Detransition, Lana (feat. Shon Faye)

my god, I am so stoked. We're pulling this together very last minute, and that is going to be the vibe. It's going to be the essence um Peyton Dicks, the essence of beauty. Payton Dix, famed bisexual, has famously never seen a single episode of Sex in the City or but she has seen the entirety of ants like that which is fucked us, which is so fucked up. We

will be discussing. But anyways, this weekend, Saturday, only a one night event, we will be live viewing the bisexual episode of Sex and the City, which is one of some would say the most problematic episode of of Sex in the City. Not me, I would definitely put it in the top three top four most problematic episodes. Well, we'll debate, we'll debate. Well, we'll debate if you're in New York City. If you're in New York City, you will have to be there to see how that debate goes.

Um And there are tickets now live on both of our instagrams on the Like a Virgin burner account at Like a Virgin for twenty sixty nine. They are cheaper if you buy the minut advance versus at the door, so look at them now. We also will have some merch at the show to buy, so women to be shopping. Bradshaw. And if you are a diva who likes to sit, please come early. Okay, seating there will be limited, limited seating. And it's small venue. It's a very cozy, intimate venue.

That's how we like it. We like intimate venues the way Madonna what wait, what tour did she go to where she had the intimate, the intimate the Madam concerts? Yeah, that her Madam. It will it will be this era, yeah with the show. That's yeah, this is our this is our weekends with adele Um. But it's only one weekend.

Come this Saturday. It's gonna be so much fun. And also, you know, while we're doing some housekeeping, make sure that you subscribe to our patreon for weekly exclusive bonus episodes. But yeah, without all out of the way, how the hell are you fran so good? Rose? Um? I you know, pulled myself out of a nap so that I could go see a screening of Scream six at the AMC Village and uh it was. It was good. Yeah, I saw it last week as well, so we um and we I didn't I thought you weren't going to see it.

I know our periods are sinked. Well, I told you that I didn't want to. I only would do it if I could put it on my AMCs stubbs List rewards member whatever the fuck it's called, um because I actually haven't used my membership in like a month and a half and so, you know, just trying to be cost effective. But um, I I still got to sit in my recliner chairs. I was very happy with my viewing experience. What did you think of the beginning? The first five minutes I think were a bit of a doozy. Yeah,

I really liked the the cold open um. It was a sort of a departure for a screen movie, and that not just one person was killed. There was not not really a fake out. It was more of like a like a narrative moment like this professor gets killed and then the killers get killed. So I thought that

was interesting. And you know, it's trying to do like what Scream does best, which is this like meta commentary on horror, and as the Scream movies have progressed, they have more become a meta commentary on Scream movies than on horror in general, unfortunately. I mean overall, I really liked the movie up until the killer reveal, and then I thought it was very dumb. Okay, so I mean spoiler alerts vision, why didn't you like the killer reveal

because I felt it was anticlimactic. Yeah, it was sort of a mix of things Scream has done before, where it's you know, a family member of a past killer or someone who's really obsessed with the whole Scream ghost Faces narrative, and it did both, and I thought the reveal was one that was like far too easy to predict, like obviously as soon as that as um Dylan McDermott show, where is that Dermott moroney, I can never, I can never.

It's it's Dermott moment, it's the other one. Okay. As soon as he showed up, I was like, okay, he's the killer. Yeah. And and then obviously also like the one odd guy out in their group who's like, of course, but I bet you all think I'm the Killer's like okay, well obviously he's the killer too, And they just did that. They just did that as well. And the yeah, where it was like the obvious one was the one. It

was just so unsatisfying. And I also felt like their justification for why they were the killers was super lame. She was reaching your honor. Yeah. Also like why did it take place in New York when it was entirely shot in Montreal? It looked like it was shot in Montreal. And also I mean, I guess they were there because Jennet Ortega was going to NYU or whatever. But here's what, Okay, I lead with the negatives because had a ball and I enjoyed this scream more too. I did. I did too.

I thought this scream was so much better than the last one and um and so big improvement they gave that main girly some acting lessons because she was rotted in the last Yeah, Melissa Guero definitely is like giving final doll um. And I actually thought they were. I thought for a second that they really were going to kill her because they had alluded to it, and because I was like, oh, if they made Jenna Ortega the true protagonist of this franchise, that actually would be such

a serve. I'm not gonna lie, but well, I think that's what's going to happen because and I think that in the next movie, Melissa of this movie is going to become the killer. Like I think she's snapped. She's she's gonna be the Scream. She's gonna be the Scream. She's gonna be screams screaming to scream. Yeah, so as she as you know, the killer is famously called Scream, Scream, Scream yeah. Um. So Anyways, the thing for me is like, there should have been more hijinks with Scream, Like I

wanted more. I wanted Scream in New York. I wanted Scream getting a hot dog. I wanted to know. I wanted Scream getting to like, yeah, going to see a Hamilton matinee. Scream in Central Park. Yes, well that crying on the subway. That's the thing is, none of that happened because it wasn't actually shot in New York and the most and I thought that some of my favorite parts of the film were the ones were it tried to approximate being in New York. Like the scene on

the subway was genuinely so good and thrilling. Um. The scene in the bodega was also really amazing. And I don't understand why, if you're gonna do it in New York, just fucking shoot it in New York. Yeah. I didn't get that either, because yeah, but I am. I love that. I love those scenes specific those are definitely two of my favorite scenes as well. I thought that in those scenes and throughout the movie, the relationship built on the

two sisters was so much stronger. So towards the end when they were like fending off you know, the screams, I was just like, I was, just like work Diva's like they're gonna be like, you know, a ragtag duo of like you know, murdery girls, and like I was, I'm kind of like I want that form of the franchise.

Kirby's return was pretty gaggy and funny. I love that she died like three times, but I hate that she's a cop because I love I love Herbie, and she is one of the high points of Scream four, which I do think is one of the better films having rewatched it recently. But it just sucks they made her a cop. Yeah, and also it sucks that they put her in that wig because she they were like, I'm thirty, and I was like, honey, with that wig, you look

like you're thirty. Yeah, Mason, Mason Gooding Man that you are. Oh god god. I mean, first of all, it's funny that he's playing a college freshman when he's about, you know, thirty two. Yeah, he looks like a college freshman. And he also looks like a Chad, which I love he does. He's so hot it's insane. It makes no Okay. That's another complaint of mine is that I think that the tension m M, no, what am I trying to say?

