Lana Del Rey’s ‘Ultraviolence’ Will Give You Goosebumps

by Brenna Ehrlich 06/04/14

Lana Del Rey is out with the title track from her upcoming record, Ultraviolence, and it’s the spookiest jam we’ve heard this year.

The jam, which references The Crystals’ “He Hit Me (And It Felt Like A Kiss)” — the song title is quoted in the chorus — tells the tale of a typical Lana Del Rey romantic relationship: broken, failed and painful.

Being a Lana Del Rey song, there also seems to be a literary reference tucked in the lyrics: “Ultraviolence/ I can hear sirens, sirens/ He hit me and it felt like a kiss/ I can hear violins, violins.”

According to Clare Preston-Pollitt, events and marketing officer at the International Anthony Burgess Foundation, the word “ultraviolence,” coined in Burgess’ “A Clockwork Orange,” could have been inspired by a passage in Vladimir Nabokov’s “Lolita” (a.k.a. one of Del Rey’s biggest inspirations).

“It could be that Burgess had been influenced by a passage in Nabokov’s ‘Lolita’ where the narrator examines the word ‘violence’ and notes that the word exists next to the word ‘violet’ and ‘violin’ etc. in the dictionary,” she said.

As you can, Lana mirrors that exploration in her track, showing the close — and sometimes very dangerous — distance between love and pain.

Brenna Ehrlich

Brenna Ehrlich is a reporter for MTV News as well as the senior writer/editor for the O Music Awards. In the past, she served as associate editor at Mashable, penned a netiquette column for CNN and co-authored the blog and book “Stuff Hipsters Hate.” She likes trying not to die in moshpits and listening to songs on repeat. Follow her on Twitter @BrennaEhrlich for news on cats and punk bands.