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Lana Del Rey · S2 E1
The Deal
Interscope Records signs an unknown artist, and the internet asks: is she real?
Late 2011, and Lana Del Rey signs with Interscope Records. The internet's first question isn't about her music, it's whether she's real.
"West Coast" (Lana Del Rey, 2014). The tempo switches between dreamy and heavy mid-song, two versions of the same artist in one track. That duality, the tension between who she was and who people thought she was, is exactly what the signing era felt like. Nobody could decide which Lana was real.
The Signing
Interscope Records signs Lana for the US while Polydor handles the UK and Europe. The deal comes fast: "Video Games" has gone from YouTube curiosity to the most talked-about song of 2011. But the same internet that made her famous is already turning suspicious.
Sources
Billboard
NME
The Guardian
TAP TO REVEAL: Why did the internet accuse Lana Del Rey of being fake?
“Everyone changes their name in the music industry. Literally everyone.”
— Lana Del Rey, BBC Radio 1, 2012
West Coast, Lana Del Rey (2014)
The song switches tempo mid-verse, dropping from a breezy California daydream into a heavy, psychedelic crawl. Dan Auerbach and Rick Nowels built the track around that shift, a structural trick nobody in pop was doing at the time. Listen for how Lana's vocal delivery changes with the tempo: light and airy in the fast sections, thick and drowsy when it slows. The song sounds like jet lag feels.
Sources
Pitchfork
NME
Rolling Stone
The Authenticity Wars
Body Electric, Lana Del Rey
From Paradise (2012). "Elvis is my daddy, Marilyn's my mother, Jesus is my bestest friend." This song is Lana constructing her mythology in real time, daring you to call it fake while she builds a persona out of dead American legends. The people screaming "industry plant" never understood that the construction was the art.
Body Electric, Lana Del Rey (2012)
Walt Whitman's "I Sing the Body Electric" meets Hollywood Boulevard. Every reference is a brick in the Lana Del Rey persona, from Elvis to Marilyn to Jesus. She's not hiding the construction. She's showing you exactly how it's done.
What was the main revelation that fueled the 'is she real?' debate about Lana Del Rey?
The label deal is done, the debut album is in the works, and Lana Del Rey is booked for her first major TV appearance. Next: Saturday Night Live, January 14, 2012, and the performance that almost ends everything before it starts.
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