I think that I would have loved more of the b plot, Like I felt like the romance between him and Jenna Ortega like could have had some like little like you know, college hijinks, twisty something like I wish I had seen more of Jenna Ortega's life and its relation and the stakes, like in you know, his survival, Mason Goodding Survival. I would have liked that, specifically to the end of making us believe that he could be

the killer. Yeah, that's what I wanted more of, was more breadcrumbs of faking us out, because that's the thing. It's like, the reveal of who Scream was was not only disappointing because it was lame, but because there wasn't a ton of mystery. I wasn't. I didn't spend the movie trying to guess who Scream was, and I should have been. There should have been people being sus and

they really weren't. Although I guess like the main Girlie's boyfriend was supposed to be the biggest fake out just because he's like some random dude, but even that wasn't like very compelling, and there was no moment where it was sort of like a gotcha that he had like a knife in his bag or whatever, although he was part of one of the other most thrilling scenes where they're locked in the apartment with Scream and have to walk across the ladder on the air shot. That was good,

so good. That was great. The action in this movie was really fun. It's just, you know, not very good killers. Yeah, I'm not very good killers. And um, I think that the reveal. The problem with the reveal is that it was just trying too hard to tie us back into stories that I personally had already forgot about and didn't care about anymore. Stories are so powerful. I don't know if you. Stories are really powerful matter not. Everyone should

have survived, like the whole four four. That's the point of screen movies is that the characters that you like die. I like, I love Gail. Gail should have died, like Mason Gooding's hot as he is should have died. Gail Weather No, wait, Gail Weathers survived. Yeah, at the end, they had the moment where they were like, oh, yeah, Gail's at the hospital, Gail and Kirby are fine. That doesn't make any sense. I thought she was I thought she was dead. I totally missed that she was still alive.

Stobbed so many times, so many times. And also, okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry to do this, but like, why is there not but a lick of I makeup on Courtney Cox. She looks dead. I thought she looked I thought she looked fab but she was still iconic. Of course she she was and rip to her hot boyfriend who had no lines and just died. Oh yeah, that was so bizarre. Again, this is what I'm saying about the b plots is like I almost wanted. Obviously, when you have a big ensemble, you can't like do a

ton with like character development. But like, I don't know, there there could have been so many more interesting ways for the killer reveal to go down if we had more stakes in like what the characters were doing. But it doesn't. You know, the action was amazing though, So yeah, you know, I guess I would plain. I guess I was hoping that the killer reveal would have more to do with the whole idea of the main girl whatever her name is in the movie, Um, like the conspiracy

theory that she was the actual killer. Like I know that the killers were the ones who planted that, but I think that could have been a better part of the sort of meta commentary that it was doing, like about victimhood and you know, they just like didn't really chase that that rabbit. So but yeah, still very enjoyable moviegoing experience. I had a lot of fun watching it, and I will be seated for every scream that's it's I just will. Okay, let's let's move on from from Scream,

both the movie and the titular killer. Yeah. Two, we're going from New York to Ocean Boulevard right now. Yes to Lana del Rey, who also is the topic of I mean she is the overarching topic of this whole episode because after this we'll have a conversation about her with Sean Fay, noted author and um Lana del Rey historian. So did you know that there's a tunnel under Ocean Boulevard? Was released on Friday? And what do we think? Fran

Um love it, Love love love it. I am like feeling like, you know, it's bringing us back to Norman Rockwell, Launa. I feel like it's also going to like SoundCloud Laana. It reminds me like something like Peppers. I think reminds me a lot of her SoundCloud song with Asap Rocky Riding. That's like so like very Lizzy Grant. Yes, it's Lizzy Grant.

It's like, I you know, trap beat from like garage band, like you know iOS six, You know what I mean, Like it was it's like fun and funny and dirty, and I don't know, she really is such a producer, and I think that's something like I think I loved and respected her more as a songwriter and asked a producer on this album than I had in previous albums.

What about You. Yeah, the songwriting on this is really beautiful, and I really feel myself drawn to some of the tracks that almost are the ones that I feel like she'll never perform live, Like something like something like Fingertips, which like is almost more of just a poem set to music, and like something that I like imagine is she like just recorded to like have it live as a song and it's not necessarily something she'll ever perform live.

You know, I agree. I think in a lot of ways, this is a return to a sound that she maybe didn't do on Blue Banisters or or chem Trails, Like there is a little bit more of that like hip hop influence on some of the songs, but I feel

like what she's writing about has evolved a lot. Like there's so much reckoning with mortality on this record, like like the death that she's experienced in her family, like the the knowledge of the mortality of the people she loves, and also like the idea of I think she's thinking a lot about the legacy she's going to leave behind. Um and what you know, imprint her music has on

the world, which is really beautiful. And I mean some of the imagery on this album, like um in Kintsugie when she's talking about you know, like the cracks letting the light come in is really lovely and yeah, I just I just think it's really beautiful. It sounds very Um.

A lot of the songs have that sort of like old school Disney quality to the like the the orchestration and um, I mean like some of them just like the the like swelling of the music if so emotional, like the the Grandfather song Grandfather, Please Stand on the Shoulders of My Father? I think is oh my Father as something. Yeah, it's so beautiful. Um fish Tails also really lovely and then um, I also really like Margaret

the song with Bleachers. I really like Candy Necklace. I do think the standouts, the real standouts are the singles that she's already released, Like yeah, I do think I do think A and W is the best song on the album A and W did you Know There's a tunnel? Um? I also love that she's like in conversation with the music she's already released, like on Um the Taco Truck, Venico Taco Truck, Venice Bitch. It's like I gasped, when

so good, so self referential. It reminded me of Sissa sampling herself in her last album and like bringing us back to these like iconic moments from their career and then putting it in a completely new context. That almost like it's like Lana kind of evaluating her self, which I feel like she has been doing a lot over the last few albums because when like when Laana like emerged on the scene, you know, she was the complete package.

