The Long Road to ‘Lana’: Why SZA Took Two Years to Drop the ‘SOS’ Deluxe Album
“Lana” — the title for the long-delayed deluxe edition of SZA’s 2022 blockbuster “SOS,” which finally dropped on Friday afternoon — has had a long and convoluted history, morphing and changing continually over the two years since she first began talking about it, shortly after the release of the parent album. Why? Because SZA is that kind of artist: a perfectionist whose work isn’t ready until she feels it’s ready. That’s a major reason why she gets so angry when her unfinished or unreleased material leaks.
“When people leak my songs, they ruin them,” she told Variety in her Hitmaker of the Year cover interview last year. “Then it’s not mine anymore; it’s actually yours. It’s something unfinished that you decided was ready to be shared. And it’s like, ‘Fuck you. Now I’m not releasing it.’ Play your leak, but you’re not gonna bully me into dropping music. I’m now embarrassed by this less-than-correct version that you put out. You’ve sent me into a weird space creatively when you could have just waited for me, but you’re selfish.”
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When someone takes their art that seriously, it takes time. Following is a timeline of “Lana”’s long, twisted road to reaching the public.
December 2022
During interviews around the release of “SOS” — which had its own long road to completion, arriving nearly five years after her official debut full-length, “Ctrl” — SZA mentions plans for an expanded version of the 23-track, hour-plus-long album.
February 2023
SZA says a “deluxe edition” of “SOS” featuring “10 additional tracks” is “coming soon.” Variety speculates that based on comments she had made in recent months, songs might include several unreleased tracks circulating on the internet, with titles guessed at by fans: “Boy From South Detroit” (which emerges on the final “Lana” tracklist, titled “BMF”), “Joni” — her tribute to Joni Mitchell that has been floating around on the internet for years — and “PSA.”
August 2023
In an interview with Variety, SZA says “Lana” is “outtakes [from ‘SOS’] and new stuff, too — I added a couple of songs. It’s like a whole new project. It’s called ‘Lana’ — my name but, it’s the first tattoo that I ever got, when I was 13. It was 10 bucks a letter and I only had 40, so that that became my nickname for no reason. ‘Lana’ is really just the B-side of SOS.”
The fluctuating tracklist was evident when she was asked if “Joni” would be on it. “‘Joni’ is on it. Well, they leaked it, so I wasn’t gonna put it on there. I guess I should still… but they leaked it already. They ruined it. [Fans] already have it.”
September 2023
On Sept. 8, SZA performs a free concert at the Brooklyn Navy Yard where she announces to the audience: “The deluxe is a whole ’nother album. It’s called ‘Lana.’ It’s seven to 10 songs and it’ll be out this fall.” Along with tracks from “SOS” and her debut full-length “Ctrl,” she performed three unreleased songs at the concert, including a song interpolating the melody of “Girl From Ipanema” that turns out to be “BMF” (“Boy From South Detroit”), “Saturn” and “DTM” (also referred to as “Diamond Boy”).
November 2023
During another interview with Variety, SZA talks expansively, although not more conclusively, about “Lana.” “I never get these things done until like the day before the deadline,” she laughs. “It became more than I thought. It was gonna be something really soft because I had made all my screaming points [on ‘SOS’], and I just wanted to glide and not think [too much], and just get out of my own head. I was so happy to say some shit that didn’t mean a fucking thing. But now it’s definitely turning it into its own album. I guess I could drop another album randomly, because no one’s actually expecting that from me right now.”
December 2023
The album appears poised for release early in the month after SZA posts a series of photos that seemed to be cover artwork for the release, each one bearing the familiar “Parental Advisory: Explicit Content” sticker.
February 2024
SZA performs the new song “Saturn” at the Grammy Awards, where she takes home three trophies (out of nine nominations for “SOS”). She releases the song as a single on Feb. 22, which seems to be the lead track from the seemingly forthcoming album.
March 2024
In an angry social-media post, SZA announces that due to three songs leaking, she will release them and other tracks as a deluxe edition of “SOS” after all, and that she will start “Lana” over, “from scratch.”
In a since-deleted tweet, she writes, “Y’all leaked three songs from the deluxe. At this point, y’all can keep the throwaways and leaks. I’ll be starting ‘Lana’ from scratch. Do not ask me about it again,” adding a few minutes later, “I’ll round up the leaks y’all already got and u can have those. Seems like a fair deal. ENJOY.” That tweet was deleted shortly afterward.
