It's not uncommon for interviewees to read what they've actually said, be horrified, and decide that it must somehow be the writer's fault. Yet Lana Del Rey's issues with the recent profile I wrote (among other slightly disturbing statements, she told me I wish I was dead already) are particularly hard to decipher. In tweets posted on Thursday night, since deleted, the singer said: I regret trusting the Guardian. I didn't want to do an interview but the journalist was persistent. Alexis (sic) was masked as a fan but was hiding sinister ambitions and angles. Maybe he's actually the boring one looking for something interesting to write about. His leading questions about death and persona were calculated.
Cue an army of enraged Lana Del Rey fans bombarding my Twitter feed with constructive criticism geared towards helping me improve my writing (drink shit; I will fly to England and hurt you) and posting deranged abuse on my Instagram page underneath bizarrely a picture showing the current league standings of my five-a-side football team (terribly disrespectful to the orange and maroon shirt of DisOrient FC, I'm sure you all agree, although given that we lost 10-3 to Blighty Coffee on Tuesday it might just be the kick up the arse we all need).
Besides the fact Lana doesn't remember who actually interviewed her, there are a number of things about her statement that sound a bit iffy to me. She may well have not wanted to do the interview but it certainly didn't seem like it she was delightful company for the 70 minutes we spent talking, and was happy to continue over the allotted time when the PR knocked on the door, an hour in, and asked how we were getting on. I was not masked as a fan, I genuinely like her music and really liked her too her life story is fascinating, she was refreshingly open when answering even the most difficult question and she seemed completely in love with music. As for the rather vague sinister ambitions she claims I had well, my colleagues sadly refused to comment on how sinister I am, but they were all adamant that I'm not in the slightest bit ambitious. Thanks, guys.
It's not pleasant asking a pop star if she thinks the idea of dying young herself is attractive it's a dark question, but it's not a leading one. She has every opportunity to say no. And she can hardly complain about the subject matter: she'd been talking about her icons all dying young, she named her debut album Born to Die and had spent much of the 50 minutes previous to this point telling me how miserable she was.
Ultimately, the problem with Lana's complaint is that she doesn't seem to know what she's actually complaining about. She's not alleging that I made up her quotes, nor is she claiming that they've been twisted or that we've printed them out of context. Instead she seems annoyed by the fact I wanted her to say interesting things and asked questions that caused her to do so. Well sorry, Lana, but that's just me doing my job.