She had an aesthetic, she had a vibe, she presented like you know who, she was pretty unapologetically, and now like these more recent albums, it's like her looking back at her own archetype and seeing what she's going to take and what she's gonna leave. I'm gonna take mine

of view with me, etc. Etc. So, like what you said about you know, her self referencing and in something like Venice Bitch, I think it just she she's doing something that she does so well on this album in general, which is take off a whole language of like you know, Laana isms and pull them back and give them a completely new meaning, Like Venice Bitch had a new meaning at the end of this album and this song, and

that I really appreciated. Same thing with Peppers. To me, I mean the trope of letting the light in and is like I think, really a beautiful kind of theme like thematic device throughout this album. Um. With Kinsugi specifically, I mean Kintsugi, like that is such a stumble upon thing like that is such a like tumbler girl discovers like what Kintsugi is and like it's her whole personality for like three months. Um. But like that's what Lana does.

So Will is like is take this like the most basic ass behavior and elevate it into an art form. Yes literally like basic into like actually like translatable like megamind art star. Um. I will say. The Father John Misty song is giving youth group. I could not I could not really I could not really get on it. I felt like part of me wanted songs like that to like No, I just wish there were more songs like A ANDW that was like my only thing, Like I wanted a little more grit, grit and glamor see.

I felt that way with the interludes, which if you do a little digging, are are from this like church that she sometimes attends and their sermons from the pastor and like that I didn't really vibe with. And I was with my friend Hilton yesterday and they were saying, like that those songs are gonna ruin the experience of having just Launa on shuffle, and like one of those comes on, So maybe those will be songs that I

have to block on Spotify. Yeah, but I do really think when placed in context with the rest of La Launa's discography, like this just makes so much sense and it's such a logical next step an evolution for her. And yeah, I wish I wish this album had been out before our conversation with Sean, But I also think we had a really good experience of like talking about who Lana is as this album was about to be released, and like where where she stands in the culture and

with all of us specifically. So I still think it's like a very It was. It was a great conversation. Well, happy Lana Day, Happy Happy Lana Weekend, Happy Lana week month, whatever. Um, there are some things that we that I know are like out in the culture that we just um that we're not going to talk about today. Neither Fran or I have watched the first episode of the new season of Yellow Jackets, and we might hold that for the Patreon, So if you want to hear our thoughts, you're going

to have to subscribe Patreon on tom Slush like a virgin. Also, I have been spending the last couple months catching up on Succession and I'm almost I'm like midway through season three. So we will talk about Succession. I don't know if we'll do it here or on the patron, but I'm I'm like, I'm like full successionista now. I season. Yeah, I was gonna ask got me Yeah. It was very

hard for me to get into it first. I was really bored through the most of season one, and then the end of season one like got me hooked, and I just like plowed through season two really quickly, and I'm I'm fully obsessed now. I said this on the pod. I think I tried to watch the first episode of Succession like four times because every time I was so bored and I turned it off. But once you're in it, Steva, you're in it. Yeah. I just I love I love Shiv,

I love Tom and Greg. I also love how none of them are using iPhones because they're all villains and we know that rule that Apple has. Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah. Um. I also love um what's her face? The mom the mean mommy, mean mommy, who like Don Lawyer, called Jerry Jerry Jerry Jerry. I also love um. I love Cherry Jones and Holly Hunter. Cherry Jones plays the you know, like the matriarch of the other so companies perfect arch nemesis yea. And Holly Hunter with her fucking bangs. Holly

Hunter is crazy in this show. Oh my god. Um okay, yeah, let's do a Patreon discussion. I can't wait to deep die. Yeah. Maybe we'll maybe we'll have to bring um back a previous guest to do like a proper Succession episode we have, And I wonder who that I wonder who that could be? Yeah? Who who has been on the show like loves Succession very publicly. We'll see, We'll see, Okay, without further ado yeah,

my pussy tastes like pepsicola. It doesn't. It'd be like a diet home flavorying diamond two baby, New York City, Sean, what's your earliest memory of Lana? Like? When? When were you? When was your cherry pop? Have you been there since the beginning? I have been there, of course, have been there since the beginning. I was like a gay boy on Tumblr. M I actually video games. I wasn't as I wasn't like right there at the beginning of video games,

before that breakout moment. I think Born to Die the song with the Flower Crown and the Throne is like my strongest memory of like the first song of lambdor Rays that I became obsessed with, and then I went back to video games. But I was there from pretty early on, Like I have only ever seen Lana live and that was twenty thirteen and it was the Born to Die Paradise edition era. So yeah, I'm a Flower crown Erastan. Okay, Well, my stand um does predate yours

just a little bit. Okay, this ship, yes, one of tranship. So I was I was having a party at my old apartment in Bushwick and my friend pulled me into my bedroom to do coke, and while we were doing it, she pulled out her phone and was like, you have to watch this music video of this girl that I was in AA with, and she pulled it out and put on video. It's not Miss Lana would be honestly so proud of your Internet Alana, Like that is so befitting.

I mean, you were in Brooklyn, not in you know, southern California or whatever, so that's like the only you know, misalignment. But like, I think she would love that, you know, you were doing coke in a bedroom and talking about you know, a yeah. Well she think she would. She would because she's she is. She's always been kind of a sober icon. Like she's been quite open about being sober from the beginning. But she also like likes to

hark back to the glory. She's like one of those sober people that likes to talk about when they used to do coke. So she'd be glad that, like people are bombing over coke, do you know what I mean? Yeah? Yeah, absolutely, friend? What was your intro to Lana? So much like Shanna, I also used to be a gay boy on Tumblr and I have said on this podcast that Lana is the most successful pop star to like emerge from the indie sleeves era, specifically on Tumblr, and that was definitely

my um exposure to her as well. I definitely found out about her on Tumblr, like in the twenty tens, like her like gifts and images and like and just like you know, the tracks when tumbler could like put any track on the blog and you could listen to all the really unreleased shit like that was my kind

of first impression. And I actually don't really remember what the first song I heard was, but obviously the first thing that stuck to me was the gangster Nancy Sinatra thing, because at the time I was going in college, I was going through a big Nancy Sinatra phase and then Lana just happened to emerge on the scene or in my life, and I was like, oh, like she I mean, I hate the kind of epithet gangster Nancy Sinatra. However

she does sound she has it. She sounds like Nancy Sinatra, and I latched onto first and foremost that like the aesthetic world that she built immediately on arrival, I mean, her second arrival when she rebranded after Lizzie Grant, but like that was like I just remember seeing the full picture of her as this like sixties Los Angeles batty and I was like, I get it, yes, and excuse us for dead names, but you know, she does seem to be comfortable with the fact that we all know

shece was Lizzie Grant, so I think it's okay. Yeah, So I actually like I was never in the Lizzie Grant era. I don't know much about that era, y'all. No, not really. I mean the music has definitely endured, Like you know, her unreleased songs are legendary and the real real stands, like even deeper stands than I am have like an encyclopedic knowledge of them. I'm more aware of the visuals of that era, like her with the Blonde.

