Skip to Content

Well, if you were wondering why every love song on Lana Del Rey’s new album sounds more like a funeral dirge, we may have an explanation for you:

Lana got engaged to Barrie-James O’Neill earlier this year, but the gloomy chanteuse revealed in a recent interview that she and O’Neill are “currently not together.”

Asked to elaborate, Lana stated, “He is a wonderful person. But there are some things with which he has to deal. I will not explain it in detail. I no longer felt free. We’ll see how it goes.”

We suppose the news isn’t entirely shocking, as Del Rey’s latest album, Ultraviolence, is filled with musings about breakups and bad relationships. 

Still, Lana (real name, Elizabeth Grant), seems to have adopted a carefully constructed public persona, and has even been accused of playing a character to make herself more marketable.

As such, many interpreted the doom and gloom sound of her latest release as a bit of artistic license on the part of the “Young and Beautiful” (and wildly successful) songstress.

While an entertainer’s personal life shouldn’t affect our opinion of their work, in light of the revelation that Lana’s engagement came to a sudden end (she hasn’t specified when the split took place), songs like “Shades of Cool” seem more authentically heartfelt.

Lana found herself at the center of a controversy last week when she commented that she wishes she was dead during an interview with a UK newspaper.

Here’s hoping Ms. Del Rey recovers from her current funk…but not so much that she can’t keep churning out bleak heartbreak ballads.