Album Review: SZA - Lana
I know you’ve told stories about me. Most of them awful—all of them true
For a number of years, I had a job that was good until it wasn’t.
And, I mean, that’s how it often goes, doesn’t it? Something works until it no longer doesn’t, and there is really no way to go back to how it was or what it was like before.
The pandemic, certainly, had a lot to do with it—when things were no longer working. When the job was good until it wasn’t. But, nobody wants to hear your pandemic story. Not now. Maybe it’s not entirely too soon for people to feel like they could recount their experiences but it is perhaps too soon for people to wish to listen. And it doesn’t make you special. No, not really. Your belief that you have a unique perspective, or genuinely interesting story to share about your life beginning in March of 2020.
Our lives were similar but they also were not. Our existence were the same but no they weren’t.
We stayed inside. We climbed the walls. We lost our minds. We lost our faith.
We put ourselves at risk. We went to work. We lost our tempers. We lost control.
I had a job that was good until it wasn’t, and during the slow decline until the end, there were moments when I did wonder if the pandemic had never occurred, how would I feel. What would the job be like. Would it still be good. What would my relationship be with my co-workers. Was it always going to end up like this, regardless of what was happening in the world.
We tell ourselves stories in order to live. Nobody wants to hear your pandemic story. And we so often are the heroes within our own stories and what we often lose sight of is that we are the villain when someone else recalls the same events.
I am certainly not the hero of this story. I don’t think I ever considered myself to be.
I had a job that was good until it wasn’t, and it is that last part, when it was no longer working, that I just continued to ride out—a slow, painful decline until it was well beyond the point of being unsustainable. Failure of leadership. Dissolution of interpersonal relationships with co-workers. A frustration and anger that I was uncertain what to do with. A sadness, or sorrow, or a darkness—whatever you wished to call it, that was with me from the time I opened my eyes in the morning until the time that I closed them again at night.
A sadness, or sorrow that made it difficult to breathe.
A sadness, or a sorrow, or a darkness—whatever you wished to call it. A flimsy relationship with my own mortality.
I learn that the idea of reasonable accommodations in the workplace does not include when someone has chronic, passive suicidal ideation.
I had a job that was good until it wasn’t. And I navigate the slow decline throughout the rest of 2020 and make it until nearly the end of the following year, when things were beyond the point of repair. I, despite my best efforts, still have grace shown to me and have not been fired.
So I give notice. I walk away from a job that, for a number of years, was very good. But no longer is.
One of the surprising things about the job, and something that, ultimately, contributing to making it as good as it was was how, for the first few years, I felt very supported in a way that I had not felt before in a place of work. I had never intended to ascend any kind of ladder of any size when I was hired, originally, in a very menial role, but over time, was given more responsibilities that I enjoyed, regardless of my initial hesitations to take on anything more.
Though, I understand some of the weight from those responsibilities did contribute to how impossible it all often felt, in the end.
And I did give consideration, somewhat recently, to trying again. After a number of years of additional missteps and failed attempts to ride things out when it was very apparent the situations in question were never going to improve, there was an opening at my old job—in my former department, for the menial role I had been hired for at the beginning.
I applied. And after two or three days without response, I made what I understand now to have been a mistake.
I still knew people—you could call them friends, maybe, or perhaps better suited now to be acquaintances, or simply people I once knew, who worked there, and I reached out to one of them, and mentioned I had applied, and wanted to confirm if the person who was in human resources when I had departed, some three years prior, was still the person in human resources that I could directly address in a follow-up message, because I had not heard anything, one way or the other.
My former co-worker, and acquaintance, confirmed that yes, the same person was in human resources. And after a long pause in our exchange, and really without prompting, they told me the reason why I had not been contacted for an interview, despite being more than qualified for this specific job.
I am paraphrasing, of course, but I was informed I was considered to be, and still was thought to be, difficult to work with, and that I would easily become upset at “unavoidable things.”
A sobering, and humbling thing to be told. And really, a humiliating thing to be forced to reconcile with.
We tell ourselves stories in order to live. And we so often are the heroes within our own stories and what we often lose sight of is that we are the villain when someone else recalls the same events.
