Born to Hear Lana Del Rey

I'd been hearing and reading the name Lana Del Rey for quite sometime now and surprisingly the name alone had not intrigued me enough to see what all the fuss was about... until I came across the link to her video "Born to Die" on Vevo. In that moment, bam!, it happened. I had a revelation. I had been taken back to the 50's (which unfortunately, I've never been able to actually experience), a time where mainstream artists included, Judy Garland, Tony Bennett, and Frank Sinatra. Del Rey's sultry, low-pitched, raspy voice captivated me in a way that made me want MORE. Not only are the lyrics to "Born to Die" so perfectly relatable to living young, wild, and free (in the words of Snoop Dogg & Wiz Khalifa) the visual cinematography of the video is also something that is worth watching. Over & over again.

Aside from all the backlash and accusal of Del Rey's questionable authenticity as a 'real' underground, raunchy, avant-garde persona she tries to portray, I for one try not to give in to everyone else's opinion and simply close my eyes or in this case open my eyes, to watch a performance that upholds true potential and talent. Unless we have another case of Milli Vanilli then Lana Del Rey's voice and songwriting is good enough to convince me she is the "self-styled gangsta Nancy Sinatra" she claims to be.

Lana Del Rey's debut album Born to Die is out now on iTunes.