Hear Lana Del Rey’s Sprawling New Psych-Pop Song, ‘Venice Bitch’
Lana Del Rey unveiled a potent new song, “Venice Bitch,” which is expected to appear on her next album, Norman Fucking Rockwell. The album is slated to arrive early next year.
“Venice Bitch” is a sprawling 10-minute cut co-wirtten with Jack Antonoff. The track starts as an tender ballad, with Del Rey unspooling her unique mix of young love and contemporary Americana over an acoustic guitar and subtle strings: “Ice cream, ice queen/ I dream in jeans and leather/ Livestream, I’m sweet for you/ Oh god miss you on my lips/ It’s me your little Venice bitch.” Halfway through, though, “Venice Bitch” transforms into an airy psych-pop jam that coasts to a cerebral, polychrome end.
“Venice Bitch” follows “Mariners Apartment Complex,” another collaboration with Antonoff released last week. During an interview with Zane Lowe, Del Rey spoke about working with Antonoff, saying, “We sat down in the studio in New York and he kind of started everything. He would just play chords for hours. He’s so good at piano, some of the stuff he writes just melodically is really kind of classical and in my case it ended up turning more folky. He made it really easy for me to just riff over everything he was doing. In our first week I had two songs I just thought were maybe two of the best songs I had written. He just has a lot of truth in him.”
Elsewhere, Del Rey discussed how she settled on the album title, Norman Fucking Rockwell. “So the title track is called ‘Norman Fucking Rockwell’ and it’s kind of about this guy who is such a genius artist but he thinks he’s the shit and he knows it and he like won’t shut up talking about it,” Del Rey said. “So often I ended up with these creative types or not or whatever and you know they just go on and on about themselves and I’m like yeah, yeah. But there’s a little bit of merit to it also. They are so good. I just like the title track so much that I was like ok, I definitely want the record to also be called that.”
Del Rey also spoke about the numerous other projects she’s working on, including a book of short stories and poems titled, Violet Bent Backwards Over the Grass. Del Rey teased more new music as well, suggesting she might put out another track in October.