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Friday, September 18, 2015

LP Review | Lana Del Rey - Honeymoon

Lana Del Rey
Honeymoon
Interscope / Polydor
Release date: September 18, 2015

By Shawal Ras


 Queen of the sad sad world, Lana Del Rey, returns to her former trip hop and baroque pop fusion element with her fourth studio effort, Honeymoon.

After achieving success with her major second studio album, Born to Die (seven million copies sold after 2012, she’s also 2014’s most-streamed artist in Spotify), Lana teamed-up with Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys and released her most praised effort yet, Ultraviolence, which debuted atop Billboard 200 last year.

Inspired from the dark side of the American dream, Honeymoon, Lana's fourth major release, sees the singer making a slight U-turn to her Born to Die days with a hint of confidence we heard throughout Ultraviolence.

The album kicks off with the title track, which we’ve reviewed a few months ago, followed by ‘Music to Watch Boys To’, ‘Terence Loves You’ (a tragic Hollywood love story), and ‘High By the Beach’.

‘Freak’, the sixth track in the CD, is one of my favs from the album. Heavily influenced with trip hop genre, the song reminds me a lot of that sexy rock-ish feel I got from ‘West Coast’ and let’s talk about that line “we can slow dance to rock music, kiss while we do it, talk till we both turn blue” – ah, that’s pretty hot.

Another striking cut from the album is ‘Religion’. Lana sings about worshipping her man like it’s a cult and just like ‘Freak’, it is deliriously and seductively hot. "When I'm down on my knees, you're how I pray," Lana sings, leaving everything to your wet imagination.

In the 10th track, Lana turns it up with some mood for Italian with ‘Salvatore’. “And I've been waiting for you all this time I adore you, can't you see, you're meant for me?,” Lana sings, giving me chills. Honestly, I can already imagine a gloomy old world video surrounding the idea of a love story set in the 1700’s Italy.

Other than the obvious few I’ve mentioned above, I’m loving ‘God Knows I Tried’, 'Art Deco', ‘The Blackest Day’, and ‘Swan Song’. As much I'd love to say I j'adore this album, forgettable tracks like 'Terence Loves You' and '24' can go.

And continuing with the tradition she did in Paradise and Ultraviolence, Honeymoon ends with a cover and this time, it's Nina Simone’s important jazz cut, ‘Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood’.

Is this a step up from Ultraviolence? Hmm, not really. But, as one of the few Lana Del Rey massive (literally – look at me!) fans in Malaysia, I can safely say we’re all loving this. Ultraviolence is good, yes, but it is nothing compared to the originality that came with Born to Die, and Honeymoon is certainly Lana’s triumphant return to her former glory.


Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.