Image by Tibor Janosi Mozes from Pixabay

I want to introduce you to Lana Del Rey, a singer I found last week. A couple of her videos were included in an article I was reading and, in a rare moment of inspiration, I decided to listen to one called Video Games. I’m not sure what I expected, but this song was a pleasant surprise:

This song is one of few recent releases I would bother listening to again. The arrangement is beautiful and the words tell an unusual story, which is not as easily interpreted as you might think after listening. This is not a superficial homage to her significant other, but conveys a deeper meaning.

The song was released on her extended play  Lana Del Rey in May 2011 and rereleased on her second album, Born to Die, in October of that year. The track got my attention, so I took the time to listen to more of her work.

Ride is from the Paradise extended play. It takes a while to get going, but is truly worth the wait.

The third song is also from the Born to Die album:

She writes almost all of her own songs, often in collaboration with others. In my opinion, they are uniformly good.

While I haven’t paid much attention to current releases and trends for years, I still can’t imagine how I managed to miss this wonderful artist when she first came on the scene. I’m busy making up for that oversight.