It's very much Yeah, it's very much thing when Katy Perry was Katherine Hudson and she was a Christian rock musician, right, yeah, it are there other examples of that, Like, yeah, Katie Perry is one of like other other big names with pre eras that we've kind of like memory hold. I'm trying to think, like, um, Shakira was Shakira was like in the Spanish language, was kind of like an alanist.

Morrisset like sing a songwriter Gabriel Garcia marqueza that if one hundred Years of Solitude was ever going to be turned into a film, he would want Shakira to write the entire musical score. And then she was like I'm going to really she Wolf, well, I guess let me, let me get on my la and wasn't there. Also didn't Mariah reveal that she at one point had a sort of like emo grunge moment that she like wrote a whole kind of pop rock album. Yeah, you know,

everyone's everyone's had different eras. Madonna of Us is another one. Yeah, Donna was the front runner. Who was the front woman of a band. I'm trying to think of others. Well, Pink, Pink had that first album where she was black as well. There was that. I mean, it's so good as well. I was listening to that. Thank you, thank you so much for bringing up Pink because we really needed to invoke her on this podcast. We need to do a Pink episode at some point. We absolutely do not need

to do a Pink episode. I don't think you need to Pink episode. But my big theory is that stupid girls. Do you remember that song that's that's a turf anothing, that's a turf anthem, that tour of anthem. You're so right. I mean, I think Pink has has rad found vibe. Yeah, she's got radigal feminists like you know, I didn't you know, women didn't fight for your right to wear heels and Panda to the male gaze. It's got that kind of those teas. But I think I must be in the banks.

It's the kind of Kate Gosling Bank that's going to be like the new era of turf Banks is actually going to be the Pink Swoop. Yeah, grown out, a

bit pushed to the side. Yeah, she does. In fairness though, the reason that I think Pink uh like has kind of now managed to escape any anything like about her turf song and her sort of like racially ambiguous problematic eras that she hates both of them, where she hates stupid girls and she's always hated it and she's always hated that first album, so that you can't really be like m your first album you Yeah, so much like podcasts,

Pink is Pink is uncancellable. M fran I do think you hit on like some of the things that really characterized Lana's early fame, and I think what people latched onto, which was that she literally sounded like she was from another era, and she also was like mashing the esthetics of a bygone time with very like girl internet like um soft grunge like she was. I don't know if there's ever been an artist that was more perfect to be tumbler famous like she just was what all the

girlies wanted to be. Um. I mean, Sean, like, what did you what did you latch onto about her? I think what I latched onto, Look, I was just thinking obviously I just said Born to Die was my first

experience with her. But where I really feel like it popped off for me in terms of my obsession with her was Ride and the Ride monologue, because I don't know, it was the kind of like campy but also deeply earnest, like lines like you know, I was in the winter of my life and the men I met along the road were my only summer and at that time, I think that was probably my peak grinder era of like pre transition. Trying to so I feel like Lana Delay

came aroung at the right time for me to self narrativize. Yeah, like I guess a kind of certain self homy interest in men. I mean, look, that will do it, honestly. I Yeah, the monologue is so iconic. My friend Willie Norris has this incredible performance of it. I strongly recommend if if anybody, if any of the Virgins, can find

like a video of it. Yeah, there's something about that monologue and just about the extremely cinematic, which I think is like I use that word all the time, but I think it's very befitting for Lona is that she was writing songs as if they were movies, Like so much of her aesthetic was entwined in Hollywood, and I think that, you know, when you listen to her songs sometimes you know, this is less true of like the first two albums, but like sometimes their songs kind of

blend together as this like backdrop or landscape for the world that she lives in. And like, uh, yeah, but that but that monologue just like painted a character that we just like got to know more and more in all of its problems and LORI you know, but it's also ridiculous, isn't it. I remember, like around the first album time, a friend of mine used to always joke that Lana Darey's favorite book was the Wikipedia summary of Lolita,

which is kind of like true. Yeah, there's like something about the fact that it's like, I don't know, the flickering, the Americana of it all is like very like like I don't know, like slightly vacuous as well. Um, yeah, well, it's like her her idea of America is like you can find It's it's like what you can find for sale,

like at a gas station. You know. It's it's like she is like cherry picking these very kind of like superficial um images of what America is and kind of working backwards from there and like trying to make them profound, and it really works. Yeah, I think that they're I mean, it is, there's a lot of it that is superficial. But I also think that, you know, the gas station

girlie that she is. I can't even remember, there's an unreleased song about her at a gas station or something, and that really is her esthetic and that really is actually I think, like a segment of California that exists, and I think that like her weird conservatism and like her complete like I don't give a fuckery about like

whatever she's doing. I think is that's a real culture, you know, like a thought a culture I want to hang out with, but like that's a real culture, that's like a real group of people I think in America that I think she acutely identified. You know. I love that we mentioned Lolita though, because like the first thing I thought it was when Azalea called her little what you called her, like little Lolita Chola cosplay or something like that. So well, they do it. They do have

epic beef. I mean, Lana and Azalia, I actually think do kind of encapsulate two of the you know, different sides of the tumbler girl aesthetic that that existed at that time. And so of course, like they had to have beef at some point. Yeah, that beef was so specific to early Twitter days too. Oh yeah, it was it. What was it? Lana said something like pull up? That

