Norman Fucking Rockwell!

Released

On her fifth or sixth album, Lana Del Rey goes for a widescreen version of Seventies singer-songwriter soft rock, and gets as close as she’s ever gotten to transcendence while also offering some of her funniest, most acerbic lines (“God damn, man-child/You fucked me so good I almost said ‘I love you’”; “They mistook my kindness for weakness/I fucked up, I know that, but Jesus/Can’t a girl just do the best she can?”). Amid the gently picked acoustic guitars and romantic strings, there are moments of genuine weirdness, like the second half of the nearly 10-minute “Venice Bitch,” much of which is taken up by a squiggly prog-AOR synth solo. Then there’s the fact that she calls a song “Cinnamon Girl” that owes exactly nothing to Neil Young, but offers an earnest cover of Sublime’s “Doin’ Time,” not changing a single word of the lyrics and thereby indicating with perfect clarity which artist means more to her.

Phil Freeman

Suggestions
Ten Silver Drops cover

Ten Silver Drops

Secret Machines
Slowdive cover

Slowdive

Slowdive
Magic cover

Magic

Bruce Springsteen
The  Haden Triplets cover

The Haden Triplets

The Haden Triplets
Complete Mountain Almanac cover

Complete Mountain Almanac

Complete Mountain Almanac, Bryce Dessner, Rebekka Karijord
Aja cover

Aja

Steely Dan
Joan Armatrading cover

Joan Armatrading

Joan Armatrading
PRE PLEASURE cover

PRE PLEASURE

Julia Jacklin
Loom cover

Loom

Fear of Men