Lana Del Rey mentioned that she has recorded an album full of covers of country songs and is deciding between two possible titles for it. It appears to be a different album than Rock Candy Sweet, the album she announced the day after the release of her latest record Chemtrails Over the Country Club on March 19, 2021.

Neither title for the covers album has been revealed yet, but she offered some hints, “Spending so much time in a close circle of country music friends, I could see one option for a title coming from that. I also have a secondary title I like that summed up 18 months of my life.”

The decision to record a country covers album was inspired by those friends and by her own music. “I went back and listened to ‘Ride’ and ‘Video Games’ and thought, you know they’re kind of country,” she explained. “I mean, they’re definitely not pop. Maybe the way ‘Video Games’ got remastered, they’re pop – but there’s something Americana about it for sure. So let’s see how these things come out – I’m not going to have pedal steel guitar on every single thing, but it is easy for me to write.”

On the other hand, Rock Candy Sweet will directly address the controversy mentioned in Harper’s Bazaar’s article “Lana Del Rey Can’t Qualify Her Way Out of Being Held Accountable.” The article was a response to Del Rey’s controversial statements about ‘inclusivity’ surrounding the reveal of Chemtrails Over the Country Club’s album artwork.

She replied to Harper’s Bazaar, “Just want to thank you again for the kind articles like this one and for reminding me that my career was built on cultural appropriation and glamorizing domestic abuse. I will continue to challenge those thoughts on my next record on June 1 titled Rock Candy Sweet.”

Del Rey had also stated previously that she’d release a covers album of standards late last year which never came out. It would’ve featured the renditions she had shared of “You’ll Never Walk Alone” and “Summertime (The Gershwin Version).”

Photo credit: Sharon Alagna