was her like pull up, but I wouldn't. Yeah, the thing is is that I was just thinking about that because I feel like a little bit I feel bad that I've just said that, like on some level it was a bit vacuous because at the same time, I think like at that early stage around the first album, and it's something that she's spoken about a lot, like Lana got savaged by critics who basically didn't get it. She felt that the music had been made poppier than

she was expecting. She's just said that in a covering of view for Rolling Stone UK. She revisited that that the album ended up poppier than she expected it and then critics kind of didn't get her, and that there was a lot to do with at the time, her esthetics, the like suspicions that she'd had plastic surgery, the slightly

like retro styling. Was that it was around the time where like Beyonce was about to drop her kind of feminist album with Self, like everyone was becoming like it was becoming popular to say you were a feminist in pop culture, and she just seemed to be out of

step with the direction of travel. And I think she has felt quite traumatized ever since by that response that she had at least critics she is kind of a woman out of time and like you're so right, and that she was so misunderstood, And I think she has carried that feeling with her throughout her career, sometimes to her detriment, like with the question for the culture of it all, but like, I mean, was there a more unifying pop culture event than Lana on SNL? Like, I

don't know. That was one of the early memes, especially on Tumblr, the little PNG gift of her twirling on everything. It's so good. I mean sometimes it still comes up on my Instagram feed and there's never a time I

won't stop and watch that. And there's like so much you can do with the captions, and I think the like, also, do you think that that, Like I feel like that whole response, especially the way that like it was kind of you brought up the question for the culture, but the misogynistic element of her esthetic and the fact that people male critics seemed obsessed with, you know, her appearance

and surgery and stuff like that. I feel like that's that there's some there's some trends identification films that I have absolutely, absolutely the thing about Lana is that she is like she is a plinth upon which to project like whatever your thing is, and so in that way, to me, she is a very transfer Yeah, she is.

And I don't know whether or not she's she's very like I feel like white trends woman vibes as well, because she's obviously just very white woman of being like slightly affronted and kind of a little bit narcissistic in the sense that she's really wronged by society, which is

kind of giving very specifically white trans woman. I can think I can think of a few, yeah, And I think in that like trans that this kind of like this like trans reading like to me, I always talk about it's so annoying, but like the bimbification of our generation and how we're all just like everybody should be a bimbo now, like Lana predated that, a lot of pop stars predated that obviously, But you know, Sean, like earlier you were talking about just um, you know, the

word vacuous and like you know whether you know using that word to describe Lane. And I do think that, especially in that SNL performance, vacuousness is the aesthetic like and why can it? Why can't it? And I think that like if Lana, if Lana word emerge in twenty twenty three or whatever, I think it would have been. I mean, obviously it would be there would be so

much different context. But like that we would be having different conversations about her, right, Like we wouldn't we would be like honoring and commending her vacuousness, which I think Tumbler did, do you know, Like we did love that she was like distant and weird and awkward and empty. Well, it also left a lot of room for people to fill the gaps in and like make her deeper than maybe she even meant to be until she actually started meeting them there and like became kind of a very deep,

introspective person. Yeah, And I think like also like that one are the aspects of the trans reading for me, which is what I said earlier about the ride monologue, but about that, like at that time, I was literally just trying to like fit in with mostly gay men that I was friends with at the time by on Grinder and stuff like that, So it was it was a kind of appropriate, um, I don't know, accompaniment to that,

but with a specifically like trans feminine reading. I think it's because there's a lot right from the beginning with Anna Delay about like um, like seeing yourself through how men see you, and about this idea of like her gaze being like projected into male gaze. I can is it off to the races where she's like, he likes to watch me in the glassroom, perfume kanyet lie, Like

whatever is that? Like it's her singing about a man looking at her, So it's her gaze on a man looking at her, which I think is very trans woman totally. I mean, I can only speak for myself, but in the early years of my transition, like, um, male validation was one of the things that validated my gender, Like

being called on the street. As awful as it was, also like made me feel super cunty because I was like, Okay, well, if they're you know, like, um, you know, yelling at me, then at least that means they like think I'm a woman and they want to fuck me, and that is very langel Ray code that this would get me canceled in the UK. No, I think I think that's true.

I mean, and I think, I mean, I love that you said in me because we like we're around the same age biologically, and also we transitioned around the same time. And I was like, I love that she's saying in my early transition because I was like, that was me a month ago. Yeah, yeah, in my early transition. I use men for validation. There was a really I can't

remember who looking for days. I remember a few years ago, like a lesbian writer wrote specifically about how Lana del Rey helped her understand like what her straight women friends were talking about because she's so obsessed with, like I don't know that, like the sort of inherent humiliations of being a woman in heterosexuality in a way that I think is like you don't really like she almost sings about heterosexuality like she's an outsider to it because she

really sort of like it doesn't seem natural to her. It's something that she is constantly analyzing. And like I said, like when when everyone else in that time where the early twenty tens were starting to become like yeah, feminism, she was actually singing some pretty regressive things that clearly a lot I think now we could probably accept that quite a lot of women still feel and struggle with inviolation to men, and thank God for that we need it.

It's very motivating. M Yeah, I mean, I am but a baby trans but like I feel like, you know, there is this kind of like moment somewhere along the way where you're like, oh, like I have like workshopped and created like my femininity around like what men want,

and that's like embarrassing, you know. I think that there's like a I think that there's like, you know, I wonder if, like Lana, I feel like, you know, when we're talking about the different eras of Lana, I wonder if Lana ever had this kind of realization where or rather like, I'm not a Laana scholars, so I'm actually asking, like, do you think that there was like a pivotal moment where Lana was like, I'm a different artist now post

video games? She wanted to like take herself more seriously and you know, release all these like slow ballads and a new era of like deeper raw music or I I don't, I don't know. I think she's always taken herself very seriously. That I think that's kind of the thing with Lana. I do believe that there was a certain point where she decided to make music that interested her and she didn't really care what anyone else thought about it, And that actually, to me, is when she

started making her best music. Like I think probably Norman fucking Rockwell is like her at her most introspective and That's why I think it's her best album and like her creative peak in a lot of ways. I kind of agree with Raise completely. It's my favorite of her albums, and I do think it's her peak today, although I think the New One has the potential too. I saw a really good meme about the new one racing It's not like thank you for saving my life meme where

and it was too. Do you know there's a ton of on Derosion Boulevard and the album to Soundswering Batman I'm not even released yet. Yeah, yeah, it does. It does feel like a return. I think tom music that she hasn't been making for a little bit, um like A and W and we we talked about this recently, that ANW does feel a little spiritually closer to some of her earlier work. Yeah, you know, I think Norman

