Norman Fucking Rockwell!
by Lana Del Rey

From corenfro TOP 100 COMMENTER 09/05/2019 14:51 | #242235 | TOP COMMENT Vote up your preferred comments and the comments with the most votes will be flagged.

Guys, I know it's been a slow year for major label music but let's calm down a little. Yes it's very good and frankly a little surprising. Lana was already an artist who I think a lot of people anticipated had a ceiling . She definitely breaks through the ceiling - but best of the decade?? Maybe a few more listens and it could crack the top 10 for me but I'm not so hasty to herald it as the AOTY or AOTD. I read things like "It establishes her as one of America’s greatest living songwriters." thanks pitchfork.

Pros:
Music is very good for the most part, Venice Bitch is awesome, a lot of really smooth songwriting on here. I've always liked her voice and it's good on here. Very well produced.

Cons:
There's still a handful of duds. The sound is nothing new she is serving up what she serves up so if you didn't like her sound previously this isn't going to change that. The cover shortly after venice bitch immediately kills the immersion for me. She still can't write lyrics I care about. I still don't care about her (or her persona's) sex life.

It's good, it's got some really great moments. It's her best album and a great accomplishment. She was always an artist I liked and would defend but not really ardently. This can change that. But man review sites giving this a higher rating than In Rainbows calling it the album of the decade? I'm not there yet. Will listen some more.

Can somebody please explain to me how Lana Del Ray just dropped the greatest album ever? Like, I'm just so confused because it's not like Lana's a bad artist but I never exactly imagined she'd be able to create something of THIS quality

From cestuneblague TOP 100 COMMENTER 10/10/2019 16:01 | #243621 | TOP COMMENT Vote up your preferred comments and the comments with the most votes will be flagged.

I stand by my main assertion that if you've heard one Lana song, you've heard them all, but for the first time that's not really a problem at all. 'Cuz the strength here is actually in the songs, as they finally feel like fleshed-out ideas rather than half-baked mood pieces that feel monochromatic when played in successive order. And she definitely hits some all-time highs with NFR!, from the beautiful wide-screen nostalgia of the companion-pieces "Cimmanon Girl" and "How to Dissapear", how "Mariners Apartment Complex" and "Fuck It I Love You" take the once clique'd-sounding, mordant Lana Del Rey-isms into something much more aggressively confrontational, the hazy 10-minute guitar solo that somehow works beautifully on "Venice Bitch" and she even has the chutzpah to name-check the Beach Boys on "The Greatest" in a tune as lush and far-flung with a geniune sense of life-and-death danger that can actually merit it's to-the-heavens ambitions. A lot of this is really excellent stuff....

but, it also has a few misteps that kind of keep it from achieving a sense of all-encompassing atmosphere and purpose, from the questionable decision to put her cover of "Doin' Time" at the heart of the album which kind of throws the momentum off for a little while, to the somewhat flat and excessively lengthy "California" that never achieves the sense of urgency it's clearly going for, as well as the one-note, bottom-of-the-b-sides late entry "Bartender" which exists as the album's most questionable inclusion. Perhaps the album's high points make the misfires more noticeable, and indeed after a nearly flawless opening 4-song suite it loses it's vision a bit and seems to spray it's focus on more than ground than it can actually cover, more successful than not but also not quite enough dynamo to it's finish to really make me forget the parts that don't really work. The ending feels thematically effective and certainly fine on it's own, but too... straight-line-from-thesis-to-conclusion? with the rest of the album to really give this ambitious work the musical sendoff it deserves.

So what can I say. It's very, very good, at times completely outstanding, but just enough lulls that it doesn't quite work perfectly as a whole. That may seem like faint praise considering the reaction so far, but that's not really meant as a slight against a once-stodgy Artist who has really come into their own. It's a major climb for Lana as (even if it took 5/6 whole albums) she's finally realizing her well-groomed vision with NFR!, whether this is her apex or a new licence to a weird artistic detour it's quite the accomplishment in it's own right- despite perhaps being just a wee bit overpraised.

I went into this album only really knowing "Summertime Sadness" from Lana. I honestly thought she was an English singer-songwriter, so that was as far as my knowledge about her went. I also favor more garage-rock and indie bands, so I didn't have crazy high expectations for Lana nor this record. With all of that said, this album pretty much blew me away! I thought the lyricism, the vocal range and overall performance, and the "minimalist-but-still-going-for-it" production was layered and very lush. I knew her music was generally emotive and melancholic, but it seems like she's put on a harder exterior and has a "not taking any more crap" mentality, which juxtaposes her vulnerable vocal delivery very well.

I think the only thing that weighs the album down is that it's about 2 or 3 songs too long. I don't mind the "Doin' Time" cover, but she should've saved it for a B-side. In all honesty, I don't know what other song(s) to cut if I could, so I can't fully blame her for keeping the rest on the album.

I very much look forward to a re-listen, given that the lyrics are next-level. For now, I'm gonna give the album a 90/100, but I could see that score +/- 5 points. I'll be rooting for it in the Album of the Year conversation!

Favorite Tracks: Norman Fucking Rockwell, Mariners Apartment Complex, Venice Bitch, Fuck It I Love You, How to Disappear, California, The Greatest, and Hope is a Dangerous Thing...

From Vatsal TOP 100 COMMENTER 08/31/2019 04:33 | #241992 | TOP COMMENT Vote up your preferred comments and the comments with the most votes will be flagged.

Holy goddamn fuck did Lana just drop the Album of the (dare I say) Decade? Don't @ me, I'm very confused.