Although the quality on Honeymoon is not as constant as on Born To Die, when she gets it right, she still sounds absolutely breathtaking. Hook after hook after hook is thrown at you and even after six minutes you don’t want it to stop. It’s vivacious, dramatic and the build up is lush. ‘The Blackest Day’ might even be the best song on there as it has every element that makes Del Rey such an exciting pop star. Her jazzy vocals shine on ’24’ and the atmosphere of the track takes us back to long lost times. Del Rey saved the best songs for last this time around, if we just forget about the pale cover of Nina Simone’s ‘Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood’. ‘Salvatore’ however is a fun twist on her big orchestral sound with soaring choruses. ‘Freak’, ‘Art Deco’ and ‘Religion’ are all servicable album tracks, but just feel like Lana Del Rey by the numbers and don’t stand out either lyrically, production wise or melodically and therefore add exactly nothing new to Del Rey’s signature sound. ‘God Knows I Tried’ is in the same style but her begging and pleading work in the context of the song, making it one of the more emotional and personal things she has ever recorded. ‘Music To Watch Boys To’ is typical Lana Del Rey, but the chorus is one of the better on the record and the production just works.’Terrence Loves You’ is atmospheric, but has her wailing and extending syllables a bit too much. Like the (promo)singles, Honeymoon is a bit of a hit and miss album, although the vast majority is more than listenable. It’s safe to say this is the most instant and radiofriendly song on there. Luckily she did right this wrong by releasing the brilliant, understated, but damn catchy ‘ High By The Beach‘ next. You can wait six minutes for something to happen, but a hook or any recognizable melody will not come around. This however does not go for title track and first promo single ‘ Honeymoon‘. It’s less instant than the two previous efforts, but if you give it some time at least a few of the tracks will come and get you. On Honeymoon everything is even slower and built on strings and more orchestral productions. On Ultraviolence she dropped the hiphop beats and went with a darker band sound, which disappointed some, but still delivered enough brilliant tunes to make a great record. The fact is that Del Rey set the bar incredibly high with her flawless Born To Die debut on which literally every track was built up from numerous strong hooks and every single one of them was hit worthy. The answer to this is not a simple yes or no. This raises the question if Del Rey has to compromise when it comes to quality with this constant output of new music. Now, somewhat more than a year later, she already has a new one out, called Honeymoon. After the release of her first major label release Born To Die she has been consistently working hard on new music, which resulted in the release of the Paradise EP and re-release at the end of 2012 and brand new album Ultraviolence in 2014. Lana Del Rey is not the ‘I release an album every 3 or 4 years’ type of artist. Lana Del Rey goes for slow and atmospheric on ‘Honeymoon’