«It was a fiasco at Primavera», someone said before Lana Del Rey’s concert in Milan. «She couldn’t hear herself, she was limp, she didn’t sing». The expectations for the live performance at I-Days, after the opinions of those who were there in Barcelona (streaming is not valid), had alarmed us. Is Lana out of shape? Luckily, however, you should never listen to people too much: Lana Del Rey’s live performance last night was exactly what we wanted to see from Lana Del Rey. And we feel sorry for the others.
The live starts at 9.15pm, she goes on stage with a huge smile. «Hi Milan, it’s beautiful to be here». There are 67,000 people, you can’t see the end. Headband in her hair, inevitable 60s bonnet, Lana arrives and begins her show. On stage, if we were in Puglia, a metallic scenography would be that of the patronal festival. With her full band, backing singers, dancers, a pole dancing pole that she will use on several occasions.
Unlike Angelina Mango, Lana doesn’t get bored if she stays still, on the contrary. Lana likes it. And so begins this sequence of twenty-five songs spread over an hour and a half where Lana does exactly what she does best: herself. There are small choreographies with reflective panels that mothers used in the 90s to sunbathe, there are ballerinas who dance around them and they too seem a bit listless. Listless but happy.
The atmosphere becomes dreamy in a few moments. Are we at the La Maura Racecourse (someday someone will explain to us why it’s called that) or are we on Sunset Boulevard, at sunset? Dreaming does not cost anything.
Fans hug each other, cry. We hear the screams: “Mother”. She is relaxed, vocally present (and even if she wasn’t: we are not at a Celine Dion concert). We still remember when at the beginning of her career they massacred her because they said she was fake, constructed, the rich girl who tries everything to become famous. Do you remember that performance on SNL, the first uncertain lives, the stage name, the past that came knocking again? Today, 8 albums later, we are faced with one of the greatest singer-songwriters of our time. Someone who did something that very few can do: give us a world, her own. Taking us up to our necks in that cinemascope dimension without letting us go out. Charts in hand, how many artists today can we say the same about? How many have managed to build style and credibility without following fashions and social trends? Lana did it, and she remembers it tonight by putting something from all of her works on the setlist. Always slowly, candidly, among sequined dresses, candles and slow movement (cit).
There’s that whole world on stage. There is nothing to prove, the repertoire speaks, and above all there is no rush. In the songs, in the way he speaks and interacts with the audience. 12 years after that debut which made the eyes and ears of half the world prick up, Lana is still here and is more credible than ever. One album a year (almost), many concerts and nothing else. «Thank you for lighting up the crowd», she says when she sees an expanse of cell phone lights that perhaps make the La Maura Hippodrome visible even from the stars. In a world of fads that pass and songs that don’t last, let’s hold on to Lana Del Rey. Is it a coincidence that Lana was in the city on the first day of summer temperatures? Let the summertime sadness begin.
