Kim Gordon: Lana Del Rey ‘Doesn’t Even Know What Feminism Is’
As we continue diving into Kim Gordon’s memoir, Girl in a Band, Joe Keohane tweeted a very pointed passage found on page 156 where the Sonic Youth bassist rips into Lana Del Rey -- though we get the feeling Keohane has an early draft of the book.
Gordon writes, “Today we have someone like Lana Del Rey, who doesn’t even know what feminism is, who believes it means women can do whatever they want, which, in her world, tilts toward self-destruction, whether it’s sleeping with gross older men or being a transient biker queen.” (Keohane’s tweet reads, “...gross older men or getting gang-raped by bikers” -- our book does not have that same sentence.)
She goes on to bluntly ask, “Does she truly believe it’s beautiful when young musicians go out on a hot flame of drugs and depression, or is it just her persona?” (Again, Keohane’s tweet reads, contradictory to our book, “... hot flame of drugs and depression, why doesn’t she just off herself?”)
Preceding her dig at Del Rey, Gordon writes about Ciccone Youth, a side project she was in that consisted of Sonic Youth members Steve Shelley, Lee Ranaldo and Thurston Moore. As she explains, “The four of us decided to do a record where we simply went into the studio and made it there, the way hip-hop is made: start with a beat or a loop, then build on it. Ciccone Youth is so different from any Sonic Youth music, we thought it was a good idea to confuse people, so we created this separate identity.”
(The band's name was inspired by Madonna Ciccone -- later known as Madonna -- who they covered on a 12" b/w “Burnin’ Up.”)
Gordon writes about how critics “rushed to embrace [Madonna’s] sexualized image-branding as self-empowerment as well as marketing sophistication, and therefore feminist.” That led to criticism of Del Rey.