Some of Lust For Life's songs are about Barry O'Neill

[StrawberryBlond 13,263]

I know this album has been out for well over a year but I never put this opinion out there until now. Because I thought everyone was of the same opinion. But recently, I've seen some references to songs from this album and saying that they're about G-Eazy, Lana's recent ex. As far as I'm aware, In My Feelings is about him, although there's never been any confirmation of this, it was just a feeling a lot of us fans had. But I gather that Lana wasn't even dating him that long enough to be inspired to write many more songs about him. Right from the beginning of hearing this album, there were certain songs that I just knew instinctively had to be about Barrie O'Neill, who was one of Lana's longest ever relationships. They broke up before she released her third album, Honeymoon, so naturally, you'd imagine a lot of songs on that might be about him. But really, I didn't get that feeling at all, it was more references to her most current relationship. But with Lust For Life...it was like she was truly mourning the loss of her relationship with Barrie for the first time and was admitting that she still felt like he was her one big love that she let get away. Here's the songs I believe reference him and why:

13 Beaches - This is a song about moping over a past relationship and Lana saying that no matter how she tries to find herself and lose herself in other things: "It hurts to love you, but I still love you, it's just the way I feel. And I'd be lying if I kept hiding the fact that I can't deal." This suggests she's pining for someone she broke up with some time ago but can't let his memory go. She even says: "can I let go and let your memory dance in the ballroom of my mind, across that county line." Barrie's originally from Scotland but moved to America and perhaps he's living in the same state as Lana now?

White Mustang - This is probably the most obvious example. This song, as discovered from fan detective work, was a replacement for Best American Record. When the official video for the song came out, many fans commented that the visuals didn't match up to the words, especially in the latter half, where an uncredited instrumental plays over the video. They found the demo for Best American Record, which had been discarded from the album and put that song over the video and found it matched perfectly and matched the visuals right up until the end as this song is longer. We believe this is Lana's message to us that she dropped the song for whatever reason but this would've been the visuals for it otherwise. I strongly suspect that she thought Best American Record was too personal and too much of a "diss track" to Barrie and couldn't do it. The lyrics of Best American Record match what Lana went through with Barrie - he left his band to be a soloist and moved to California with her, where he worked on his solo album but they split up before he released it and it flopped badly. Lana's pretty much referencing throughout how he was too busy working on his magnum opus that he had no time for her and that's how they broke up. White Mustang is a lot more subtle but references similar ideas of being disappointed in a past love who couldn't give her what she wanted. She even says: "I couldn't stop the way I was feeling the day your record dropped." When Lana sang this live in one city, she shouted afterwards: "And it wasn't even that good!" which some took to be a diss towards G-Eazy. But personally, I don't think the timelines fit. G-Eazy was a new relationship and he released albums in 2015 and before and his most recent one was released in late 2017, after Lust For Life, so there's no way he and Lana were dating before 2015. Barrie's only solo album was released in 2016, leaving plenty of time for Lana to write a song about him for her 2017 album. And personally, I could totally see someone like Barrie riding a classic, retro car like a white Mustang, as opposed to a modern rapper like G-Eazy who might prefer a flashy sports car.

Tomorrow Never Came - Kinda like 13 Beaches, Lana is mourning a lost love, potentially one who she asked to meet her "in the city on a park bench," so they could talk over maybe trying again. But he stood her up and she realised their relationship was never going to be rekindled. I think it totally sounds like the kind of song she would have made with Barrie if they were still together, it's his kinda style. And she even references the fact that she's got Sean Lennon's vocals on the track, seemingly saying to him something like: "You maybe thought I'd never make it on my own, but I've got a big name featured on my track and you never have." Again, I imagine that Barrie would have looked up to The Beatles and John Lennon and been jealous of the fact that Lana managed to get one of their offspring to feature on her song.

Heroin - While one of Lana's many metaphors for fame and decay, this could totally be referring to a past relationship that she still pines for. "I put you on an aeroplane, destined for a foreign land, I thought that you'd come back again to tell me everything's ok" could potentially be a reference to her saying goodbye to him when he left her in California to fly back to Scotland but he never came back to visit her.

 

What do you think? Like many fans, I liked Lana and Barrie together and was sad when they broke up. To me, this seemed like an overdue love letter to their past.