Since 2012, Lana Del Rey has been building her myth as indie’s poet laureate of dusty,
Read more: Lana Del Rey’s new 2019 album – everything we know so far
10. ‘Venice Bitch’
A nine-and-a-half-minute odyssey, ‘Venice Bitch’ transforms from a finger-picked folkie dream into an experimental patchwork of droning sounds and fragmented lyrics. It’s brilliantly weird, completely refusing to play into structures expected of pop songs or Lana, and sounds like an artist fully at ease and overflowing with ideas.
9. ‘Ultraviolence’
Elizabeth Grant has taken us on a confounding journey with her Lana Del Rey alias, a complex character who blends pseudo-biography with sad-face grandiosity to enhance her Twin Peaks-esque enigma. The title track from her second record, ‘Ultraviolence’ starts off in the vein of slow-burners like ‘Video Games’ before taking a disconcerting turn into Crystals-referencing descriptions of domestic violence.
8. ‘Brooklyn Baby’
This single didn’t get the fanfare of its ‘Ultraviolence’ counterparts, but its creeping, wispy melodies soar in and out of huge reverb washes to create a darkly atmospheric beauty, with semi-ironic lyrics perfectly poised between hipster-hate and hipster-bait. Loving Lana might be an unpopular hobby for the dedicated music fan, but if Arctic Monkeys had written this one your mates’d be all over it.
7. ‘Ride’
“Been trying hard not to get into trouble, but I got a war in my mind,” Lana croons on the cinematic beauty that is ‘Ride’. Her answer? To hit the road and “just ride”, where she can clear her head, feel the breeze on her skin, and escape her problems, at least for a little bit.
6. ‘Love’
Best known for her elegantly sad songs, Lana switched things up on her fifth album, ‘Lust For Life’. Just as she could be seen smiling on the record’s cover, so she could be heard singing happily on its lead single, ‘Love’. Like an astronaut watching over Earth from space, she narrated scenes of young people gliding through life in a romantic daze. “You get ready, you get all dressed up/To go nowhere in particular/Back to work or the coffee shop,” she sang before dropping a dreamy, doe-eyed pay-off. “Doesn’t matter cos it’s enough/To be young and in love.”
