Norman Fucking Rockwell! by Lana Del Rey

I’m as surprised as you are that I’m putting a Lana Del Rey album on the Top 31. But believe me, this is one of the best albums of the year! You can blame Cat Power for putting Del Rey on my radar, with the wonderful duet “Woman” from her top 10 2018 album Wanderer (#7 that year). Norman Fucking Rockwell!, her sixth release including her 2010 self-titled debut, is the first album of Del Rey’s that I’ve paid any attention to, and I’m so glad I did.

Del Rey is fully embedded in the “sadcore” side of alternative rock (of which Cat Power is the “queen”), and this album does not betray that notion. It’s slow, depressing, and dark, but it doesn’t ever fall into self-loathing or goth (which wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing).

Del Rey, whose real name is Elizabeth Woolridge Grant, has always created music in this vein, with a particular “cinematic” quality to it. The video above, titled “Norman Fucking Rockwell,” takes that to its logical conclusion, turning three of the songs on the album into a 14-minute short film, less a music video and more a parable. It‘s well worth watching the whole thing.

If you’ve not yet heard this album, don’t let whatever your brain associates with the name Lana Del Rey discolor your opinion of it. Put it on, close your eyes, and hear it for what it is: a beautiful, perfectly executed album.

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21. Our Pathetic Age by DJ Shadow
22. Juice B Crypts by Battles
23. Pony by Orville Peck
24. Hyperspace by Beck
25. Eraserland by Strand of Oaks
26. Dogrel by Fontaines DC
27. You’re the Man by Marvin Gaye
28. Big Wows by Stealing Sheep
29. 1000 gecs by 100 gecs
30. In the Morse Code of Brake Lights by The New Pornographers
31. Radiant Dawn by Operators

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