Singer taps 1960s mood in emotional performance

CONCERT REVIEW

Lana Del Rey took the stage Tuesday night to Henry Mancini’s unforgettable theme for the 1962 film “Experiment in Terror.”

Her stage was populated by varying sized boulders, the kind found along California beaches. A black-and-white film of waves rushing rocks and sand looped behind. All of it seemed borrowed from the set of “The Sandpiper,” the intoxicating 1965 melodrama starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.

Which is not far from where Del Rey draws the tragically romantic tone for her songs.

In videos and taped live performances early in her career, Del Rey seemed able only to create an unfocused, narcotic atmosphere.

But Tuesday night, the complete package combined with her mature stage presence and refined delivery, reinforced the core narrative of her songbook: Romance by nature is tragic and fleeting as life, itself. The titles of both her newest “Lust for Life” and second “Born To Die” albums sum it up.

She opened with “13 Beaches,” whose first line is “I don’t belong in the world,” running aground emotionally as soon as she set sail. The second song featured the singer and her two singing and dramatic foils lying flat on the front of the stage as she sang. The video behind captured them from above, murky, as if lying at the bottom of a pool.

Del Rey’s obsession with all things vintage, Hollywood, and dreamlike was reinforced by her look, especially the ‘60s beach-girl hair, the performance video cast in black and white, and the arrangements, which featured surf guitar and a Phil Spector-like sound.

“Born To Die” took the link to past paeans to teen tragedy a step further, its video something like a reworking of the 1960s hit “Last Kiss.”

The songs’ pace never passed mid-tempo, most plodding along, more intent to create mood and storyline rather than dancing. The not-full house, nonetheless, responded regularly with deafening shrieks and exclamations of love for the singer.

Colombian-American pop and soul singer Kali Uchis opened with a short set full of tease and smoldering soul vocals.

Stranded on the huge stage with just four musicians and minimal arrangements, though, she struggled to get across.