Lust For Life analysis
Lana Del Rey’s album Lust For Life tells a story of the shift within herself that is symbolic of her growth individually, instead of focusing on outer circumstances. She hones in on her perception of herself and the life she wants to live. The album is overarchingly representative of a new era she’s entering and depicts her life coming intensely full circle from Born to Die (her first major-label debut album) to having a lust for life.
Lana mentions that this is an album dedicated to her listeners and how prior, all her music was made for herself. This disposition of shifting her gaze from herself to the world around her results in songs such as “Love” or “God Bless America - And All The Beautiful Women In It”. Even within the first lyrics of the first song on the track, Lana is already emphasizing the importance of youth and the significance they hold:
Look at you kids, you
Know you’re the coolest
The world is yours and you can’t refuse it
Her songs focusing on youth and their value also hold some spiritual weight which could signify the growth in her own spiritual journey. For example, in “Coachella - Woodstock In My Mind,” she sings:
I’d trade it all for a stairway to heaven
…
I’d trade the fame and the fortune and the legend
I’d give it all away if you give me just one day
To ask Him one question
Significantly, however, the greatest story is told through the final three songs on her album: “Heroin,” “Change,” and “Get Free.”
Heroin is literally a story of her ex / friend, Rob Dubuss, who died from a heroin overdose in 2011 (also some linkage to Dark Paradise). But this song is also deeply representative of her own experience symbolizing the numbing allure of fame. Although there are multiple personal meanings to this song and lyrics, listeners are able to embody it still by attributing it to their own life and sufferings, and attempting to numb those feelings. She finishes the song with these altered lyrics, shifting the focus inward to embody her own thoughts / life she’s living:
I’m flyin’ to the moon again, dreamin’ about marzipan
Taking all the medicine to take my thoughts away
I’m gettin’ on that aeroplane, leavin’ my old man again
I hope that I come back one day
To tell you that I really changed, baby
And this leads into “Change.” This song was written the night before the album’s submission deadline and truly captures her raw feelings. The lyrics symbolize the change in view she’s having towards herself and is representative of the new era she’s entering of authentically wanting a change and maybe not knowing what that is or what that means but understanding its significance. And wanting to want it. She sings:
Maybe by the time Summer’s done, I’ll be able
To be honest, capable
Of holdin’ you in my arms without lettin’ you fall
When I don’t feel beautiful or stable
Maybe it’s enough to just be where we are, because
Every time that we run, we don’t know what it’s from
Now we finally slow down, we feel close to it
There’s a change gonna come, I don’t know where or when
But whenever it does, we’ll be here for it
This song is about acceptance in not knowing but understanding the why. She’s expressing her desire to find the inner strength to be reliable and supportive. It also instills hope that people are powerful beings and can see change from a positive lens even if that change is painful because there is beauty in suffering.
And finally, we enter into her last song on the album, “Get Free.” This was initially supposed to be a song depicting her story up until that point but at the last minute, she decided to change it to be about wanting to change for the better and moving out of the black and into the blue. Not only is this a beautiful entryway into her next album, NFR, but it is a beautiful representation of storytelling, going from hopelessness and despair to understanding there needs to be this need for change, to then the awakening of wanting a new future and hope for that potential. As she sings, ‘Finally, crossing the threshold,” it expresses how long this change has taken and this longing for something different. The authenticity of this song displayed in the lyrics she sings:
I’m doing it for all us who never got the chance
…
I wanna get off, but I keep riding the ride
I never really noticed that I had to decide
To play someone’s game, or live my own life
And now I do
I wanna move
Out of the black
Into the blue
Lana references her song “Ride” from her Born to Die: The Paradise Edition album by acknowledging that she has grown mentally exhausted from the ride she’s been stuck on and has finally realized the power she has to choose herself and her own life instead of playing someone else’s game. In this moment, she’s representing all of us by choosing the blue, and gives her listeners an inspiring feeling that they can do the same. We all can choose to move into our own blue, and Lana beautifully describes that realization in this album’s crescendo.
The reason this album holds so much significance is because until this point, Lana’s music has always revealed this inner struggle of whether to live a life for herself or for the men and relationships around her. This album represents her breaking point of realizing she can no longer continue with the mindsets that have defined her life leading up until now. She knows what she needs to do and recognizes the new trajectory her life can take, it’s just about having the strength to commit to that. This realization is deeply relatable, as it almost takes immense suffering and difficult circumstances to finally reach that place of inner peace. Moving forward does not necessarily mean entering some kind of a perfect or effortless life. Rather, it means a new perspective and finding hope in something greater than what once defined you. So, with that being said, out of the black and into the blue.