Fucking Rockwell is her best album. It's not my favorite album just because Ultra Violence was so formative for me and I spent so much time with it, and like the summer that Ultra Violence came out, whenever I went to someone's apartment, I would be like, turn on your AC and turn on Ultra Violence, and not with just Well. It was never not being listened to and it's fucking music. Norman fucking wrote Well was a breakup album for me after I had had like it was my biggest attempt

at assimilating into heterosexuality. It was just before the pandemic and I had like a straight boyfriend and stuff like that, and then in the end the irreconcilable differences of the fact that he just basically wanted me to be like his like cis girlfriend and like settled down and get married and have kids, and I realized I couldn't do that, so I left him, and then Norman fucking Rockwell came out, and I feel like that's it's such a mood as a breakup album to be like a goddamn near sociopath

and like Sylvia, I mean, I was just I was living and then we and then we went into like Quarantine and I just listened to it all the time. What a like that is? Like so like, I'm sorry that you experienced that breakup, but you're so lucky that Norman fucking rock or was it like that must have felt so cathar Like you must have been wallowing and laying around and so sad and like it's a dangerous thing for a woman like me to have. But I have it. But I have it, But I have it period.

She has had it. Um god, um wait, Rose, did you ever have like a Lana breakup era or like a Lana heartbreak era? I think, um, yeah, yeah, you're like none that I want to talk about. Um, I mean Lana For me, I do tend to visit Lana more when I'm feeling slutty than when I'm feeling sad or when I'm feeling like the perfect mix of both. Yeah, just when I'm binary? What a binary? I'm I'm non binary, I'm slutty, I'm sad often yeah same um yeah um.

We should also say for the Virgins unsure of when this episode is coming out, but as of record, we only have a n W out as her most recent release. And like I also am excited for this era, Like I do think it has the potential just from this that one song to be something that is like greater than Norman fucking Rockwell. And just as Rose said, like her earlier era, there's something about n W that is distinctly sound cloudy, you know what I mean, Like it

sounds like a little like grungy roddy. It sounds kind of tinny at the end, like it sounds like it's you know, pumping through like a laptop speaker or something like I really one of those old white MacBooks. Yeah, it sounds like it's coming out of that. It kind of the end of it kind of gives unreleased Lizzy Grant track. Yeah, It's like I wasn't just a nice seven minute like the sort of like egregious ego of road dropping like a seven minute song. I just feel

like we haven't seen the like in years. I mean, it's giving like I don't know, like a since since I goistic, but it's a yeah, no I know, but like I do, I do kind of miss you know. I was just thinking the other day in when Gaga would just release like insanely long music videos and then like we all became white fatigued by it, and then and then they went back to normal length. I think it's just time for like stupidly long songs and maybe

even a return to long music videos. Well now, but like absolutely well now that every song is like TikTok length, I think we really crave like longer songs that you know, dare to defy the Spotify algorithm. You know, we talked a lot about like Ethel Kaine and like when she you're you know, her album, you know, mixed reviews, but a lot of people hated that Thoroughfare is nine minutes,

that all these songs are seven minutes or whatever. And Ethel Caine has like cited Lana as like her favorite artist of all time, and I just like, like why not, you know, like I personally, you know, seven to nine minute songs are like a lot of them are usually they feel like experiments, so they don't feel finished or they like drag on. But like I would much rather someone try to do it and dare to like experiment, experiment or make something that's like kind of all the

way out there, you know. Ethelcaine. Ethel Caine who dated Lana's bisexual porn star boyfriend. H yeah did you Yeah? This guy has like bit has made the rounds with the girls I wanted to do I want to do it where it was his Instagram drop his ig So he's so hot in the grossest way possible. Oh no, does he look like super unemployable? Yes? Yeah, that is my type two. Okay, we need we need the ig dropped? Do you know I didn't. I didn't know. I was listening to the eel Kan album all of last year.

I only found out she's trans like a month ago. How did I miss that? You know? The trans pop girlies are are, you know, coming in stealth? Like I feel like when Kim Petris emerged on the scene, so many of my friends had no idea she was trans. And I think that's amazing, you know, I think Ethel it's not never something that she hid. The same thing with Kim. It's like never something she hid. But it's like, you know, it's like just like a kind of thread

in the fabric of her life, I think. And I can't wait for Lana to come out as trans f to f trans woman. She kind of is. She is like Liddy Grant is. Yeah, is before I was going

to actually just talk about that. It is. Also what is funny is that Lana Delray has somewhat detransitioned in terms of her femininity from this like heart like the esthetic of the beginning, which obviously is to do as well with the fact that she obviously was like horrifically pressured to like lose loads of weight and so she's become more I guess, more comfortable. But there's all this discourse around the fact that her style is that she just dresses like a regular person and that like this

like higher target. Yeah, so that like this highly kind of um, I don't know, like manicured esthetic of the first like album or two. It's clearly something that she never really was that comfortable with. And I think it's kind of great that she's like able able to just dress like a normal now and yet and yet that esthetic, the aesthetic of your is kind of what her music

has bred in the people who listen to it. Like I was, I have my sisters who are twenty, they're visiting and they're staying with me, and I was mentioning Lana Delray to them, and like they're super familiar with her. They have friends who love her and listen to her,

but they're friends who love her. And I think a lot of the girls who are still like very enamored with her and the whole low leader vibe, like are still like like seeing her as this pinnacle of like a high of like an internet high fem persona, when that like aesthetic is so completely divorced from who Laana is irl, And it's just fascinating to me the way that Laana has endured as this high fem Internet icon for so long while not actually giving that so much

in her like literal aesthetic. I either we've just cut, we haven't even bothered talking about Lust for Life, No one does. Yeah, I mean for me, there are like Honeymoon. Lust for Life and Honeymoon are my least favorite Lana offerings. Um, they're the most skippable to me. Yeah, I concur I

