Ghetto Art Deco

"Art Deco", a track from Lana Del Rey's fourth studio album Honeymoon (2015), has long been rumored to be about her music scene BFF Azealia Banks. LDR has shut down this interpretation in a NME interview: "I have no idea where people got that from. I just don’t know what the correlation is. That song is actually about a group of teenagers who go out every night.”

The correlation may lie in the mix signifiers for 'high' and 'low' culture in Lana's ode to an unnamed 'Club queen on the downtown scene', and the reference to 'rapper's delight':

'You're so Art Deco, out on the floorShining like gunmetal, cold and unsureBaby, you're so ghetto, you're looking to scoreWhen they all say hello, you try to ignore themCause you want more (why?)You want more (why?)You want more (why?)Cause you want more'

Lyrics: Genius.com

This Kristijan Majic remix - accompanied by a fan-made gay-themed music video (which features scenes from Troye Sivan's "Youth" and Years and Years' "Desire") - replaces the slow, hazy and skeletal trap beats of the original track for a more uptempo production, and certainly works to foreground Lana's stated intentions for the track. Lana's insightful character-sketch lyrics remain, but her signature brand of tortured, vintage melancholy has been replaced by a more party-ready ambience. And while Jessica HopperPitchfork's  argues that the lyrics 'You're so ghetto' amounts to a tonal misfire, I view it as an unexpected reminder of the hip hop bravado that characterised her breakthrough album Born to Die (2012) - and a perfect lyrical shorthand for her 'haute trash' stylings.