I am certainly not the hero of this story. I don’t think I ever considered myself to be.
You’ve told stories about me. Most of of them awful. All of them true.
*
And this was how, around two calendar years ago, I began writing about SOS, the second full-length album from Solana Rowe—the rapper and singer professionally known as SZA. And this is how, around two calendar years later, I will begin writing about Rowe once again. At the start of SOS, released originally at the tail end of 2022, on the album’s brief, unrelenting titular track, Rowe asks for more time. She doesn’t beg for it. Though, there is a kind of urgent pleading in the way she breathlessly demands, “Gimme a second—gimme a minute.”
And I suppose that, two years later, Rowe is no longer asking for more time, but rather, she is simply taking it, regardless of how that makes you feel.
And there is, of course, consideration to be given to so many things here, with regards to Solana Rowe, and any number of them you could, and perhaps have, found in any other piece written about her, or her recorded output. Like her perceived perfectionism in the studio. Her contentious relationship with her label, Top Dawg Entertainment, and its president, Terrence “Punch” Henderson. The long gestation period between Rowe’s debut full-length, CTRL, and the allegedly delayed arrival of its follow-up, SOS. Her desire to leave the music industry behind completely.
There is, of course, consideration to be given to so many things. Like the life of an album, versus how an album lives. The idea of the “album cycle.” The relationship between artist and listener. And what we, as listeners, or “fans,” continue to unfairly and unwarrantedly ask of artists, even after they continue to give so much of themselves, over and over again.
There is, of course, the consideration to give to Lana—a fifteen-track collection of songs, released two years after the arrival of SOS, marketed, or packaged, as the “deluxe edition” of that album, pushing its combined track list to 38 songs, with a running time of nearly two hours.
I think a lot, maybe more than anyone should, really, about the difference between the life of an album, and how an album lives. The life of an album, especially today, is short. Singles are often released in advance. The album arrives. A tour commences. The tour ends. The album is not forgotten about, exactly, but the momentum that it gathered in the interim certainly recedes. There is, for the artist, perhaps a break before it all begins again.
The listener moves on. Almost always. To the next thing.
How an album lives, though, is different. It is about the moments where we do, hopefully, choose to return to it. It’s about how we continue to find ourselves in its songs. In its lyrics. How we continue to give consideration to the artist responsible. It gives the album the opportunity to grow over time, and if we are lucky, it grows along with us.
There is consideration to give to Lana, an album that yes expands SOS, and certainly renews interest in the album, two years after its arrival, by putting it, and Rowe, back in the zeitgeist as she prepares to embark on an enormous stadium tour with Kendrick Lamar.
It, and again, like its predecessor, or rather, what it serves as a companion piece to, is the alleged product of perfectionism—gestating for two years, and it is a collection of songs that are curiously placed at the top of this reissue, rather than at the end, as “bonus material.” And because of that, and for a number of other factors, Lana, or at least these fifteen additional songs, are bold enough, and confident enough, with even as reluctant as Rowe herself might be, to stand on their own, and be viewed as her third full-length.
*
The first thing that Solana Rowe asks for on SOS in the spiraling, relentless titular track, is more time. “Gimme a second—gimme a minute,” and two years later, she is no longer asking for more time, but rather, she is simply going to take it regardless of how you feel.
Much was made, and will probably continue to be made, during the initial waves of the “album cycle” for Lana, about the amount of time it took for these songs to arrive into the world, as well as how they arrived. A “deluxe edition” of SOS was alluded to at the time of the original LP’s release, in December of 2022, as is customary now with marquee name releases in the world of contemporary popular music—it was originally conceived to have an additional ten tracks, and this expanded edition, or continuation’s title, shifting from SOS to Lana, was revealed well over a year in advance.
Like SOS itself, the release of Lana was not a surprise, exactly, but as anticipation continued to build, when it would arrive was kept under wraps. SOS was announced roughly a week ahead of its arrival on digital platforms—Lana, just two days notice was given.
Much was made, and will probably continue to be made, about the amount of time it took for these songs to arrive into the world, as well as how they arrived. And Rowe asked us, as listeners, for more time, once, and she is not going to do it again. And we, as listeners, unfortunately, continue to ask entirely too much of artists, and performers, even after they have already given us so much of themselves time and time again.
