Single-handedly bringing metaphor back into song in a big way, Lana Del Rey has given us yet another preview of a song she teased earlier in the year called “Happiness Is A Butterfly.” On the heels of “How To Disappear” (not to be confused with Radiohead’s “How To Disappear Completely“–as Del Rey and Thom Yorke already have a fraught legal history), Del Rey has been fairly transparent in showing her fans that just because we’re in the post-#MeToo era and she’s gotten a little more political of late, it doesn’t mean she’s letting go of one of her old favorite topics: lusting after a guy who’s bad for her–and generally just bad.
Once more speaking on the topic of a serial killer as she did on the unreleased yet still somewhat official track from her pre-fame days, “Serial Killer” (performed regularly on the LA to the Moon Tour), Del Rey shrugs, “If he’s a serial killer then what’s the worst that could happen to a girl who’s already hurt? I’m already hurt.” So yes, why not surrender Dorothy, indeed? Succumb to the temporary pleasures of giving in to a love that one inherently knows is bad for her for the sake of, just for a little while, feeling that specific high that only comes with doing something that’s going to fuck up your mental (therefore physical) health in the long run.
Just as it has always been the crux of her work (as is evident in such tracks as “Off to the Races,” “Shades of Cool” and “Gods and Monsters”), Del Rey can’t help but see the good in an “evil” man (also The Shangri-Las’ kryptonite–so it’s no wonder they’re such an inspiration), musing, “If he’s as bad as they say then I guess I’m cursed/Looking into his eyes, I think he’s already hurt.” Ah bullshit. He ain’t hurt. He’s just another lily-livered asshole. But with the ratio being what it is, Del Rey, like so many of us, will feel inclined to think just about any man is “good” so long as he isn’t a rapist (and even those types manage to get interested parties, e.g. Ted Bundy).
What makes this common theme in her work feel slightly different this time is that 1) she’s supposed to be old enough to know better about men by now and 2) with Lust for Life, she seemed to be systematically veering away from this notion of fatal and forlorn love being the most romantic–ergo best–kind. Then again, maybe all Del Rey is really trying to say is that after two people endure irrevocable heartache that fundamentally mutates their ability to love in a form as pure as before their emotions were decimated, perhaps it is possible for them to find one another afterward, coming together to heal the cracks in their brokenness–codependent of a thought as it is.
Thus, Del Rey is not merely reverting to an old favorite motif, but rather, showcasing that it is possible to move on after a love you thought would last forever. In contrast to earlier songs and videos from her career like “Born to Die” and “Ride,” Del Rey is not self-victimizing in the face of “fate,” so much as embracing whatever it might assault her with–in this case, someone that might be as dangerous to her psyche as a serial killer to a teenage girl in a Wes Craven movie.
Or maybe, in the end, “Happiness Is A Butterfly” is ultimately about what we’re all not so latently feeling right now: if the apocalypse is imminent (which it consistently will be so long as toddlers run the free world), might as well bang somebody on the regular, even if he does end up stabbing you with something other than his penis.
