Born to Sing

how are ya?
I’m good, better now.
Good stuff, so, you know the story has been told, over and over again,
in a record amount of time, in the shortest time possible, it’s insane,
so I just want to talk about now,
and just talk about your interests,
talk about what you want to talk about, what do you want to talk about?
Me? I’d like to talk about anything other than myself,
Yeah, I know, what a crazy few months you had huh?
It has been different, yeah.
You have said…
one of the things I really like has been a constant throw out the press
that you’ve had to do is that you said
this has always been something you wanted to do, to make music,
that It really lives and dies with the music, that’s it, the rest is whatever. Right?
I like writing and I like singing, um,
but I’m passionate about it because I enjoy the craft of it,
but I do actually have a big outside life, outside music,
Included in that, in those interests, um film,
I mean, you…you are really into the ardour that feels really cinematic,
I mean when you listen to it.
Well, I’m definitely interested in like having a cinematic soundscape,
like having a record, and I do, I do like film, yeah, I do.
Did it kind of play any role at all, On the album Born to Die?
I mean did you…you mean it’s impossible to make cinematic sound of music
without having a scene in your head, right?
That’s true, you know I think when I wrote the songs,
I was sort of looking back to moments in my past
and trying to paint pictures with my words about the way that things used to be.
And when I met Emile Haynie
who sort of been the famous hip pop producer for the last 10 years,
Could I just stop you there and also point out for those who are listening that
he’s probably the classiest beat maker in New York City.   Emile Haynie
He’s really classy, you know when I met him, when I met Justin Parker,
I feel like I met, um, my music soul mate,
and you know, Emile’s beat plus Larry Gold’s string composition really sort of
started to make it cohesive, kind of gorgeous sound for the entire record.
Because, you know, Emile makes modern day hip-hop soul music, I think.
Yeah, like when I found Emile we were sort of an unlikely duel,
but he knew exactly what I was talking about when
I describe the sound of the record I was trying to bring out,
and we’ve just been, God we are together so much, you know.
I bet you…there’ve been times recently where you wish
you were back in the studio in that safe place with him and just making beats.
Yeah I do, a lot of the time, but you know,
I’ve really found like a musical family within the three producers that I met
and you know Emile’s been amazing, really supportive like,    Emile
he’s not even moving on to another project yet,
we’re still working on like a mix tape to release in the summer.
Awesome, fantastic, we’re gonna continue to talk to Lana Del Rey,
and we’re gonna play right now the track from her new album born to die.
just kinda…how cool is made of that all, by the way?
Just gorgeous, it was crazy.
Amazing, isn’t it? It smells of music in that.
It does, the band was just like in heaven,
Did they check out the Bing Crosby plaque on the wall?
I don’t know if they saw that.
We spoke briefly when you were in New York City once,
shopping on 5th avenue
I wasn’t shopping, I was like sitting on the corner,
and they were all like, oh she now have fancy,
You fancy, you think you get fancy huh?“
I was like, great
So you’re back up here in the UK,
and I suppose given that it was very recent,
we should give you a chance to talk about
what happened last night with the Maccabees,
you know, it’s early for…to be not doing a show,
and it never hurts anybody more than a musician
than has to cancel so what happened?
No one wants to cancel but I just really wasn’t feeling very well
and you know I was…I did the Meadville sessions earlier and afternoon,
pretty much by the end of that I was pretty certain
I couldn’t really go on stage
but like I said I could’ve but you know never really had to cancel the show before…
It’s gone to serious, you hear that?
All of a sudden it got too serious there for a second
all of a sudden it was like the end of The Incredible Hulk for a second,
I would start crying, and you would start crying, and Craig would start crying,
and everyone would cry a little bit,
and we’ve thought better of the end…we don’t wanna go there.
Hahaha
Now that we’re talking about the live thing,
because not everybody necessarily I think should feel
once they make a record they need to rush on and perform it,
I mean if you think about yourself
and the essence of what you are trying to do with your art, with your craft,
and you feel very comfortable in the studio
working with your producers and the people around you,
you know for instance some people when they think about public speaking
it make them wanna throw up
Yeah, most people.
Yeah, I mean how do you feel when…
I mean there’re some musicians for instance,
if I say Dave Grohl one of the thing
you know you look forward to most about being foo fighter is
he goes “pull up and play alive man”!“
But how do you feel when you think about the idea,
if you see your manager come and say “at least do a tour”,
how does it make you feel right now?
Well it kind of depend on the day for me
like obviously like I’m sort of more, you know, like I do well in the studio,
because I like putting things together kind of with my producers and things like that,
but you know ever since I went on the road
and I realized how many people were out there,
I actually feel pretty good you know on the road, I like to travel
but you know I also really like Brooklyn I like being in New York so I miss home
and I…you know it really depends on the show,
like if it was…I probably wouldn’t play a really giant show,
I would probably you know…but so long as they are kind of small I…
I have a good time.
Yeah right, and many who’ve gone before here
whether it’s Neil Young or Bob Dylan or most recently Adele,
these are the artists that say
“look, if there’s nothing interesting what I have to do live, “
then I’m gonna pick and chose how I present that”
have you thought about like making it more special for you in the future?