Traditionally, new albums arrive on digital platforms at midnight, eastern time, on the morning of their release—much to the dismay of listeners, and music writers, Lana did not arrive at midnight, but rather, in the afternoon, with Rowe still working away at mixing the album to her satisfaction.
And I have, in the past, though it is something that I certainly do not wish to do often, criticized other music writers—for how they have been dismissive, in the past, of something, or potentially missed the point an artist was trying to make.
And I am remiss to use the descriptor “music journalist,” because that, implies, I think, some objectivity, or a lack of editorializing, specifically in something like a news brief.
In announcing that Lana had, in fact, arrived on streaming platforms during the middle of the day on Friday, December 20th, Pitchfork staff writer Jazz Monroe felt compelled to include his opinion on the delay within the two-paragraph brief shared to the site’s homepage. “To nobody’s surprise, the eternal perfectionist was still tweaking the record when, as expected, it to drop at midnight on Friday (December 20.)”
And in what is presented as a positive review of the album, running on the unfortunate date of January 6th—it’s given an 8.8 out of 10 and the title of “Best New Music,” writer Shaad D’Souza, in the same breath as referring to Lana as a collection of diaphanous new songs, still manages to punch down, and references the delay in release. “It was an early gift from SZA,” he writes, adding, “Which still managed to arrive a little late.”
And we do ask so much of artists. More than we should in a number of cases. Even after they continue to give, and give. It just never seems like it is going to be enough.
Two years ago, Solana Rowe asked for more time. A minute. A second. She’s no longer asking. And I think that the very least we can do for her, as members of her audience, is respect the fact that it takes as long as it takes.
And just be grateful that this shit even exists at all—that Rowe felt benevolent enough, and moved enough, to labor over these songs long enough to feel like sharing them.
*
And maybe it is because I am always reaching. Or stretching. Looking for things that are not really there. Rowe began SOS by asking for more time, and in a sense, begins Lana with a similarly bold declaration that serves as not a response, so much, to her ask from two years ago, but offers commentary on it, as well as where Rowe finds herself now, personally and professionally.
“No more hiding—I wanna feel sun on my skin,” she sings on Lana’s opening track, “No More Hiding.” “Even if it burns or blinds me. I wanna be purified within.”
On the day of its release, Rowe stated on Twitter that SOS was an album about hurting, or being hurt, and that Lana, then, in expanding upon the work, or continuing the conversation, is an antithesis of sorts, because it is about healing. Because there is a want that courses throughout the album’s 15 tracks. A want for physical intimacy, yes, certainly. There is no shortage of thirsty, or lusty moments. But it is a want for growth, or discovery, and to know the self better as you move forward.
It’s complicated. It certainly isn’t easy. But Rowe continues to do it with such grace.
I hesitate to say that SOS, as an album, was hopeless, or inaccessible, but there is a heaviness that, two years later, still hangs over parts of it, and the size of the album alone (23 tracks) can make it feel kind of daunting, or intimidating.
In turn, and even from the moment it begins, there is a sense that Lana is an album that is not, like, hopeful, exactly, but there is more optimism coursing through it, or at least the want for something more, and for things to be better. It, in its scope, is not as intimidating, and sonically, it arrives sounding more accessible, or lighter in a number of places, if that makes sense.
That hope or optimism and that lightness converge as the album gently opens—which, upon reflecting on the kind of dynamism across Lana, Rowe does really well. Gentle. And, I mean, she can construct songs however she wishes—there are, of course, very straightforward, contemporary tracks that skitter along and allow her to demonstrate the dexterity of her range as both a rapper and vocalist, but the moments when she is accompanied by very little are the places where there is a kind of thoughtful intimacy created between artist and listener. The bombast and exuberance that are found in other places are stripped away, and a moment like “No More Hiding” is like her leaning forward to whisper something important.
“No More Hiding” glistens, and moves like a pleasant breeze—the acoustic guitar strings are flicked underneath a buzzy synthesizer melody, with just the slightest amount of static, or crackle, woven in between the layers as an atmospheric element. And the song itself, I suppose, is not a mission statement exactly for Lana, but it does introduce the theme, or notion, of wishing for more. “I wanna be in love for real,” Rowe exclaims within the first verse. “Don’t care what it cost me. I’ll trade anything to feel now.”
