It’s only been a few weeks since Lana Del Rey released her long-awaited effort Chemtrails Over The Country Club and she’s already readying her next release, complete with some questionable cover art. After teasing a snippet of her next project, titled Blue Banisters, Del Rey has now surprise-released three tracks from the project.
Del Rey returned Thursday to share the tender singles “Wildflower Wildfire,” “Blue Banister,” and “Text Book.” According to Pitchfork, “Wildflower Wildfire” was co-written and produced by notable Kanye West collaborator Mike Dean. Each of the new songs are aligned with Del Rey’s signature music style: slow-paced, sultry, and sparse when it comes to the instrumentation.
Along with gaining attention for the unannounced releases, fans were quick to critique the singer’s choice of artwork. Del Rey’s other albums lean on professionally taken imagery, but the graphic for each new single is a different edit of the same selfie Del Rey previously unveiled as the Blue Banisters cover art. The photo looks as though it was taken from inside her car and is highly stylized with saturated colors, odd textures, and curly fonts.
Lana Del Rey just randomly uploading 3 singles on a Thursday with no promo using the same selfie for each cover that she knows everyone hates. Loves it. pic.twitter.com/vUY8MwFHTj
— Lowri Angharad Williams (@lowriangharadw) May 20, 2021
https://twitter.com/garfieIdfilms/status/1395429458585214979
https://twitter.com/cadelynxuy/status/1395425038296289285
me disguising myself as a rat in lana del rey’s house do i can delete picart from her phone when she’s sleeping https://t.co/tsVEjpfG4s
— abbi (@abbipaperbag) May 20, 2021
Blue Banisters is currently slated for an early July release. Along with previewing the sound through a handful of singles, Del Rey previously stated that the effort will “challenge” the idea that her “career was built on cultural appropriation and glamorizing domestic abuse.”
Listen to “Wildflower Wildfire,” “Blue Banister,” and “Text Book” above.
Blue Banisters is out 7/4 via Polydor.