It’s not secret that pop music is centered around trend-chasing–but Lana Del Rey has never been one to fit neatly into the zeitgeist. The “Young and Beautiful” singer has carved out her niche as the Pop Girl with her own sound. As Billboard’s latest cover girl, she elaborated on how she exists outside of the formulas that populate the Hot 100.
“I mean, God, I have never taken a shortcut–and I think that’s going to stop now,” she told writer Meaghan Garvey. “It hasn’t really served me well to go by every instinct. It’s the longer, more arduous road. But it does get you to the point where, when everyone is just copying each other, you’re like, ‘I know myself well enough that I don’t want to go to that foam rave in a crop top.’”
Billboard notes that Del Rey’s only top 10 hit on the Hot 100 is a Cedric Gervais remix of her 2012 single “Summertime Sadness.” However, her songs have managed to rack up over 3.9 billion on-demand streams, according to Nielsen Music.
“When we sign [an artist], it’s not necessarily what everyone was listening to, but they had real vision,” Interscope chairman/CEO John Janick told the trade magazine. “Lana’s at ground zero of that. There have been so many other people who’ve been inspired by Lana. She’s massive, she has sold millions of albums, but it always has been on her terms.”
Her unconventional approach to pop initially made her a divisive figure when her viral hit, “Video Games,” launched her to superstardom in 2012. “Sometimes with women, there was so much criticism if you weren’t just one way that was easily metabolized and decipherable,” she said, “you were a crazy person.”
Elsewhere in the story, Del Rey’s team acknowledged her impulsive approach to the recording process. “She doesn’t follow any kind of plan beyond what she feels is right, and it works every time,” her manager Ed Millett said.
Her cover of Sublime’s “Doin’ Time” made it to the tracklist of Norman Fucking Rockwell because it was the right place at the right time. “We were involved in executive-producing the [recent] Sublime documentary because their catalog is through Interscope, and Lana was talking about how big a fan she was,” Janick said. “So she ended up doing that cover, which turned out amazing. But then she felt like it fit the aesthetic of the album.”
Del Rey just released a double music video for her latest singles, “The Greatest” and “Fuck It I Love You.” Norman Fucking Rockwell drops on Aug. 30.
Catch up on all of the lyrics to Lana Del Rey’s biggest hits on Genius now.