The delicate nature of the song’s arrangement allows the thoughtful and searching nature of the lyrics to resonate the further we’re taken. “Everything I love, I gotta let go,” she continues. “Gotta break it if you want it to grow.”
Rowe returns directly, to this kind of self-discovery and growth, in the album’s second half on the jittery and jubilant “My Turn,” which, at least in the earnest way she belts the chorus, is one of the more stirring or powerful moments on Lana.
And it is not a fault of the album, but just something that I continued to take notice of the longer I spent with it, and listened with a more analytical ear, and it certainly does speak to both the time, and the wish to create something that is, ultimately, accessible, but there are a number of places on Lana, “My Turn” being one of them, where the production feels very familiar.
And this is to say I do not believe Rowe is capable of only making one kind of song—I think the dynamism throughout his record, as well as CTRL, certainly, shows the nature with which she wishes to explore aesthetics. But it speaks more to how contemporary R&B and rap sounds, or feels. The skittering kind of rhythm, and the cadence of Rowe’s vocal delivery, is a product certainly of this moment. And that is neither a good nor a bad thing. It is just a detail worth noting, as I think Rowe does try her best to work within these melodies and structures but finds the places where she can push the boundaries out just a little further to make something that is inherently more genuinely interesting.
And there are any number of instances throughout Lana where it is clear that Rowe, with as personal as she wishes to become in her lyricism, is on the journey from hurt to healing, and “My Turn” is perhaps the most clearly declarative moment on the record. It is quickly able to transcend the familiar rhythmic pattern it begins with and becomes something both extremely soulful and triumphant sounding by the time it arrives at the shout-along chorus.
Men, and her contentious relationship with them, appear often in Rowe’s songwriting, and appear often throughout Lana as off-stage antagonists. “Stuck by your side—thin, thick, yeah,” she sings with regret in “My Turn”’s first verse. “Even when you was just some side dick, yeah—put you first even before all my shit.”
The soulful dip that the song takes comes just before it ascends to towering, powerful heights. “If I let you push me off the ledge, too,” Rowe reflects. “Yes, I got regrets, too. And they say life ain’t fair but it’s still forgiving you.”
Rowe, from the way the album begins, and throughout, is looking to take ownership, and the chorus of “My Turn” turns that into an emboldened statement. “My turn—mine to do the hurting,” she exclaims. “Your turn to bear the burden. My turn,” she continues. “‘Cause I deserve this.”
*
Men, and her contentious relationship with them, appear often in Rowe’s songwriting, and appear often throughout Lana as either off-stage antagonists, or foils to her. And in that, the way she writes about them, or addresses them is often blunt—and at times, extremely funny.
Funny enough that, it does make you do a double take, wondering if you heard her correctly.
“I let you do me like a dummy,” she coos suggestively in the second verse of “My Turn.” “Had me lookin’ like mamma raised me on my bummy.”
Rowe’s lust, or thirst, is not intentionally, I don’t think, contained to a specific portion of Lana’s sequencing, so it is a coincidence then I suppose that the songs that do find her to pine, or long, the most, are placed near the first half of the album after it finds its footing.
“Diamond Boy,” similar to the aesthetic of “No More Hiding,” sees Rowe working within a relatively sparse arrangement that, yes, a very slow burning, skittering rhythm does slide in eventually, but overall, it is structured around intricate electric guitar noodling that is a little meandering at times, but there is certainly something soulful to be found in how it wanders around. And in that soulfulness, there’s something tender and also melancholic that resonates throughout.
“I need you poolside,” Rowe begins, not wasting any time with her yearning. “You’ve been on my mind.”
“I like your soft side,” she continues. “I like you on top. You make my thoughts stop. You make being’ me less hard.”
And for as much affection, or adoration, as Rowe displays early on in “Diamond Boy,” there is also a sense of anxiety, and infatuation, that comes later. “When the dick hit, that’s how how you gotta do. I’m addicted—that’s why I keep calling you,” she states right before the chorus, where she begins to surprisingly plead with her foil. “Baby, if it’s OD, tell me. Am I saying too much?”