Yeah, definitely, I mean everyone on my team is totally aware
that I like to cap every venue of 900 people
so yeah those artists are good examples,
people who did things on their own terms,
and I think that people that I involved with like they are involved with me
‘cause I’ll do things the way I want,
what I really cared about was that the record was good, and so I mean…
Too good now, huh?
I know, it’s Ellen, off to their races.
There you go, that horse is bolted, welcome to the modern world.
And this has been an really interesting experience, I wanna talk about that in a sec,
but let just make it light again and let talk about A$AP Rocky,
this guy is just a real breath of fresh air for American rap music,
and I know what a beagle you are as well.
Well, I mean, you know I like the best of the best,
I don’t like it all, but I mean you know like I feel like
energized by yeah like good rap music.
You are a very intriguing character,
you know I just started see your music in the way you know
you are the kind of subject matter of your song I think
you find yourself meeting a hero in some
pretty interesting environments you know.
Oh I like that prediction.
Right. And this’s been an fascinating experiment
watching this all happen from my point of view,
for one very specific reason which is the music that you’ve made,
the art that you’ve tested along all the videos and photographs,
the way that you’ve present yourself be honest or otherwise,
that’s your, that’s entirely your business by the way,
but I believe it’s absolutely honest,
but what is done is it conjured up an essence of time that’s come before us,
and yet it’s found it’s way to people in the most modern way imaginable.
Right
Have you thought about that? And if not, can you now?
Well when I was putting the clips together
like I wasn’t really going necessarily for a vintage feel,
I just knew that I love the quality of vintage film,
but I didn’t think that people would really
think that like a hearkened back to bygone eras so much.
When did you sort of become a digital kid?
Because you grew up in the middle of nowhere,
the internet’s become something that’s changed the way…
you know, everything’s distributed and discovered,
but predominantly music has been completely transformed
and the industry has redefined itself,
I mean when did you sort of become a digital kid
and discovered that it could work for you as an artist.
I mean like in terms of being a digital kid, I had different phases of it,
like I remember when I was 14 years old,
instant messenger came about so like we all met our bf over instant messenger.
It’s like carry a pager of digital isn’t it?
Yeah, I just remembered when that happened
it’s like you just can freaking believe it,
you’re like talking to like the most popular senior in high school
and like “can you sneak the house to meet down the block”,
that was crazy, and then you know,
I didn’t really pay attention to the internet
like I’ve always been a big believer in the internet
know a lot of people who are sort of you know trying to use it
to unify the world in a good way, and make our world one, you know, one small globe community
where information could travel quickly and you know help could travel quickly,
so I mean I never actually thought about in terms of like furthering my music,
I was always putting up music videos on Youtube since I was really young,
just because it was a passion of mine,
I liked editing and things like that,
but I always thought like if anything went well
it’s because someone came to one of my shows,
The traditional approach, “hey that’s good music, I’ll tell someone about it”
Yeah you know I mean that was how I read about
other people sort of getting their music heard, but…
It’s interesting though because now
that’s just a given these days in how we discover music,
but this is a superb saga way here I just come up with in my head,
this is on some broadcasting, this is classic broadcasting material.
Back in the day, you have to rely on classic singer songwriters like
Bob Dylan or John Byer to get the message across you know,
they were the modern day information carriers, back in the day.
Maybe.
They were, I mean that’s to a certain extant how things change works to a song,
you got a track with Bobby Womack on his forthcoming new album,
with Damon Albarn and Richard Russell.
I do
How was that experience for you, working with legend?
It was good, I mean I think they want me to come in after,
like the day they saw me on Jewels,
so really they just you know…
Bobby wanted me to freestyle on just some of the tracks he had,    Bobby
he wanted me to just make a chorus,
so that’s why I did, and it’s been a while now, but it was beautiful.
Well I’ve heard the track
Oh have you?
Yeah, and I can tell you that it’s incredible,
and there’s a note you hit on that song where you go hiiiiiii
and your voice cracks, and I was like “this sounds like Bobby”,
and it’s not, it’s you
Oh shoot
There you go
Hey that’s…I haven’t heard it,
I’m glad they’re gonna use it, you know.
Well fingers crossed, I think it’s amazing, fantastic,
I can’t wait for people to hear that side of you with that track,
it’s gonna be good, interesting.
Lot of things to look forward to, you know,
in terms of this year, ideally having achieved so much in terms of what’s conventionally successful
with lots of people watching Video Games, listening to the songs and the album,
you know, you made it, you did it, congratulations,
you’re a modern day hero,
what do you want to look back on 2012?   2012
And what do you ideally want to have achieved?
I mean I think the same thing, as I sort of wanna achieve every year,
which is just to have no regrets, and live gracefully,
and I wanted to make a good record, and I did that, so that’s cool.
Yeah, you did, and you know I hope you enjoy that process of getting it out,
and the way people react to the music,
‘cause you know as well as I do that’s what really matters,
and thank you very much for your time Lana Del Rey.
Thank you.
And we’ll catch up with you when the time’s right,
you’ve started planning any show out here again in the summer
or is it too early to say?
Um, thinking about festivals, kind of have to figure it out.
It’s nice to talk with you.