It’s only appropriate that Lana Del Rey should opt to make her latest cover song (of which there are already many, including that live performance of “Unchained Melody” for the Christmas at Graceland special) none other than John Denver’s 1971 hit, “Take Me Home, Country Roads.” Not merely because it’s on-brand for Del Rey to pay homage to 60s and 70s-era white male titans of the music industry, but because it was only just this year that the U.S. Library of Congress selected the song for inclusion in the National Recording Registry.
Like the National Register of Historical Places (which includes Graceland, as Del Rey reminded people by taking a photo in front of the sign during her trip down to Memphis for the Christmas special), the National Recording Registry similarly seeks to preserve/credit songs deemed “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant.” Songs that “inform or reflect life in the United States” at one time or another. Perhaps if there was one song that could encapsulate the U.S. at the dawn of the 1970s, “Take Me Home, Country Roads” might very well be the best choice (apart from “Baba O’Riley”). After all, the post-hippie daze of the 60s was starting to become a more distant (even if still bad) hangover. To that end, it was at the outset of 1971 (January 25) that Charles Manson, hippie cult leader extraordinaire, was found guilty of murder. In line with hippiedom falling out of fashion, a “return,” of sorts, to the “good ol’ salt of the earth” American way of life seemed to be coming back in vogue (reaching a zenith when a peanut farmer became the president in the late 70s)—even as the awakening to the extent of what a sham America was kept progressing. This included the initial publication of the Pentagon Papers in ’71 and the imminent approach of the Watergate scandal that would occur in 1972.
Despite the gradual unraveling of the American dream and its glamor, Denver, like many, chose to stay optimistic about the nation (how Del Rey-esque). By focusing on one of the most “impressive” things about it: its roads and associated car culture. So it is that his “optimism” about America is ultimately belied by his wistfulness for a version of the U.S. that no longer exists. Just as many other Americans (especially white ones), he seemed to yearn for a better, simpler time characterized by lyrics such as, “Dark and dusty, painted on the sky/Misty taste of moonshine, teardrop in my eye.” This type of description, with its evocative word choices, is, of course, very Del Reyian. For she did study under men like Denver and Bob Dylan when it came to songwriting. While she’s already referenced the latter plenty of times in her music (e.g., “All I hear is music, like ‘Lay Lady Lay’” on “Religion,” “Lay, lady, lay, on that side of paradise” on “Tomorrow Never Came” and “The way I roll like a rolling stone” on “Off to the Races”), her first sonic mention of Denver occurred this year via “The Grants,” the opening track for Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd.
The nod to Denver in that particular song is a sentimental one that relates to her uncle, David Grant, who died in 2016 after climbing the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. So it is that Del Rey croons, “I’m gonna take mine [memories, that is] of you with me/Like Rocky Mountain High/The way John Denver sings.” Grant’s death was, in fact, a suicide, with Del Rey alluding to that in another song from Did You Know… called “Fingertips,” during which she states, “Give me a mausoleum in Rhode Island with Dad, Grandma, Grandpa and Dave/Who hung himself real high/In the National Park sky.”
Denver’s synonymousness with Colorado (complete with his last [stage] name and being well-known for “Rocky Mountain High”) makes him an obvious choice for why Del Rey would intertwine him with her uncle. And why she would choose to cover a song by him to further honor the memory of Dave. While some might wonder why she wouldn’t cover “Rocky Mountain High” as a means to do that, perhaps that song is too grimly on the nose…even for Del Rey. What’s more, “Take Me Home, Country Roads” is in keeping with Del Rey’s increasing fondness for what coastal folk call the “flyover states.” Not to mention her love of “on the road” life. Something Denver was also able to freely wax poetic about before the 1973 oil embargo made it all but impossible to afford enough gas for any country road to be able to take one home. So he’s lucky he came up with that song just shy of when it would have been “in poor taste” to release it. Even if it’s still in poor taste now to romanticize the use of fossil fuels.
In any case, Del Rey cemented her own bond with the Deep South earlier this year when a photo of her in a Waffle House uniform in Alabama went viral (no one seeming to be offended by the “cosplay” element of Del Rey feigning “slumming it”). Her tour for Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd was also certain never to veer off the path of “bumfuck nowhere” milieus like Huntsville, Alabama, Brandon, Mississippi, Burgettstown, Pennsylvania and, yes, Charleston, West Virginia. The very state that gets name-checked so frequently in “Take Me Home, Country Roads.”
And while Denver’s original version is more upbeat and acoustic, Del Rey naturally renders her interpretation with more than just a dash of somberness…and piano. To boot, the accompanying album artwork features her in the middle of a generational pile, if you will, with her younger sister, Chuck, placed on top and Chuck’s daughter/Lana’s niece, Phoenix, placed at the bottom. The brand of the boat they’re sitting in, “Phoenix,” is also prominently displayed to, er, drive home the meta nature of the name of the next generation in the Grant line. Though Phoenix will not so easily be able to claim being a “simple country girl” with such overt financial backing. Del Rey herself continues to have trouble making that claim, try as she might. Indeed, “Take Me Home, Country Roads” appears to be another defiant bid to prove that she is not some garden-variety Hollywood rich girl (though Del Rey did have her Old Hollywood glamor phase for a while there, too). She knows where the “real” people are. And they’re not in California or New York.
Del Rey’s aesthetic and musical “pivot” toward what the latter populations, as mentioned, derisively deem the “flyover states” started, not coincidentally, when she began her romance with Sean “Sticks” Larkin. A.k.a. the cop guy that “Shades of Cool” could have easily been written about had she known him then. Larkin’s ties to Tulsa, Oklahoma undeniably inspired the tone and content of Chemtrails Over the Country Club—what some might call the “runoff” from Norman Fucking Rockwell—complete with tracks like “Tulsa Jesus Freak,” “Let Me Love You Like A Woman” and her down-home cover of Joni Mitchell’s “For Free.”
Despite dating Larkin for under a year, Del Rey clearly soaked up her “era” in that part of the country, seeking to spend more time in it as the residents unspokenly declared, “We accept her, one of us. We accept her, one of us.” As they likely will with even more enthusiasm upon hearing this official release of an iconic “hick” anthem. Maybe next she’ll even do an official release (as opposed to just a live cover) of Tammy Wynette’s “Stand By Your Man,” too. It’s all part and parcel of the Del Rey metamorphosis into a “bona fide” country bumpkin. In truth, however, she’d be more suited to writing an original composition titled “Beverly Hillbilly,” while authentic “hayseed” Britney Spears might actually be the better fit for covering a single such as this.
