Lana Del Rey

Lust for Life

The ageless 32-year-old arrived at a languid sound, a detached authorial voice and a set of obsessions on her 2012 debut Born to Die, and her fourth album remains true to them all.

Part love story and part political parable, it’s her most complex, linear and ambitious record to date; one that demands to be listened to from swaying start to folky finish.

Since the drastically superior Paradise Edition reissue of Born to Die, Del Rey has neither swayed nor settled. Instead, doubling down on her palette of inky blues and blacks, the singer-songwriter has delivered a trio of dark, dense, radio-agnostic albums that stand wholly apart from any of her pop music peers.

Lust For Life espouses the strengths of simplicity and modernity: Its beats are subtle hip-hop twitches or electro-pop swells, with percussion redolent of faraway fireworks booms or mellifluous melodic washes.

If the signature style of America’s 21-century chanteuse isn’t your cup of tea, then steer clear of her fourth album Lust for Life. But if you count yourself among Del Rey’s disciples, get excited. Lust for Life is a whole lotta Lana.

Lust for Life, Lana Del Rey's most ambitious album to date, is a sprawling contemplation of her aesthetic and its various dissonances.

Shying away from the big riffs of 2013's Ultraviolence and the glossy noise of 2015's Honeymoon, Lust for Life is almost like a fan service album, solidifying the idea of Del Rey as a trapped-in-space pop star of yore who happened to touch down in Los Angeles in the era of streaming music and sponsored afterparties.

Compared to her previous albums, especially its somnolent 2015 predecessor, Honeymoon, Lust for Life is positively ebullient in tone, if not in tempo.

I never expected that Lana Del Rey’s voice would be one of reassurance. Lust For Life is still her, the Best God Bless American Girl, but with her inner well-being coming together just as the United States affective sphere is coming apart, her fixed position feels more a lantern now than a siren.

Lust for Life postures itself above all as Lana Del Rey’s most optimistic, political, and globally conscious record to date. Much in the same way that Katy Perry has begun making so-called “purposeful pop”, here Del Rey questions her role as a musician in ushering in a better world.

Since Lizzy Grant emerged as Lana Del Rey back in 2012, she's been donning the trope of the Hollywood starlet with a darkness surrounding her. On Lust For Life, to some degree that gloom has lifted: it's perhaps for the first time we're really seeing the Lizzy behind the Lana.

No matter how deserving Lana is of accreditation, and how close she is to true vindication, less than half of the tunes on Lust for Life are worthy of Born to Die, Paradise, Ultraviolence, or Honeymoon, despite the handful of very promising singles that would make you think otherwise.

Lust For Life may be a scattered, confusing record, but it's a beautiful ride—one worth repeated listens, even if Lana's intentions—like her enunciation—aren't always clear.

The optimism of Lust For Life is a pleasant surprise, though the album is still painted in the same shades as Del Rey’s previous releases. At times it’s some of her best material, but it seems like a record best experienced in pieces than as a proper whole.

While Lust for Life might be Lana Del Rey's weakest attempt at reconciling her old school and new school influences, it's also the first time I've come away from one of her albums with more highlights than lowlights.

Lana Del Rey’s Lust for Life may well be the funniest piece of post-ironic conceptualist performance art project you’re likely to hear this year.