A retrospective look at Lana Del Rey’s ‘Ultraviolence’
He hurt me but it felt like true love
“I shared my body and my mind with you. That’s all over now.”
That’s how Lana Del Rey opens her sophomore release Ultraviolence back in 2014. This bold declaration is also her first statement since her 2012 release Born To Die. In those two years, Ms. Del Rey had established herself as an eccentric enigma, whose affinity for rich, old men, cocaine, and hopeless romanticism broke pop’s meticulous formula for success. Her submissiveness contrasted sharply to the empowerment-based music that most women in pop chose to do at the time. She became a countercultural icon in the entertainment industry. She also became the poster child for controversial pop stars of the 21st century.
It’s rare for any artist, let alone a woman of pop, soaked in such an absurd amount of controversy and infamy, to release an equally polarising and bold sophomore follow-up. However, once again, Lana Del Rey proves that she’s anything but predictable. Her enigmatic personality, combined with a now refined sense of character and production, fuelled this album to become her best-selling LP yet. It also immortalized it as one of the most memorable moments in music for 2014. Everyone may not have liked Ultraviolence, but everyone most certainly had an opinion.
Ultraviolence is interesting, in that it’s an album where one can discern the very real and tangible control she exudes regarding the narrative. There are three songs that showcase this the best.
Cruel World, in my opinion, is one of the best non-singles of her discography. In her words, it’s a song that sets the basis for the rest of the record. Her particularly strong vocal performance and uniquely chaotic yet melancholic string-based production set the scene, not for Ultraviolence the album, but rather, for Ultraviolence — The Movie. The raw emotion and anger she exudes contrasts wildly to the ‘damsel-in-distress’ persona of Born To Die. Lyrically, it’s one of those rare times where her character actually manages to end a bad relationship. Sure it still borrows many of Born To Die’s themes, including prostitutes, drugs, God, and money, to name a few. However, this time, she is in control.
Money, Power, Glory is one of the more flashy tracks on the album. A sarcastic interpretation of the holy trinity, the song is a 4 minute and 30-seconds long snarky response to all the critics and journalists who dragged her in op-eds and articles during her Born To Die era. Lana sums it up herself best, saying,
“I felt like all that anybody was going to allow me was maybe, if I was lucky, was money, and power, in the form of infamy, rather than fame.”
The media repeatedly showcased Lana as superficial, materialistic, and privileged. Rather than fight fire with fire, Lana chose to embrace the narrative the world had given her. If that was all that she was going to be given, might as well make the most of it. Once again, Lana embraces and takes over the reins of a narrative that was actively hostile to her. She is in control.
Along with her supposed thirst for money, her sensual stage persona also branded her as a sugar daddy seeker. The media and the public alike couldn’t help but speculate the various wild and sensational sexual favors she must have had to do given her meteoric rise to fame. Once again, in typical Del Rey fashion, we get one her best femme fatale performances yet with track 9, F**cked My Way Up To The Top.
Now, there is a caveat. Lana hasn’t exactly denied the validity of the title explicitly. In an interview, she mentioned,
It’s commentary, like, “I know what you think of me,” and I’m alluding to that. You know, I have slept with a lot of guys in the industry, but none of them helped me get my record deals. Which is annoying.
Now, technically speaking, it is false, given that said favors didn’t actually get her anywhere. That is, of course, assuming that this is true, which, given her black comedy-esque casualness when talking about it, likely means that it’s not.
It’s one thing to respond to rumors. It’s a whole different ball game to make a TMZ headline into a song title and offer no information whatsoever to deny it. As if she weren’t embroiled in any controversy at all, Lana Del Rey actively ensures that the listener knows exactly what they’re getting into. Once again, however, we see that she is the one in charge. All she did was turn a popular rumor into a fledgling of a news story and she’s back. She controlled the flow of information now. She is in control.
However, there is the other, equally contentious, side to this coin. No song represents that side better than the titular track, Ultraviolence.
Ultraviolence tells the story of a visibly abusive relationship between the singer and a man named ‘Jim’. Lana opens the song with the ways in which the female protagonist is described by ‘Jim’. ‘Deadly Nightshade’ and ‘blessed with beauty and rage’ are terms assigned to femme Fatales. Women whose external beauty and softness hid a powerful entity within. She is clearly alluding to the women in the aforementioned songs like Cruel World, where their force of will controls their fate. However, this woman is different.
At the end of the pre-chorus, we are given one of the more publicized lines of the album, where she sings,
Jim told me that, he hit me and it felt like a kiss
Some may call this the glorification of domestic violence. Some may call it a darker shade of eloquence and grace. Many believe ‘Jim’ to be a reference to Jim Beam, a brand of alcohol and making the song out to be about losing to alcoholism. Regardless, it puts her in a position with no power, despite those previous descriptions of hers. In a way, Ultraviolence is the climax of her Born To Die persona. Her blind romanticism, unsubstantiated hope, and insensitivity to obvious red flags harkens back to her 2012 classic and gives her listeners a taste of the past. This and its more digestible sequel Pretty When You Cry, in short, positioned a powerful woman in a powerless position.
Of course, these two themes aren't the only ones on the album. One of the best songs on the album (and the lead single), West Coast, is a casual beat that revolves around an innovative and psychedelic production and fleeting emotions of casual flirtation and romanticism. Brooklyn Baby is a rather upbeat, optimistic detour to the east coast, where Del Rey pays tribute to all things Brooklyn, from Beat Poetry to Lou Reed. There’s Old Money, which sees Lana return to do what she does best, break hearts. The haunting piano melody, which she borrows from the original score of Romeo and Juliet, remains a favorite among romantics. The Other Woman, her first of two covers of Nina Simone, provides a poignant ending to the standard version of the album, which sees the woman of this movie end the narrative with a return to her former power. Both vulnerable and sarcastic simultaneously, you get the feeling that no one could’ve done this cover better than her. I’ll also give a shoutout to Black Beauty, the only worthwhile track on the deluxe version and a track whose omission from the standard version will forever remain a deep mystery to me.
Ultraviolence, along with Honeymoon, remain her least recognized works of art. Despite being one of the best selling LPs of the year, few awards ever bothered nominating it, let alone winning.
However, in its own institutional way, Ultraviolence remains an album that never needed awards season vindication to succeed. This is in part due to the fact that Ultraviolence’s job was never to sell well, at least from an artistic perspective. I couldn’t help but see the parallels between this and Taylor Swift’s Reputation.
They’re wildly contrasting in terms of lyricism and production, no doubt. Yet they both share one thing. They were born out of the flames of infamy that scorched their creators. They were crafted meticulously to silence them forever. When Born To Die was released, many believed that Lana would just be another one-hit-wonder. A failed studio fabrication that yielded no return on investment. With Ultraviolence, she not only proved that the queen of alternative was here to stay, but that she was also a conniving beauty. A snow-covered volcano.
And now, she had erupted to critical acclaim.
They judge me like a picture book
By the colors, like they forgot to read— Brooklyn Baby
