard-hitting opening riff to lead singer Yannis Philippakis’ ringing vocals, “The Runner” is pure Foals through and through. Like almost all Foals songs, the song is meticulously arranged – each layer of each section seem to be exactly where it needs to be. Philippakis’ wandering, emotive chorus is especially well-placed against solidly-measured drums and guitars.

In our opinion, Foals have been underrated on the global scale their entire career. While they’ve been fairly well-recognized in their native England – thrice-nominated for “Best Album” at the prestigious Mercury Prize awards – it’s a shame that they don’t enjoy the same household-name status everywhere. Hopefully, with the double-wallop of Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost, Foals will make their mark in indelible ink.

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Monthly Playlist: May 2019

1 Jun

What a month May has been for great music. Stalwarts made a strong mark, with Vampire Weekend releasing a highly-lauded fourth studio album and Tyler the Creator releasing a fifth – and his best-rated – record. Newcomers, too, blew it out of the water: notably, British rapper slowthai and relative newbie Jamila Woods, who has put out one of the best albums of the year. With all this great music, we really had our work cut out this month picking five great songs to share: but here goes.

5. “We Belong Together” by Vampire Weekend feat. Danielle Haim

As longtime readers would know, anything with one of the Haim sisters is almost always alright in our books. “We Belong Together” – the second Danielle Haim collab from Vampire Weekend’s fifth album, Father of the Bride – is a great, old-school duet love song with a quintessentially-Ezra-Koenig melancholy twist. Black and white, day and night, left and right, bowls and plates – Koenig and Haim list off the timeless and kitschy ways pairs the two lovers belong together. But wait, what’s this? “Baby, there’s no use in being clever / Baby, it don’t mean we’ll stay together,” they say, on a sugary-light bop, following it up with a devastating “We go together like lions and lambs / Oh, we go together”. This is another irresistibly great song from what has been a solid album front to back. Look out for a full review of FOTB from us soon – until then, take a listen through this track (and the other we’ve covered in our playlists!).

4. “Doin’ Time” by Lana del Rey

Speaking of melancholy crooners, the absolute queen of mournful murmuring is back. Lana del Rey has announced a new album in 2019 (the brilliantly-named Norman Fucking Rockwell), and “Doin’ Time” gives us a good taste of the excellent things to come. A cover of the ska / punk band Sublime’s 1996 single – and itself sampling the jazz standard “Summertime” – “Doin’ Time” is a head-fake that starts off like a cheery hit and segues into an adult-contemporary drive through Lana’s, well, sublime vocals. The result, as you may expect from a story about feeling trapped by an unfaithful partner, is a mixture between fuzzy contemplation and spiky regret. More to come from Lana this year, and we couldn’t be more pumped.

3. “Record Collection” by Kaiser Chiefs

In another throwback to the mid-aughts, Kaiser Chiefs are back with “Record Collection”, a song that’s basically an updated version of every one of your favorite songs from your high school years (think Killers, Franz Ferdinand, Kaiser Chiefs themselves, and so on). According to lead singer Ricky Wilson, the band recorded their seventh studio album Duck, slated for July 26th (featuring this new track) after going back and reminiscing over their own first few records. You can hear it too: after a forgettable couple of records in the middle, Kaiser Chiefs finally sound rejuvenated. A thick bassline and poppy drums elevate Wilson’s vocoder-style vocals on “Record Collection”, and the song is peppered with the sort of supple hooks that made “Ruby” all the rage more than a decade ago. (Has it really been that long?!) With “Record Collection”, it looks like we have yet another great summer album to await – mark your calendars!

2. “Vacancy” by Havelock

With so many releases from well-known artists this month, it’s easy to miss tracks like “Vacancy”, the second track (ever) by English singer Havelock. But, wow, are we glad we didn’t miss it – and we are so happy to recommend it to our readers, too. “Vacancy” tells a tale well-known by young people around the world – hustling until you make it, with an end in mind but not in sight. Beyond his chill vocals and the warmth of the production, what Havelock really cracks is that clever yet effortless turn of phrase. In fact, there’s a line on here that we loved so much that we’ll transcribe it here in full: “’Cause you got a brand-new vacancy, and I want to join the agency; I hope that it can give me something that I could hold, somewhere that I could go, without working to the bone: can you give me that?,” he asks; achingly poetic in his naivety. “My snooze is on repeat / I know I’d better wake up or I’ll wake up in the streets” goes another splendid couplet. We haven’t been this excited for a new artist in a long time – and we hope you feel the same way, too. (If you liked this tune, you’ll love “Pig Latin”, his debut single.)

1. “Inglorious” by slowthai, feat. Skepta

From an arrangement standpoint, “Inglorious” has a very simple layout: a short intro, followed by a verse by slowthai and the hook, followed by another verse by Skepta and the hook. But what happens in those five parts may well have changed the topography of British rap. Of course, Skepta is already famous; his unapologetic display of British culture – in a genre dominated by American culture – has placed him on a 2017 list of the most influential people in the UK. On “Inglorious”, his talents and persona are put to the best possible collaborative use with newcomer – and inevitable star – slowthai. A dreamlike intro leads into one of the best beat drops we’ve heard all year, along with a volley of British-isms and descriptions of struggle (“Remember when they wouldn’t let me in / Now their wages just a day’s per diem”). “Inglorious” features on slowthai’s debut album, Nothing Great About Britain, which is honestly one of the best albums we’ve heard all year. Listen to “Inglorious” – if you like it, you’re in for a treat for the rest of the album.

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Lana Del Rey: Ultraviolence

23 Jun

I enjoyed Lana Del Rey’s 2012 album Born to Die. It was over-stylized and a little too easy to digest, but nevertheless good, intriguing music. Even if it painted in cliché, the album itself made an interesting whole and the pictures it drew were unique, if not wholly novel. Additionally, it was highly consistent and coherent, both of which are necessary for something that tries to be new. Ultimately though, the album failed to live up to its breakout single “Video Games” and similarly her second album Ultraviolence fails to live up to Born to Die.

The album starts well. The title track is a wonderful trip into her world. There is all of the theater that defines her work, the sounds and imagery writ large for none to miss. When she does well, she can do very well. Her voice drifts languorously through exquisite soundscapes. It’s hard to find music quite as evocative as her best.

Sadly, that doesn’t sustain long enough and the album collapses a little on itself. Her pose starts to feel tired and the album devolves in places to mere emotional hooks instead of actual statements. Additionally, the lyrics are bad enough to break the mood in places. I don’t really need her crooning that she’s a bad girl and the ending of “Brooklyn Baby” is so painfully obvious that actually saying it is just crude.

The album does sound quite different than Born to Die. This is slower and less catchy, but more rich and atmospheric, more theatrical. This is still very clearly a Lana Del Rey album though and there are not enough of those around. No one else makes pop that sounds like hers. All told, this is a quite reasonable album and she does get points for uniqueness, but this is still nothing more than reasonable.

– @murthynikhil

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