Lana Del Rey Drops New Single “A&W”

Lana Del Rey at the LACMA: Art and Film Gala in 2018
Lana Del Rey at the LACMA: Art and Film Gala in 2018. Photo by Matt Baron/Shutterstock (9960023qk)

Lana Del Rey’s next album is coming our way next month and she’s doing a great job teasing its release. The Grammy-nominated singer celebrated Valentine’s Day by dropping the second single from her upcoming ninth studio album, titled “A&W”.

“A&W” stands for “American w—e” and it will take you on a wild seven-minute journey into the signer’s past. Its lyrics reflect the trappings of youth, as she takes a sensual step into adulthood and explores what lies ahead, with no true love on the horizon.

Del Ray co-wrote the song alongside her frequent collaborator Jack Antonoff, who described it as his favorite track they made by each other’s side. “A&W” could be best categorized as a folk-pop ballad, and it features an interpolation of the 1959 song “Shimmy, Shimmy, Ko-Ko-Bop” by Little Anthony and the Imperials.

“A&W” has been released as the second single from her upcoming album Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, and Del Ray said it will be very different from her last studio effort.

“This album felt totally effortless. When I did Norman F—ng Rockwell! it was about world-building, whereas this was straight vibing… The majority of it is my innermost thoughts. Some of the songs are super long and wordy like ‘Kintsugi’ and ‘Fingertips,'” Lana Del Rey told Billie Eilish in an Interview Magazine story.