There is an intimacy that comes very naturally to the recent works of Lana Del Rey. Did You Know There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd navigates that with a gentleness and a blur of different eras of style. An immediate chamber-pop presence helps with this particular track, heading up the album of the same name to this single. Although there is particular style and immediacy in the instrumentals of this piece and the vocal range that strikes through too, there is little for the lyrical qualities to weigh up with. A reliance on love for others to feed off of and to take love for the self is core to Ocean Blvd, but it never quite feels deserved or warranted.
Del Rey is still an articulate performer, her vocal range here is soft and engages an intimate style not found on her previous album work. This is a different phase that relies on a blur of the past, and rightly so. There is a bigger, grander feel to Ocean Blvd that cements the track as a thoroughly solid piece. Longing vocals that soon take the gamble of repetition. They do not quite strike through as well as the likes of those Norman Fucking Rockwell! days, but like all great artists, Del Rey has moved onto the next phase and tries not to look back. Even then, her track takes the form of a sombre turn and a traipse through old memories, combining those moments with a reflective period that sees her work here takes an interesting form.
Soft and calming throughout, there is an intimacy found within Ocean Blvd that does not line up with the lyrical stance taken. Being a sucker for violins and string quartets certainly helps with a track like this. Chamber pop charms strike through with those moments, where orchestral, uplifting strings battle against the slower paces and gut-punch beauty that lingers in the vocal style of Del Rey. Ocean Blvd is a track that marks itself as too long, a build-up that takes itself and its presence with far more sophistication than first expected. It is too long in the sense that Del Rey appears to be stretching those lyrics, which do begin to phase themselves in as repetitive, to their very limit. Hoping to stretch them that much further sees repetition utilised frequently, for padding or perfection.
Either way, this is a very solid track and a good return for Del Rey, even though she never went anywhere. Not as convincing as Blue Banisters’ single efforts, not as monumental as Norman Fucking Rockwell!. An artist will always have the unfortunate position of being compared to their previous works, but to their defence, Del Rey has crafted Ocean Blvd to sound, more or less, like most of the other chamber pop woes. It is suitable for those that like it, indifferent for those that don’t. It is strikingly simplistic in that sense, the crashing of string sections and the vocal periods are good, it is the intent and lyricisms that ebb away with little to show for themselves, though.
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