mean I actually think as well. This is what's strange, isn't it is that I feel like there are the like albums with the capitol A and then the albums with the kind of lowercase A, and so like for me, the big Alblana albums are like Born to Die, Paradise Edition, Ultra Violence, Norman Fucking rock Quell, And then now I've sensed that it will be the case with did you know there's a Tunnel under Ocean Boulevard? Because also with

chem Trails over the country Club and Blue Banisters. I mean, I guess she was trying to do a little like Miss Taylor Swift vibe of like dropping two albums in the Pandemic that was so close together, but I just felt like they, as I say, the Pandemic was so overshadowed by my obsession with Norman fucking Rockwell that I just feel like I do like chem Trails over the Country club Work. I like the song, and I like Jesus Tells a Freak and is so good. I think

it's one of her best songs. Yeah it is, But I just feel like the two albums and Blue Banisters is really good, but it's just like I just feel like they were too jam packed together and they weren't

given enough room to breathe. And I do think I know that like Taylor Swift with Folklore and Evermore managed to get away with that, but I do just think in general, that's an section to the rule, and I think I think like releasing like custers of albums like that, especially probably in a time where I don't know, I felt somewhat distracted and so soon after such a huge landmark album like Norman fucking wrote, Well, they just I feel have always been a bit like Tier two for

me in comparison. Yeah. Well, I mean, first of all, Taylor did get away with Folklore and Evermore, but evermore still kind of is folklore B sides. And I say that as a big Taylor Swift fan, but I read something interesting recently. So Lana has been doing a lot of press around her new album, and she said that her last couple albums have been much more personal and

like specifically about her family. And one thing she said about Blue Banisters was that she made it because she felt that she had to and she didn't really care about so much about releasing it, and in fact, that's why she did basically no promo for it and why she made that like you know Microsoft paint cover that we all joked about, and she said, I don't know, I don't have the exact quote, but she said something like she wanted it to be there in case anyone

needed to go and like look it up and reference it and kind of investigate her and have more context for who she is as a person, and not really that she needed to have this big moment of like offering something to the world artistically. It's her finst Oh my god, you're so right, Blue Banisters, and maybe like, okay, here's here's what it is. Cam Trails is her close friends and Blue Banisters is her finstuff. This is one. This is just one for people that want a little

bit more context. Um, what what is your what's what is your distinction between? Because do you think like a Finster is like Close Friends is like here's stuff that I'm going to share that's I wouldn't put on Maine, but like it's still if you screenshot it, my name is still there. So it's got to be okay a certain level. Whereas Finster is full mass. Yes, Finster is Finster is like top secret. Um, Finster is like I mean, I don't even really use my Finster anymore. Um, very

miss Rose, bring it back. I used I used to love your Finster. There was some I used to I've gone back for it onto your Finster so many times, every every time that I've been prescribed prep there you had on your Finster like a girl with like a little like tank top that said bare back Princess. And I would go every time, screenshot it and then send it to Gaze. I'm so glad that I'm glad that it exists as a community resource well exactly like weibnisters. Yeah. Close,

I would say that Close Friends has more. I utilize it more. Now is like farming for like opinions from people that I actually know IRL or I guess, okay, here's by close friends. I will only add to it people who I actually know in real life or like Internet friends that I feel comfortable sharing like a slightly more personal level of my social media experience with. And then Finster is like for the girls, and that's it.

Like I have to have actually like spent time with you in real life and like be somewhat confident that you would not share my personal information with someone. Well what realistically for me with Finsters and with close friends, I have to be convinced that you are mentally ill like I am. Yes, actually to be the same kind of like you know, atypical, you know, like I feel like I feel like, um, there's a for me like close friends. I hate it that it's called close friends

because it's not my close friends. No French. I use it definitely as like a control almost like a controlled audience.

Like I don't really love posting things to like, you know, thirty thousand people, fifty thousand people or whatever, and so I think it's more like everyday like shit posting kind of like embarrassing date thing that happened that I'll share on close friends to a lot of people that I maybe have not met but like I know are good like Internet sisters, and then finstas like I'm posting my completely unsharable like dank memes like and like also I think I go there to like talk shit, because usually,

like I don't want stuff on close friends if it can like travel, you know the I don't know if either of you have done this, but I'm going to confess it here. The most unwell use of my close friends ever is when I've taken all of my actual friends off close friends, put one person that I think is hot, and then put like basically a semi news that's diabolical Stan very Lana. I was going to ask, y'all,

so what is it about Norman fucking Rockwell? I mean, I think lyrically, I mean like lyrically it is like stunning, Like I mean the fact that like it just the opening like opening with goddamn Manchild, you fuck me so good. I thought I almost said, I love you, like what an opening to an album, But also like Mariner's Apartment Complex is like one of the I just think one of the most gorgeous songs that I can think of, you know, of this century that's been written like um right,

like it makes me want to cry. I was it like, um, you're lost at sea, our command your boat to me again if I misquoted that anyway, Like it's just pretely butchered that when I've been it's one of the most beautiful lyrics. But yeah, it's just I just think it's like lyrically, it's just gorgeous and it's sonically lush. It feels extremely vulnerable in a way that this artist, who I think started her career as being like a heightened like version of herself, like created this sort of persona.

It feels very stripped back. It's very like my most personal album yet vibes, but like it actually was, and yet you can plug into it so easily. It really is some of the best things she's ever had to say about womanhood in like the Perfect Vehicle. Yeah, I mean from that, it's like everything on Norman fucking Rockwell too. This is the experience of being an American whore, Like there is just like holding hands they go together, I mean American. It's the experience of being an American horror.

