01.

I clean the house
I put all your books in order
I make up a colorful border
I clean my mouth
‘cause froth comes out
send it up on fire, death before dawn

02.

I work all day and I think of you
I dream all night and you’re there too
I’ll wipe you ass and do your dishes too
you know it’s all I ever wanted to do
I know that you’re saying it’s common
and I know what you’re saying
but we don’t talk about it

03.

it’s you, it’s you, it’s all for you
everything I do
I tell you all the time
heaven is a place on earth with you
tell me all the things you want to do
I heard you like the bad girls honey, is that true?

mootpoint:

supergalaxy:

“…as far as we understand the harshest criticism of Del Rey, it’s not that she’s “wanting and taking like a man,” it’s that she’s “wanting and taking” just like a stereotypical, anti-feminist conception of a woman: That is, she isn’t wanting at all; she’s existing only as an object of desire, completely in thrall to the male gaze.”

i really don’t expect guys to like lana. she hits on a nerve that is entirely coated in estrogen for me. the fantastical things she says make me sink into a subdued revelry that is so hard to explain.

it’s the feeling i get when i watch the hours or reread virgin suicides. they get whatever hard-to-pinpoint feminine struggle it is that sorta floats around like that cloud guy who chucks spiky turtles at you in mario games.

she’s like this odd swan that is just gooey with femininity. she’s a summation of female fantasies as well. she’s hardly racy—in fact, i find her quite elegant. and brash. i like both qualities. they make smoking and listening superbly fun.

maybe it’s just me growing into myself.

also, what wouldn’t be considered behaving in response to the male gaze? would she have to don turtlenecks, tattoos, unwashed hair? this isn’t meant to polarize, i really am sincerely asking.

i don’t know why i feel the need to constantly be on her side. mysteries!

I think it’s great that people are engaging with Liz Phair’s French Feminist WSJ editorial, but I really feel like having a dude write about it is kind of missing the point (sorry, Marc Hogan, it seems like you are engaging in good faith and whatever, but the casual way the Phair piece was framed kind of belies how complicated the conversation is about female subjectivity and desire in the heteropatriarchal world, and this is maybe something that might be hard for a lot of dudes to get, because it’s not as easy to explain as violence against women or the wage gap or even the male gaze), it’s just that I feel like the whole Lana Del Rey performance - and I’m basing this almost entirely on the epic beauty of “Video Games” which I have lived, and which I love, (I haven’t heard the rest of Born to Die yet because I’ve been traveling) - is so, so much about Being a Girl and losing. It’s basically “Why Don’t You Love Me” on downers.

Bolding mine, and goddamn. Once, I remember explaining to Matt how our relationships with feminist performance art are necessarily more mitigated by theory and criticism than our relationships with visual arts tend to be, because of the nature of transmitting performance art itself. Stills and archives are inherently curatorial, but feminist performance is more often archived only through theory and criticism. i.e., you will read about it more than you will experience it. This is maybe the first time I’ve had a similar feeling with a pop star: my feelings about Lana Del Rey are so much about the theory (not just the talk, but this kind of theorizing) she generates. Like, I am still only moderately interested in her music, but hearing people say stuff like this feels kind of like the first time I read Peggy Phelan.

karaj:

i was only half-listening to you guys about lana del rey because i only half-listen to everything, it’s my method, and maybe yours, too. and i saw that my ex-boyfriend wrote something about her, because one of you posted it on tumblr; i’m not linking to it because i’m not looking for it, i was serious about not hate reading, i don’t even read the times anymore, ostensibly because he writes for it, but that’s a lie, i actually already didn’t read the times, and now i have a really good excuse not to, because if i say i don’t read the times, who won’t believe i’m just too traumatized? which is all a long way of saying i have no idea what he said, or what any of you have said, except i know that mikki and rgr maybe-approve, even if i don’t know exactly why, but i am sure they are exactly right, because i feel more strongly about this than i felt about early early gaga or ke$ha (who is kinda fucking brilliant but maybe racist i don’t know what the end of that story was). like, this is some actual next level shit, like it’s so smart it’s 3 chapters. plus it reminds me of jenny holzer so it’s like half a dissertation right there. what i’m saying is that this is the epitome of feminist boredom, which is really really real and in our bodies. this is everything about everything and i mean that more than i meant it last time.  

I literally have three reasons why I’m pro-LDR:

1. She had the nerve to only wear one dress on SNL and I can’t even
2. Makeup (really this is a million reasons)
3. People are saying she has no talent or skill, when really I didn’t like her because she has too much talent and skill for my taste, but now I guess I have to be on her team because you know fuck the world

But I still would mostly rather be listening to The Fame. Somehow LDR makes me wish Gaga had better makeup on The Fame and like that’s a big deal.

fyeahqueermusic:

This is an episode of He-Man where some magical singing lady warbles on and on and her song is magical and Skeletor or Evil-Lynn or someone manages to mind control her and use her voice for evil, but then Sorceress snaps her out of it and she warbles some more to defeat an evil tentacle monster and He-Man (no, I don’t know why the tentacle monster is there even though I’ve seen this episode four times).

The reason I post this is because Lana Del Ray was on SNL and was atrocious, like, unlistenable and awful. If you skip to 1:50 in the video that god awful warbling noise made by the singing lady sounds like Lana Del Ray’s warble. Can anyone out there explain the appeal of her? ‘Cause I really, really am not getting it.

Also, you all should watch this episode because it is AMAZING. 

Ughhh, like, I am not an LDR fan but I’m uncomfortable that queer blogs on my dash are regulating the female voice like this because that’s fucked.

I AM NOW A LANA DEL REY FAN. ALSO: THE NERVE OF HER! WITH THAT DRESS! WHAT EVEN!

What the fuck kind of nervy broad doesn’t change her dress between SNL performances? Who is this lady??

I just don’t know how I feel about Lana Del Rey. I think what she does comes with a much, much, much heavier gaze than it would if she was just a straight-up pop star (only intensifying the feeling that maybe I would just be better off listening to The Fame). I think she’s kind of racist and pretty much the class enemy more than anyone else (yes, even more than Gaga). But goddamn, if girl isn’t a singular cosmetic hero I don’t even know.

Would you understand what I meant, then, if I said, in the most feminist way, that I wish she was just a model?

I would like Lana Del Rey better if she was a model.