SZA knows how to make an entrance. She slammed the world for her new Lana. First she announced the album’s release at midnight on a Friday, then kept everyone biting her nails while she took another 15 hours to put the proper finishing touches on it. But it was worth it. Lana has just arrived to celebrate the Year of Music, just as she performed her breakthrough blockbuster SOS two years ago in December. Although the song is officially part of SOS’s deluxe “reissue,” it stands on its own at 46 minutes and 15 tracks. These songs don’t feel like bonus tracks or additions to previous statements. They are great albums in their own right. Lana is SZA in moody late-night R&B electro ballad mode, and her sonic imagination and emotional ferocity are as vivid as ever.
The only previously released song is “Saturn” which was released in February. The production is low-key, with deep soul guitars, chilled-out synths, laid-back beats, and plenty of features from the monster Kendrick Lamar. The songwriting reveals Solana Rowe at her most frank and forthright. In these songs, she confesses her weaknesses, fights to forgive those who don’t even notice her efforts, and longs for an emotional resolution that is still out of reach.
Some tracks were outtakes from SOS, some were new, and the album remained fluid until the end. (And it lasted double-digit hours after the telegram.) The album’s title also reflects the artist’s attempt to change his identity. This is a nickname she has had since childhood. She got her first tattoo, Lana, at age 13 because she only had $40 while a letter cost $10. “Now I’m going to be called something else,” SZA told Rolling Stone after revealing that the title of SOS comes from her nickname “Sos.” “I’m calling her Lana now, but that might burn too.”
SZA lets Lana flow through her emotional awakenings like a diary. Following the massive global success and acclaim of SOS, she is reevaluating where she is and who she is now. It starts with “No More Hiding” with flute-like synth and acoustic guitar. “Let me cut myself open and see what I’m made of,” she sings. “I think I’m guilty of giving false love/I’m really a fake, shit.” Her plea, “I really want to be in love,” is heartbreaking.
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She works with some of the most trusted producers including ThankGod4Cody, Michael Uzowuru, Carter Lang, Rob Bisel, Benny Bianco, and Tyler Johnson. “Chill Baby,” a co-production with Lil Yachty, is also about someone who, after wasting so much of their lives building protective walls (“it’s hard to find the urge to build those walls”), still This is a song about a girl who is wary of trusting others and struggles to stop hiding. . “I’m tired of seeing people die, literally or figuratively,” SZA sings. “I just want someone to be by my side.”
“What Do I Do” is the ultimate heartache ballad and features one of the twists in her story. It’s about her man accidentally butt-dialing her while having sex with another man. She is both furious and vulnerable, exasperating: “Even if you’re with that woman/I’m getting emotional and it’s hard to stop.” This could be “Kill Bill” looking for a place to take place. She sings over cold smooth jazz chords that echo Lil’ Kim’s ’90s classic “Clash on You” (originally sampled from Jeff Lorber Fusion’s “Rain Dance”). It cleverly juxtaposes Queen Bee’s world-class bravado with SZA’s bravery. Wounded fragility.
“Scorsese Baby Daddy” is another standout song, full of 80s style cheese rock guitar. “I had all the problems,” SZA admits. “Then I smoked a cigarette about it/I could have called my mom/I’d rather be like shit about it.” She may be hoping for a solid connection, but she doesn’t see it in gangster movies. I’m hooked on the tension and confusion that comes with it. She’s “obsessed with drama/Scorsese’s baby daddy.” This image is great because Martin Scorsese’s movies are full of insecure men who are clearly not soulmates. (The scene where Ray Liotta gives Lorraine Bracco a gun to hide in Goodfellas is hot, though.) But this is a song about love twisting into bad moods and a downward spiral.
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The most unusually lilting song is “BMF,” her bossa nova moment. She sings the hook from the Stan Getz and Astrud Gilberto classic “The Girl from Ipanema,” but the action moves from the beaches of Brazil to Motown. She sings, “South Detroit boy keeps bossing around/And I can’t keep the panties from falling.” But she also gives a shout out to Slauson Avenue. It’s a touching salute to one of her heroes, the late Detroit icon Nipsey Hussle.
She sings about dancing in the “kitchen,” but while on shrooms, her voice is processed into a smooth puree over the Isley Brothers’ lush Seventies guitar loop. Ta. However, she forgives her ex-lover who treated her cruelly. This is a major theme throughout Lana. “Drive” finds her standing alone on the road, “heading nowhere, hoping someone somewhere will miss me.” SZA gets aggressive and yells, “I’m not going to give in like these cum-devourers.”
Kendrick also joins her in “30 for 30,” continuing her long winning streak. From CTRL’s “Doves in the Wind” to the new GNX’s “Luther” and “Gloria,” they always blend together. he says to her: “To all the damn women who think they’re prettier than you/Tell them you’re on your period, but he’s on his period too.” Of course, I have no idea who he’s talking about, but the title may or may not remind you of the former Drake, who closed out his 2015 collaboration with Future, What a Time to Be Alive, with “30 for 30 Freestyle.” (It includes the reckless line, “If I resort to too much legal action, I’ll be like Michael Jackson.”)
“30 for 30” opens with a clever spoken word sample from ’70s Motown soul band Switch via Rich Boy’s “Throw Some D’s.” We hear SZA confessing the “immaturity”, painful doubts and insecurities that seem to keep her trying to beat the whole Lana thing. She is fighting to make changes and break old patterns that are holding her back. This is an area she has been exploring since the beginning, but never before has she expressed it so openly, so rationally, so frankly. “I’m okay with not being a good girl,” she told Rolling Stone in 2023. “I’m okay with people knowing I’m competitive.” But Lana proved that SZA has no competition at all.
