In defense of…Lana Del Rey

In her short time in the spotlight, Lana Del Rey has managed to acquire haters, the like of which have not been seen since Rebecca Black’s ‘Friday’ debacle. People hate on Rebecca Black because they see a bratty teenager whose parents attempted to pay for their daughter’s singing career, except she couldn’t really sing and the song closely resembled my third grade diary (also a world-wide sensation). People hate Lana Del Rey because they think, basically, that she’s a sham. They rag on her because she doesn’t have great stage presence, and because she tried to break into the music business under her given name Lizzy Grant, as a pop artist.
 People can’t seem to understand that Lana Del Rey’s performances aren’t about flashiness or incredible showmanship. Many are calling her performance ‘infamous’ because she, horror of horrors, went on SNL and simply sung her songs, no choreographed dancing or light sequences in sight. Lana Del Rey has also admitted that she tends to get nervous when performing, which makes her stiffer. Try as I might, I can’t understand Lana Del Rey as deserving of the label ‘infamous.’ In my eyes, ‘infamous’ is reserved for a performance like Ashlee Simpson’s infamous lip-synching, Irish-jig dancing disaster (also on SNL). What’s more, is that everyone is in an uproar that it all occurred on SNL. In the words of Kristen Wiig, acting as Lana Del Rey in a parody; “the music stage on SNL is hallowed ground, and I failed to reach the high bar set by past guest such as Bubba Sparxxx, the Baha Men, and Shaggy.”
Countless writers have cited Lana Del Rey’s past attempts to break into the music industry, under her given name Lizzy Grant, as another reason to dislike her. According to them, because of her attempt to break into the industry as a pop artist with a different name, this makes her not a “legitimate” alternative artist. What do I have to say to that? Pretty much what Kristen Wiig summed up nicely on SNL: please. Breaking into the entertainment industry, whether it is in music, acting, dancing, or whatever, is really, really hard. There are very few people who get “discovered” and then go on to be famous. Most people have to sing back up or take roles in student films to get their foot in the door. They have to dye their hair, switch up their sound, lose weight, or even get plastic surgery in order to meld into what the industry tells them they need to become in order to be successful.
Katy Perry was once Katy Hudson doing country music, and when that didn’t work out, gospel-rock, until as a last attempt she went pop. Vin Diesel? Born Mark Sinclair Vincent. Of course, probably the most famous is Norma Jean Baker, but you probably know her as Marilyn Monroe. Amongst the many others, as Kristen Wiig refers to; “Cher, Lady GaGa, Jay-Z, and pretty much all of hip-hop,” have become different people entirely in order to ‘make it,’ the very least of which is changing their name. So what’s the big stink about how she changed her name, or diverged on what her song-writing/singing style was in order to gain success? Everybody has, everybody does. That’s how the game is played.
Besides all that, exactly how does one become a ‘legitimate’ pop artist or ‘alternative’ artist? None of what we see from entertainment is ‘real’ or ‘legitimate,’ so that confuses me. Any celebrity, singer, actor, dancer, has been molded by teams of people into what we ‘see’. It should really be referred to as what we are allowed to see. Every single piece of publicity that we read in magazines or see on television and in film, is a calculated attempt by publicists, stylists, managers, agents, and the like in order to get you to conceive of an artist in a specific way. These people are products, to be bought and sold by us in order to make a profit. By very definition then, they cannot be ‘real’ or ‘legitimate.’
So, I take Lana Del Rey like I take most other artists; as a creation of many people, that isn’t real, but something produced for my enjoyment. I’ve listened to the song ‘Born to Die’ about ten thousand times in the past week. I love Lana Del Rey’s voice, I love her songs, and I don’t really care that she didn’t spend her adolescence in a corner writing in blood so that when she grew up and wanted to sing alternative music I would take her ‘seriously.’ Seriously, get over it.
How many times in your lifetime have you changed your personal style, or what kind of music you listen to, or friends you surround yourself with? If we’re allowed to constantly change, as we grow older, why was she not allowed to? She tried pop, it didn’t work out, and so she became Lana Del Rey, and here she is. Big deal. As Liz Phair argues in the article she wrote for the Wall Street Journal (“Liz Phair on Why Lana Del Rey Scares Rock’s Boys Club” – read it); “ I would argue that the uncomfortable feelings she elicits are simply the by-product of watching a woman wanting and taking like a man… I don’t give a f— about your labels, I just want to hear the true voices of women self-expressing.” People are uncomfortable with a woman that is a go-getter in a man’s world. When we look back on Ryan Gosling’s start-off in the Mickey Mouse club we all say; “aw, look how far he’s come!” Nobody looks incredulously at him and wonders how he could possibly be a legitimate actor in Drive because of his Disney background, and nobody should look at Lana Del Rey incredulously because she was once Lizzy Grant.