The pacing of Lana picks up immediately after “Diamond Boy” with the breezy, sensual “BMF,” which, outside of everything else it has going for it, makes clever and subtle use of the melody from “The Girl from Ipanema”—which Rowe interpolates into the first lines of what serves as the chorus, while she recounts her feelings for the men she is describing. “Young, and fine, and dark, and handsome,” she sings with confidence. “The boy from South Detroit keep bossing. And I can’t keep my panties from dropping—he’s so fly.”
“BMF” moves quickly, or at least it sinks along into a very playful, seductive groove almost immediately as Rowe has fun with the cadence with which she sings, and then like, raps and sings, her lyrics, reflecting on her experiences with these young, fine, dark, and handsome individuals. And while yes, she does give in to her lust, the song also is, in some regard, a cautionary tale because for as much desire as there is woven into the lyrics, there is also a bittersweetness to them as well.
“I’m not the one but we can still pretend this can be my man,” she admits in the first verse. “You say you feel different when you with me—tell me anything. Compliment my energy. It’s different laying next to me.”
Something that Rowe has done, both in moments on CTRL (I am thinking of the infectious and dazzling “Drew Barrymore”) and on SOS (the bombastic, angsty heights of “F2F”) is lean into a more experimental, or daring nature in terms of the production and instrumentation—these two moments, specifically, are reminiscent of a kind of nostalgic, 1990s alternative rock, or guitar-driven pop sound that, within the context of those albums respectively, are a revelation. A breath of startlingly fresh and exuberant air.
“Scorsese Baby Daddy” is not nearly as jubilant or bombastic as “Drew Barrymore,” or “F2F.” There is a surprising, and welcomed, downcast kind of alternative rock sound to it—it’s dreamy at times, sure, but it’s also one of the collection’s moodiest tracks. The percussion is a little distorted, and the thudding sound of the rhythm shudders through the mix while a fuzzy, hazy-sounding electric guitar wafts through, snarling on some of the notes it hits before receding.
Of these lustier songs at the top of the album, “Scorsese Baby Daddy” is one where Rowe is in the least amount of control of herself, and what’s happening around her, shouting her observations in the first verse in kind of call and response with herself. “I rolled up all my problems, and then I smoked about it,” she explains. “I could’ve called my mom up—I’d rather fuck about it.”
“Right there, just a little further down,” she coos, before the chorus, before switching her focus. “Got a brand new reason to spiral out. Oh, uh-huh. In a bad mood, baby, come work me out.”
Rowe, as a lyricist, can be very funny and can be very poignant or personal when she wishes to be. There are times when her writing is surprising, in a candid, or blunt way—the expression “I can’t keep my panties from dropping,” in “BMF’ is funny, sure but it is also included, I think, to surprise a little. Or startle. And she does something similar here, in the second verse, of “Scorsese.”
“I would pretend to do my favorite man—he’d call me tasty,” she exclaims, before making what is almost seemingly an aside. “Period is late again. I wonder if I cooked a baby. One day, I’ll understand all that it takes to be a lady.”
The reflection, then, in this kind of loss of control, or the entropy that is surrounding her, comes in the chorus. “I hate to be the one who is doing the most. That’s what it takes, though, so can you be the one?,” she asks. “Can you be the one to love me for—you love me for it.”
*
If, structurally, Rowe has placed the more familiar or accessible sounding material, and the outwardly lustier, or thirstier songs, near the top of the album, the second half of Lana is where you will find the more pensive, or introspective songs, lyrically, as well as the ones that are the most fascinating and genuinely interesting to hear, in terms of their production.
Drifting into a strong, shimmering, psychedelic kind of soulful haze, “Kitchen” makes use of the melody, and samples heavily from The Isley Brothers’ smoldering funk song, “Journey to Atlantis,” speeding up the tempo slightly, then smartly including a dazzling, twinkling progression on the keyboard during the ascendent moment when the chorus arrives, which breaks up the repetition of the sample found within its core.
