Breathing new life and hope into an entire generation of Tumblr-raised fan girls fond of black and white GIFs of people making out, Lana Del Rey has released a new music video for ‘Ride‘ that pays homage to her favourite source material, the elusive American Dream/freedom/being born to die.
Taken from the deluxe edition of ‘Born to Die‘, ‘Ride‘ is an ambitious ten minute epic poem that’s two parts Sons of Anarchy, one part Easy Rider, a hopeful part On The Road and a whole cup of Lizzie. Bookended by two self-penned monologues that present Lana as a semi-autobiographical club singer, the miniature epic flows in the same vein of LDR’s Camelot fantasies but, thanks to the direction of Anthony Mandler, veers away from an introductory course into which Instagram filter best suits your nostalgic purposes into actually watchable territory. Saying that, it’s still very much in LDR’s oeuvre (freedom, sexual and otherwise, smoking, drinking, wind in my hair, hand on the back of my neck). Some things change, some stay the same.
