18th January 2012
Quote
Del Rey, after all, isn’t the first to take more than one shot at finding a pop persona that worked. Imagine a 1969 Internet reacting to David Bowie’s breakthrough with “Space Oddity”—a single as mannered, languid, and beguiling as “Video Games,” and a performer as in love with artifice and with plenty of past to dig up. Would his career have benefited from blogs tearing apart his inconsistency and torrents bundling his hit with “The Laughing Gnome”?
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Tom Ewing nails it about LDR in his
essay for the Pazz and Jop polls. I didn’t want to like ‘Video Games’, and it really is likely to be the best thing on her album, but regardless of context, it’s a song that I’m glad exists.