Lyrically, “Kitchen” finds Rowe turning inward, and grappling with the want to be kind to herself, or heal, and the desire for another—regardless of how bad they may be for her.
“You know we got a real history—that’s no reason I can’t choose me,” she laments. “You know that dick been good to me. You make it hard for me to choose me.”
“You know we got a real history—that don’t mean I’ll let you abuse me,” she continues when arriving at the discovery, and reversal, within the second verse. “That pussy hit like royalty. Must be hard for you to lose me.”
And I am often, I find, more and more, writing about the difference between a “love song,” and a song that is about love, and where the two things may overlap. And I would make the argument that there are really no love songs, in the traditional sense, to be found on Lana—the love for another. Because if SOS was an album about hurt, Lana is an album about healing, with Rowe, as difficult as it might be, working towards a kind of love for herself.
“Kitchen,” then, is certainly a song about love, and all the things, both good and bad, that come along with giving part of yourself to another, which is where we are pulled in the iridescence of the song’s chorus. “Dancing and kissing, the kitchen,” she begins, creating something so vivid, by using only three words. “Makes me forget, I forgive him. Mama told me I don’t listen,” she continues. “Back again.”
And like so many of the songs on Lana, there is no real resolution for Rowe—and perhaps she is not really looking for one.
“So hard to do the right thing,” she muses, but lets it linger at that.
And there are a number of places on Lana, within this second half of the album, specifically, where the production and arranging is the most compelling, that Rowe gives nods, rhythmically, to a different kind of nostalgic sound—heading further back than the 90s inspired alternative rock and guitar pop, to a hazy kind of homage to older “girl groups” producing R&B in the 1960s—tapping into this feeling with an impressive kind of grace and beauty in two different places.
One of those is the album’s swooning penultimate track, “Another Life.”
Opening with the warm, melancholic tones of a synthesizer, as Rowe pleads soulfully, the other elements of the song come slowly tumbling in, like the subtle progression on the electric guitar, and the strong, deliberately paced percussion—the thuds of the bass drum and the quick snapping of the snare spaced out so that the silence that forms in between becomes like an instrument all of its own, or at least holds a surprising kind of weight, or meaning, within the fabric of the song.
“I wanna be right by your side—can’t risk perfection, love is timeless,” Rowe confesses at the start of the song. “Don’t wanna throw, or wait in line,” she continues, before adding, with some remorse in her voice. “I know you’re not the staying kind.”
“Don’t wanna make him nervous,” she continues, leading up to the pensive, urgent chorus. “Did I let you know you got control of me, baby?”
The sense of immediacy and the need to reconcile with the fact that things are not meant to be with the off-stage antagonist she’s addressing continue to build the further along in “Another Life” we’re taken—with the speed of her vocal delivery picking up, and then another kind of call and response, back and forth that Rowe has with herself as she attempts to grapple.
“I don’t wanna be just a shell of me,” she exclaims. “Just another thing in your gallery. I was dumber then, we were young and free. Flaking on my friends, let you fuck on me all night long, til I forget who I was. Lovin’ me, lovin’ me ’til I’m lost—I can’t recover now,” she continues, before arriving at the surprising revelation that she absolutely belts before crashing headfirst into the chorus.
“Self-respect? I’d rather die.”
Even in the doubts that she expresses in “Another Life,” there is this small amount of hope, or optimism, found in the message of the chorus. “In another life,” Rowe admits. “I know we could ride out, boy.”
The first indication, aside from Rowe’s assurances that an expanded edition of SOS would eventually arrive, was the release of “Saturn”—issued as a stand-alone single a year ago and included within Lana’s sequencing as the surprisingly introspective and bleak, but also beautiful closing track.
There is something a little eerie, or chilling, or haunting, but also like very welcoming, and very gorgeous, about the opening melody that plays at the top of “Saturn.” Like it is being broadcast from a music box that was opened in another galaxy—and the song itself, as it unfolds, finds this balance between the sorrow that Rowe expresses in her writing, and the quaint kind of beauty in the production.
