LANA: The Next Chapter in SZA’s Chaotic Love Story
The latest addition to SZA’s iconic discography comes with the deluxe to her 3x platinum record, SOS. Continuing her journey navigating through the messy and unpredictable nature of dating, SZA released SOS Deluxe: LANA, a new 15-song project that is a unique addition to her catalog. With common themes of love, betrayal, heartbreak, and insecurity, this project has some of the same sentiments as SZA’s other projects, but it presents it with some fresh sounds that I haven’t heard from her before. LANA does an adequate job of maintaining a consistent warm tone throughout the tracks, while also spicing it up with 808 drums and fun samples. This doesn’t match the genre-bending sounds of her previous release SOS, which makes the fact that this is a deluxe rather than a standalone album puzzling. It does manage to grasp feelings similar to those of her classic album CTRL while allowing SZA to show the growth within her current sound and mindset.
SZA starts this project with a strong track in “No More Hiding,” speaking on her progress in battling her insecurities. The first lyrics spoken are, “No more hiding, I wanna feel the sun on my skin, even if it burns or blinds me, I wanna be purified within,” which is a fitting way to introduce one of the themes of this project. SZA is known to have a tumultuous history of dealing with public criticism; beginning this album with these lyrics sets the tone of the emotions that will be explored throughout the tracklist. In an interview with Hot Ones, SZA speaks on her interesting choice of wearing the bug mask that she sports on the album cover, she states that “being a person is so daunting,” and she feels that wearing the bug mask “brings (her) so much peace.” This is interesting because her wearing this costume on the album cover almost juxtaposes the initial lyrics. Wearing the mask to cover her true self and hide from public critique is the direct opposite of wanting to “feel the sun on her skin.” Having this is a great way to show the complex feelings that SZA deals with while also showing that this is an ongoing battle that she’s fighting.
A highlight of the project is the third song, “30 for 30,” featuring Kendrick Lamar. SZA and Lamar, both being signed to the label TDE at one point, have many collaborations under their belt but this addition seems to be one of the most unique. Sampling Switch’s 1979 track, “I Call Your Name,” SZA and Kendrick bring a lively back-and-forth flow, which is layered on top of the soulful ballad with strong 808s bumping throughout. The hip-hop/r&b mixed song brings a lot of quotable lyrics. With SZA rapping lyrics such as, “chat, should I fold that bitch no yoga mat,” and Kendrick’s, “you fucking with niggas that’s thinking they cuter than you, oh,” the song brings a fun bop to the album that carries an almost braggadocious tone to it. It’s very different than the other work that they have together on songs such as, “Gloria” and “Luther” which were on Lamar’s most recent project “GNX,” and, “Doves in the Wind,” which was on her debut studio album CTRL.
My personal favorite track, “Love Me For Me,” carries one of SZAs strongest vocal performances with an infectious jazzy production that gets a few seconds to breathe in the middle of its runtime. SZA speaks on her feelings of being unseen in her relationship and her desire to receive the unconditional love that only her mother gives. She repeats the lyrics, “love me for me,” and, “saw me for me,” throughout the song when talking about what she wishes her partner would do for her. This repetition seems to show how often she felt that way within the relationship and it caused her to start going to drastic lengths to show her desire for his attention. She says, “For you, I’ll change my name, for you I’ll kill my fame, for you I’ll be so different, won’t recognize my face,” which is a very powerful run because she is describing a common problem of self-neglect and insecurity that many people will do to try and receive the love of another. She then concludes the song by coming to the realization that, “it’s time to love me for me.” This song shows a change in her mindset from one of her previous songs where she is dealing with the same issue, “Supermodel.” In that song, SZA also speaks about how she could be her lover’s supermodel, “if (he) seen it in (her).” With the way that she concludes this song, it seems like she has learned the lesson needed to grow from that mindset and begin to love herself the way that she should.
LANA is an impressive tracklist that manages to stand with the other projects that SZA has released. She is able to showcase talented vocals and powerful lyrics that no other artist is currently displaying. The production is nothing to overlook, with contributions from Michael Uzowuru, Rob Bisel, ThankGod4Cody, and even Lil Yachty, LANA creates its own distinctive atmosphere that is easy on the ears. Highlights on the tracklist consist of the aforementioned, “30 for 30,” and “Love Me for Me,” which will gain a lot of runtime on my playlist with other tracks such as, “Chill Baby,” “Scorsese Babydaddy,” and, “Drive.” If I were to give this album a rating between 1 and 10, I would say 8.5 which is not as high as CTRL (9.7) or SOS (8.8) but manages to demonstrate a high level of quality that is consistent within her discography.