That line it's like such a like Lana del Rey algorithm generated like lyric and yet like as as so many are, and yet it works so well. Like and you know, the aesthetic through line of Norman Ruckle is just perfect for her. It's like classic Americana to the point of like a kind of weird chooginess, like almost like a dystopian like happy nuclear family kind of thing that I don't know, it just it just worked so well when I when it was announced and when I

was listening to it. It is a crystallization of everything she's ever done. I remember in like twenty twelve when she was first round. I remember my a really good friend of mine at the time saying they're not my

friend anymore because of this. No they they said something like, oh, I really like how long could she keep basically this up, like this kind of nostalgic but this idea that she would be kind of like on one album Wonder And it always I always think of it about like, actually, how the longevity in her career and the idea that like, I guess it returns to my earlier point about how she was received, but this idea that it was a stick that was going to come to an end, when

in fact she's really only kind of deepened it. There's been like full arcs within it where she's returned. But also like we haven't really mentioned Billy Eilish, but like the very fat that there are so many, there's so much Lana del Rey progeny now that like these artists raised Billy Eilish. You know, there would be no Billy Irelish without Lana del Ray, which Billy said in that interview magazine interview when she interviewed Lana, I didn't know that. Yeah, okay,

question for the culture. Fuck Mary, kill Lana albums, Lana albums, Lana Eras. Sorry, I'll sorry, Yeah, okay, you go, Mary Norman fucking rock Well, fuck ultra violence kill lust for life. Okay, I won't do this. I won't do the same as you and Mary. I would. I would realistically, I would marry Um Norman fucking rock Well too, But let's say because I would maybe fuck Born to Die. I love Born to Die. I love I love cocaine and old

cock as a kind of motif. Um not not not literally anymore, but I I Yeah, so I feel like I still find the kind of glamor, of Born to Die, like it's often one that I will still put on when I'm putting on my makeup. So I would probably fuck that. I would probably I have to marry Norman fucking rock Well. It was my breakup album, and then I would kill Lust for life. Like I'm sorry, I don't I don't think. I don't think I've ever like apart from when it like maybe the first month that

came out, I never returned to her. Yeah, doing us duet with the Weekend is the kiss of death for me. That makes me so sad. Well, do you know what we haven't Also is that I actually secretly also love This is quite trashy, maybe for like pure like pure Lizzy grandstands is I still love her old covers like she did for the Maleficent Disney Live action film. She did the same upon a Dream. I still love that.

I love her cover of blue velvet, and I love Young and Beauty, and I love Young and Beautiful for the Great Gatsby film. They're all stunning. Yeah, especially the full orchestra version is so gorgeous. Yeah, when I go to heaven, was it like, please let me take my man. The codependent tease. I love it. Um Okay, Fran we need your fuck Mary Kill. It's it's that cinematic quality. I think to her music that it's like she's perfect

actually for soundtracks in general. She needs to do more soundtracks except for them the Charlie's Angels Charlie's Angels verse on the Remember Okay, I would I'm cheating a little bit. I would kill Kim Trails. Sorry. I would marry Dealer from Blue Banisters specifically because that is a vibe that I could listen to for the rest of my life. And I feel like there's so much about that song

that just like I connected with spirit. It's definitely probably top five Lana songs for me, just because it came I think the right time in my life or whatever. And I think I would fuck like her SoundCloud tumbler era, like I I'm thinking of. She has this song with Asap Rocky called Ryden. I think that I was obsets with in the first in my first year's moving to New York. And I think that that song Pale Moonlight, driving cars with boys dumb dumb, like that is like

the era that I want to like fuck forever. I think Asap Rocky is so Hot in the National Anthem music video Lana's videos, do you have a favorite Lana video? Because you know those I think those are so like so woven in with her music. Yeah, I mean, ride is It's not my favorite song, but it probably is

one of my favorite video. It's just because it, like remarked it's now so it's so genuinely nostalgiic because it's like ten years old, and it was such a specific time where like we're like the gift and like, you know, you get like the BuzzFeed breakdown of of it a well, honey, but Lana was keeping BuzzFeed's light build on, like fought catalog, Like the girlies would not have had jobs if Lana did not give them, you know, content to write about her such a specific era of media like that, when

like Jezebel was kind of the apex of like feminist journalism or whatever. This is what I was going to say about the feminist of because I mentioned earlier about how obviously like she was a like, Lana was criticized a lot for the misogyny or the internalized misogyny rather of her lyrics. At this time when as I say it became popular for like more sort of mainstream female pop artists to have to identify as feminists, whereast it wasn't in the two thousands, really a cool thing to be.

And what I love is that I feel like I don't know, we don't know whether or not, because she's always had this sort of persecuted, I misunderstood thing. But I feel my reading of it always is that Lana went through a phase of trolling. She's always kind of trolled media back. So there's some really like great headlines that there was one where she was asked about feminism and she was like, it really doesn't interest me at all.

I'm much more interested in Tesla and our intergalactic possibility a taste, because you can't if you got it if you're focusing on one. I just, I mean, I kind of it's me when I get asked in press into these here about about the Harry Potter lady. Can we talk about our intercalactic possibilities? Not feminism? Yeah? That's such a And the other good headline that she gave, which was again it was a British interview, was The Guardian.

Here it's Lana del Rey Colon I wish I was dead already love say, oh my god, she was so real for that. I mean that of that, That's why Dealer was so good. She's on there shrieking like I don't want to live, and I'm like, yes, like or of us these like you know lexapro bops Okay, like did you know there's a tunnel under Ocean Boulevard? Fucked me to death? Yes? Please now too dead. It's giving dissociated slay slide into our dms at Like a Virgin for twenty sixty nine to let us know what's your

favorite Lana song album? Are you feeling so Lana del Rey Vinyl right now? Also, make sure that you become a patron at patreon dot com slash like a Virgin. Also buy our merch You can find the links anywhere. Do you follow us, It's very easy to find. We have lots of cute stuff for you to where to

show your virgivity or lack thereof. Next week we have honestly like one of I think one of our best episodes yet with special guest Frankie Grande, who we will be talking about Star Wars with and a lot of nerd shit. Oh yes, It is definitely an episode for gay nerds everywhere. It's it's an episode for gay nerds, it's an episode for arinators, it's an episode for people. Yes, yes, so don't miss don't miss that. In the meantime, follow us at Like a Virgin four twenty sixteen nine. I'm

your co host Rose Damn. You. You can follow me anywhere online at Rose Damnu and I'm Fran. You can find me at France, squish Goo anywhere you like. Like a virginus my heart Radio production. Our producer is Huge Pinter was supporting from Lindsay Hoffman and Micky Tour until next week. Bye