Lana Del Rey promotes album with billboard in ex's hometown

Lana Del Rey is promoting her next album in the most ‘petty’ Lana Del Rey way

Lana Del Rey is smiling and looking up while tucking her hair behind her ear while wearing a brown plaid blazer

By Nardine SaadStaff Writer

Dec. 21, 2022 9:10 AM PT

Lana Del Rey is all about quality not quantity when it comes to targeted ads. And, apparently, vengeance.

The L.A.-based singer-songwriter is using one strategically placed billboard to promote her forthcoming album, “Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd,” and it’s in her ex-boyfriend’s hometown of Tulsa, Okla.

“There’s only one and it’s in Tulsa,” the “Summertime Sadness” singer wrote earlier this week, captioning a photo she took with the billboard on her supposedly private Instagram account. (A screenshot of it has been immortalized across social media.)

“It’s. Personal,” she added.

The 37-year-old took aim at ex Sean “Sticks” Larkin, whom she dated for six months before they broke up in 2020 due to their “busy schedules.” Larkin, a retired police sergeant, is also a reality TV star who has appeared on A&E’s reality show “Live PD” and co-hosts the podcast “Coptales and Cocktails.”

The two famously attended the 62nd Grammy Awards in 2020, posing together on the red carpet.

Del Rey’s ninth studio album is due March 10. She released its title track on Dec. 7, which appears to be Larkin’s birthday, her fans noted. Coupled with her targeted billboard, fans applauded the musician for unlocking a new level of pettiness.

“lana del rey putting up just one billboard for her album in her ex boyfriends city and then posting about it is so lana del rey,” tweeted one fan.

“Lana Del Rey placing the only billboard to promote her album in Tulsa, Oklahoma (her ex’s hometown) is the level of shady I aspire to be. Taylor Swift taught her well,” wrote another, referencing the singer’s recent collab on Taylor Swift’s “Midnights” album.

“Lana Del Rey putting up 1 billboard to promote her new album, in Tulsa Oklahoma, where her ex lives, is the type of petty that I LIVE for, “ tweeted another.

“we love a petty queen,” added another.

“Honestly… slay,” tweeted another.

In a May interview with W magazine, the Grammy-nominated singer described her new music as “angry” and “conversational.”

“I’ve been practicing meditative automatic singing, where I don’t filter anything. I’ll just sing whatever comes to mind into my Voice Notes app. It’s not perfect, obviously,” she said. “There are pauses, and I stumble. But I’ve been sending those really raw-sounding files to a composer, Drew Erickson, and he’ll add an orchestra beneath the words, matching each syllable with music and adding reverb to my voice.

“When I’m automatic singing, I don’t have the time and leisure to think about things in terms of colors. It’s very cerebral. In ‘Honeymoon,’ there were so many color references ... ,” she added.

“For this new music, there’s none of that at all. It’s more just like: I’m angry. The songs are very conversational. For the first song, I pressed record and sang, ‘When I look back, tracing fingertips over plastic bags, I think I wish I could extrapolate some small intention or maybe get your attention for a minute or two.’ It’s a very wordy album. So there’s no room for color. It’s almost like I’m typing in my mind.”

Del Rey’s latest album follows her pair of 2021 LPs, “Chemtrails Over the Country Club” and “Blue Banisters,” and will arrive almost four years after 2019’s critically adored “Norman F—ing Rockwell,” which was thick with L.A. iconography related to Laurel Canyon, Long Beach, the Venice boardwalk and a bar where the Beach Boys used to go.

The title track on “Did You Know ...” is a slow-rolling piano ballad that also pays homage to an Art Deco pedestrian tunnel that lies beneath Ocean Boulevard at Pine Avenue in Long Beach.

According to a 1992 story in The Times, the tunnel — which has a vaulted ceiling and runs 181 feet in length — was built in 1927 “so that beach-goers could avoid traffic-clogged streets.”

Times staff writer Mikael Wood contributed to this report.