Lana Del Rey ignited a firestorm a few weeks ago when she told a reporter for U.K. newspaper The Guardian that she wished she were dead already.
In the article, the singer, whose new album, “Ultraviolence,” will debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 this week, brings up Kurt Cobain and Amy Winehouse and admits that she thinks their early deaths help make them more glamorous.
Now, Cobain”s daughter, Frances Bean Cobain, has jumped into the fray to remind Del Rey that when people like her dad die young there”s really nothing glamorous about it.
In a series of tweets posted Sunday night, Cobain, 21, said (we”re stringing them all together here and using her spelling and shorthand): “@Lana Del Rey the death of young musicians isn”t something to romanticize…I”ll never know my father because he died young and it becomes a desirable feat because ppl like u think it”s “cool”…Well, it”s fu**king not. Embrace life because u only get one life. The ppl u mentioned wasted their life. Don”t be 1 of those ppl.”
Cobain then responded to a Twitter poster who wanted her to lay off Del Rey, who, herself, took to Twitter last Thursday (in tweets since deleted) to say the reporter”s questions “about death and persona were calculated…I regret trusting The Guardian.” The reporter has posted the audio of the interview on SoundCloud so people can hear it for themselves.
Cobain didn”t back down, however, and in a measured, mature way, answered “I told her to not waste her life. How is that attacking. I literally said embrace this life because u only get 1.” Cobain then tweeted to Del Rey, “ur too talented to waste it away.”
Those tweets have all been taken down. The only one that remains is one from Cobain saying, “I'm not attacking anyone. I have no animosity towards Lana. I was just trying to put things in perspective from personal experience.”
I'm not attacking anyone. I have no animosity towards Lana, I was just trying to put things in perspective from personal experience.
– Frances Bean Cobain (@alka_seltzer666) June 23, 2014
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Del Rey, who has not publicly responded to Cobain”s tweets, has the right to say whatever she wants, but should realize that she has many young fans who take her dead-eyed persona and her words very seriously.
Should Del Rey decide that dying young really is glamorous, imagine her dismay at knowing she”s too old to join the 27 Club… that”s how old Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain and Amy Winehouse all were when they died.
Del Rey turned 28 on Saturday (21).
Was Cobain right to take on Del Rey?