Lana Del Shares Instagram Post Defending Her Music Against Critics

Lana Del Rey logged on during the early morning hours of May 21 with a lot to get off her chest. She posted a personal statement to Instagram, announcing that her forthcoming record is slated for a September 5 release and that her two books of poetry are coming out through Simon & Schuster. Unfortunately, Del Rey buried the lede on this one, and the aforementioned statement kicked off with a winding defense of her music against glamorization of abuse, feminism, and potential jabs towards her pop music peers.

Del Rey expressed her frustrations that artists including Doja Cat, Ariana Grande, Camila Cabello, Cardi B, Kehlani, Nicki Minaj, and Beyoncé are able to have hit songs about "being sexy, wearing no clothes, fucking, cheating, etc," but when she does it she's "crucified" and demonized as glamorizing abusive dynamics. "Can I please go back to singing about being embodied, feeling beautiful by being in love even if the relationship is not perfect, or dancing for money?"

"I’m fed up with female writers and alt singers saying that I glamorize abuse when in reality I’m just a glamorous person singing about the realities of what we are all now seeing are very prevalent abusive relationships all over the world," she wrote. "With all of the topics women are finally allowed to explore I just want to say over the last ten years I think it’s pathetic that my minor lyrical exploration detailing my sometimes submissive or passive roles in my relationships has often made people say I’ve set women back hundreds of years."

One of the alt singers in question could be Lorde. As reported by The Guardian, Lorde mentioned Del Rey in a 2013 interview with The FADER: “She’s great, but I listened to that Lana Del Rey record and the whole time I was just thinking it’s so unhealthy for young girls to be listening to, you know: ‘I’m nothing without you.’ This sort of shirt-tugging, desperate, don’t leave me stuff. That’s not a good thing for young girls, even young people, to hear.”

Del Rey said that her songs are honest and optimistic about the "challenging relationships" she's experienced, and that her expression of sadness had her lambasted by critics as "hysterical" as if it were the 1920s. "I just want to say it’s been a long 10 years of bullshit reviews up until recently and I’ve learned a lot from them," she said. "But also I feel it really paved the way for other women to stop ‘putting on a happy face’ and to just be able to say whatever the hell they wanted in their music."

Read Del Rey's full statement below.

Question for the culture:

Now that Doja Cat, Ariana, Camila, Cardi B, Kehlani and Nicki Minaj and Beyoncé have had number ones with songs about being sexy, wearing no clothes, fucking, cheating, etc — can I please go back to singing about being embodied, feeling beautiful by being in love even if the relationship is not perfect, or dancing for money — or whatever i want ––without being crucified or saying that I’m glamorising abuse???????

I’m fed up with female writers and alt singers saying that I glamorize abuse when in reality I’m just a glamorous person singing about the realities of what we are all now seeing are very prevalent abusive relationships all over the world.

With all of the topics women are finally allowed to explore I just want to say over the last ten years I think it’s pathetic that my minor lyrical exploration detailing my sometimes submissive or passive roles in my relationships has often made people say I’ve set women back hundreds of years.

Let this be clear, I’m not not a feminist – but there has to be a place in feminism for women who look and act like me — the kind of woman who says no but men hear yes – the kind of women who are slated mercilessly for being their authentic, delicate selves, the kind of women who get their own stories and voices taken away from them by stronger women or by men who hate women.

I’ve been honest and optimistic about the challenging relationships I’ve had.

News flash! That’s just how it is for many women.

And that was sadly my experience up until the point that those records were made. So I just want to say it’s been a long 10 years of bullshit reviews up until recently and I’ve learned a lot from them

but also I feel it really paved the way for other women to stop ‘putting on a happy face’ and to just be able to say whatever the hell they wanted in their music —

unlike my experience where if I even expressed a note of sadness in my first two records I was deemed literally hysterical as though it was literally the 1920s

Anyways none of this has anything to do about much but I’ll be detailing some of my feelings in my next two books of poetry (mostly the second one) with Simon and Schuster. Yes I’m still making personal reparations with the proceeds of the book to my choice of Native American foundations which I’m very happy about. And I’m sure there will be tinges of what I’ve been pondering in my new album that comes out September 5th.

Thanks for reading

Happy quarantining