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Lana Del Rey "Blue Jeans" (2011)

Album: “Video Games/Blue Jeans” (Single)

Label: Interscope

Emile: “She’s my favorite new artist. An A&R guy who worked for Interscope named Jon Ehmann, who was early on peeping the kind of shit I’m doing now with songwriters and singers and writing songs, called me and was like, ‘I got this girl, she’s super interesting, beautiful voice, she writes—very talented. I think you should meet her.’ And he’s always been a dude whose ear I’ve trusted.

“Sometimes new artists don’t necessarily know their vision yet, and it takes them a while to figure out what they want to do. Whereas Lana, she came to the studio, and she had her whole shit in her head. She knew exactly what she was, what she wanted her songs to sound like, what she wants to talk about, what she wants her style to be, and what the videos she does herself look like. She’s the total package. She knows her vision. She knows exactly what the fuck she wants to do.

 

Lana, she came to the studio, and she had her whole shit in her head. She knew exactly what she was, what she wanted her songs to sound like, what she wants to talk about, what she wants her style to be, and what the videos she does herself look like. She’s the total package.

 

“We didn’t work the first time we met, we just sat and talked. And she showed me some of the stuff she’d been working on, including that track ‘Video Games.’

Musically, it wasn’t trying to sound like anything else. It was some different shit. She has a new sound. She figured it out.

“Then we set up a session, and she came here. It was one of the first sessions I had at the new studio. She had these chords and a lyric for what became ‘Blue Jeans.’

She had the idea in her head, and she started singing it to me, and I was like, ‘This is amazing. Let’s do it.’ So we sat together and built it up.

“Capturing her sound, and putting the guitars in there, it had a very L.A., Hollywood, 1950s kind of vibe and feel. Like glamour, and that kind of shit. And she’s very creative and hands-on, so it was easy to work with her and write the song with her. And we finished the song, and I kept producing it up, and she liked where it was going. It was sounding new and interesting but still having that classic, vintage music feel.

“She’s a special new artist. I’m producing a lot of her new album. I think it’s gonna be the shit. If I had to bet, I’d put all my money on her.”