Like so many other places throughout Lana, the drum beat to “Saturn” hits hard, skittering and thumping through and resonating deeply—it also creates not a counter rhythm, exactly, but when it comes in, it kind of lags behind or works in an unconventional way, in how it weaves itself into, and around, the swirling melody the song begins with, with Rowe, again, showing how dexterous of a vocalist she is, allowing her words to stretch, constrict, and then float above it all.
There is a rather compelling kind of existential nature to Rowe’s songwriting on “Saturn,” and as it unravels, she ends up working through a lot—or rather talking through a lot, with a definite want to what she’s reflecting on. Like a want for something greater, or something more, for herself, and the wish for a kind of growth and peace within. And I say that she is talking through, rather than working through, because there is no resolution in the end—no answer, easy or otherwise. If anything, a resignation.
“If there’s another universe, please make some noise,” she begins. “Give me a sign—this can’t be life. If there’s a point to losing love,” she continues. “Repeating pain. It’s all the same. I hate this place.”
Like any good pop song, “Saturn” relies on its instrumentation, and how it does glisten, even if sounding a little warbled or off-kilter, as it does so, and a kind of warmth from within the melody, to distract from the darkness, or bleakness of Rowe’s narrative. Because her thoughts only get darker the more time we spend in the world of the song.
“Stuck in this paradigm—don’t believe in paradise,” she confesses. “Don’t believe in paradise. This must be what hell is like. There’s got to be more…stick of this head of mine,” she continues, allowing her voice to skip and swoon the syllables of each word with extraordinary precision. “Intrusive thoughts—they paralyze.”
Later, after the second verse, she alters just a few of the lyrics while managing to fit them into the melody. “Stuck in this terra-dome,” she begins. “All I see is terrible—making us hysterical.”
The wish for something better, or more, or at least an attempted escape, comes from the brief musings in the chorus. “Life’s better on Saturn,” Rowe tells us. “Gotta break this pattern of floating away,” adding later. “I’ll be better on Saturn. None of this matters.”
The resignation comes in the final line of “Saturn”’s second verse.
I gave it all I could.
Because there is often no clear resolution, despite our want for one. Or need for one.
But we, regardless, continue to try.
*
We tell ourselves stories in order to live.
I know you told stories about me. Most of them awful.
All of them true.
And sometimes, it is an entire album that I am drawn to, and feel compelled to sit down with, and find myself in, and then write myself, or my way, out of. Sometimes, there is no question—it is an album so impressive, or captivating, or moving, that I feel a kind of palpable excitement to be able to dedicate the portions of my day, and week, to listening with intention, and collecting my thoughts, then plunking them out onto the keyboard.
Sometimes, it is an entire album that I am interested in, sure. There is a compulsion. But it can be daunting, certainly. I remember at the end of 2022, and into the first part of 2023, feeling intimidated by working my way through SOS and wondering where I may, if I may at all, find faint reflections of myself.
Lana, just taken as a 15-track collection, removed from how it was released and marketed as the “deluxe edition” to an album celebrating two years in existence, can still be intimidating. It moves quickly, and it is often restless. It is about a lived experience unlike my own. And regardless of how often I found myself listening for leisure, in the days and weeks after its release I did wonder if I would have anything of interest, or note, to say about.
Sometimes, it is a single song, though. One that I am drawn to, and feel the compulsion to explore. Even if it is daunting, or slightly intimidating. You make the time and the space. And because of the one song, you are able to catch even the slightest bit of yourself, even in how unflattering, or humbling that might be.
You told stories about me. Most of them awful. All of them true.
Placed well into the second half of Lana, “Crybaby” was certainly a song that I took note of, just in terms of the long shadow of sorrow that hangs over it, during my initial listen of Lana the day after its release, but it is also the song that, the more time I spent within the album, wondering if I could find my way into it and write myself out, that I was the most drawn to, and saw a stark, unflattering reflection of myself in.
“Crybaby,” musically, is the song on Lana that owes the most or perhaps is the most apparent in its homage to a specific sound—a kind of smoldering R&B and soul aesthetic from the 1960s. The entire thing, from the moment it opens with the thick, pointed bass notes, bluesy electric guitar noodling, and warm, mournful electric piano chords, has a gentle, swaying kind of momentum to it, like someone is cradling you, or rocking you slowly, attempting to offer a kind of comfort, even though Rowe’s lyricism here is just absolutely devastating in the kind of unflinching, self-effacing observations she makes about herself.
Rowe, as a vocalist, is a product of modern production techniques—her voice, and range, do not need to be manipulated through the use of Auto-Tune, or other effects in the studio, but they often are. “Crybaby” is not the most noticeable place where you can hear the quivers and warbles rippling through her voice, but they are present, as well as a cavernous reverb, both of which work together to create this kind of very distant, chilling feeling that, while just a tad distracting, do ultimately serve the kind of atmosphere the song is working to conjure.
There is, of course, a terribly sorrowful feeling to “Crybaby.” The tone it strikes immediately creates this feeling of melancholy and regret, and there is a kind of soulful pleading to the way Rowe sings, really only allowing her voice to soar when she sings the titular phrase, as well as the poignant, harrowing, and reflective final lines.
“Maybe, if I stopped blaming the world for my faults,” Rowe confesses in the first verse. “I could evolve. Maybe the pressure just made me too soft.”
Even with as difficult as it is to walk through these observations, the song is smart enough in how it is assembled to not only be, like, warm, and inviting in how it sounds, but also to wander into a slight groove within the way the lyrics just before the chorus are delivered, and the deliberateness of how Rowe’s words land within the rhythm. “All I seem to do is get in my way and then blame you,” she sings. “It’s just a cycle. Rinse. Recycle. You’re so sick—I’m so sick of me too.”
And there is an oscillation that occurs in “Crybaby,” within the towering highs and plummeting lows of the chorus—with an implied reluctance in acceptance from Rowe, for her role in her own unhappiness. Which is, of course, a humbling thing to face, admittedly.
“Call me Miss Crybaby,” she howls. “It’s not my fault. It’s Murphy’s Law,” she explains. “What can go wrong goin’ wrong.” Then, changing the lines slightly in the final chorus to “fuck Murphy’s Law,” and “It ain’t gone ’til it’s gone.”
The heartbreak, and difficult self-reflections throughout do certainly resonate, but it is truly the sobering admission from the song’s final moments that lingers long after “Crybaby” has arrived at its delicate, inevitable end.
“I know you told stories about me. Most of them awful—all of them true.”
We tell ourselves stories in order to live.
We are so often the heroes of our own stories, and what I think we often forget is how, in that regard, we are then the villain in somebody else’s.
But what if we are not the hero of our own story.
Everybody has a pandemic story. Nobody wants to hear your pandemic story. Five years later no one wants to know about the anxiety or fear or anger you felt, day after day, and how it seemed like it was never going to cease. Nobody wants to hear about the version of you, that you could have been, had things been different.
Nobody wants to hear about how you are confident that because of the circumstances, you would up becoming the worst version of yourself.
Difficult and too emotional about unavoidable things.
You told stories about me. Most of them awful. Yet all of them are true.
I’m sick of me, too.
*
Two years ago, in the opening track on SOS, Solana Rowe asks for more time. From us, as listeners, but also I think from herself. But even in the ask, she was ready to take. “All that funny shit aside, I just want what’s mine,” she boasted.
Lana, as an additional 15 songs, and as a gentle reminder of Rowe’s work from two years prior, does not need to be bold, declarative statement—in a sense, I mean, SOS was a huge statement for Rowe, as a performer, who demanded to be taken seriously. CTRL, too, while serving as an introduction to a much larger audience outside of those who had listened to her earliest mixtapes, was just as huge, and bold, and commanding. Solana Rowe will always be a voice that does not ask for your attention but demands it. She may have asked for more time, from us, but we should have, and we should still continue to, give it to her without her needing to even broach the subject.
We ask so much of performers. Always asking for more. Another album. Extra songs. Tours. More more more. Artists give so much already. And we as the audience seemingly are never satisfied.
Lana might be about healing, but it is not about being healed because there is always “the work” that must be put in along the way, and it is arduous, and seemingly never-ending. It is a thoughtful, fun, and yes, bold, boisterous collection of material that offers no real resolution to its larger questions—a reflection of the human condition, and the long way still to go when one is setting out to discover the self.
Comments
Post a Comment