The following day, she writes a series of tweets stating the same plan in more detail, confirming the deluxe edition of “SOS” would now feature “the leaks and outtakes” and “Lana” will be its own album. “Lana deserves more time and music no one’s ever heard before,” she writes.
She calls out a person named Janessa who leaked “unreleased pics and audio” and notes, “Being that this is material from ‘Lana,’ this prompted me to make a decision. I decided w all the leaks and me not knowing what someone has or doesn’t have it’s too complicated so I should jus consolidate the leaks and the outtakes and drop that as to not prolong the process and then focus on my next project as a win win for everybody.”
She continues, “And please be clear anybody defending a thief is weird as fuck. I don’t come in your job and take shit and fuck up your work. Why would that be okay? Where’s the home training? Nobody wants to prosecute a young woman. We’ve all asked very nicely for some time now.”
June 2024
For her concert in London’s Hyde Park, SZA’s elaborately staged, nautical-themed “SOS” stage setup is suddenly replaced by equally elaborate staging featuring renderings of insects and other bugs in a setting that looked like a nature film about life on a forest floor, complete with a giant fallen tree trunk and a huge fake ant that she sings one song while perched atop. The change is striking, as the old set had been used at the last gig of the North American “SOS” tour just a couple of weeks earlier. The set change marks the debut of the “Lana” artwork themes.
“New album, you ready?,” she asks the crowd before playing a snippet of a song apparently titled “Storytime.”
November 2024
SZA appears on two tracks on Kendrick Lamar’s album “GNX,” which is surprise-released on Nov. 22. Ten days later, the two artists announce a joint North American stadium tour, spanning April through June, increasing speculation that the release of “Lana” might actually be imminent.
December 2024
On Dec. 9, the two-year anniversary of “SOS”’s release, SZA teases new music with a short video trailer that included a snippet of one of the album’s tracks. The video depicts SZA in a nature setting, pulling down her baggy camo pants to pee by a creek. She looks directly into the camera before taking a tissue out of her pocket to wipe herself up as the words “Lana” appear across the screen.
December 16
SZA announces on social media that the long-delayed “Lana” will be released on Friday. The post features a snippet of actor Ben Stiller singing along passionately with a song that turns out to be her new single, “Drive,” while driving on a rainy night.
December 19
Late Thursday night, SZA posts the full song and video for “Drive,” which features Stiller in the first half and SZA, dressed as one of the fantastical woodland insects similar to the ones featured in the stage setting, writhing in a field in the second half.
“FULL DELUXE DROPS FIRST THING TOMORROW AM??,” she writes in the caption. “(Had to get my mixes right lol ! All songs are delivered and Ingesting into the system as we speak????? pls be kind .. we been up for days).” She posts photos in her Instagram story of collaborators in the studio, including one of producer Michael Uzowuru sleeping on a mattress on the floor.
December 20
However, the definition of “AM” is unclear: The album does not arrive at the standard release time of midnight ET, nor at noon ET, as reps had said seemed likely (or as likely as anything after such a long journey).
Finally, at the stroke of noon PT, “Lana” arrives. It features some, but not all, of the tracks that had been discussed or rumored for inclusion.
Just two hours later, SZA seems to suggest that even more music is imminent, posting a text exchange between herself and longtime manager Terrence “Punch” Henderson in which she’s “begging” him to release more songs, including “Take You Down,” “Open Arms,” “PSA” and others. He replies “I think we should def let this breathe for a week at least. GIve it to them for new years or Christmas.” So — a deluxe edition of the deluxe edition next week?
We’ve heard that one before…
“SOS Deluxe: LANA” Tracklist:
1. No More Hiding – produced by Michael Uzowuru
2. What Do I Do – produced by Benny Blanco, Carter Lang and ThankGod4Cody
3. 30 for 30 feat. Kendrick Lamar – produced by J White
4. Diamond Boy (DTM) – produced by Carter, Scum, Solomonophonic, Declan and Michael Uzowuru
5. BMF – produced by Carter Lang, Blake Slatkin, Omer Fedi
6. Scorsese Baby Daddy – produced by Michael Uzowuru and Tyler Johnson
7. Love Me 4 Me – produced by Rob Bisel, Carter Lang and Nick Lee
8. Chill Baby – produced by Lil Yachty, Sad Pony, Cade, Calvin Dickinson, iseeyou and Julian Fried
9. My Turn – produced by ThankGod4Cody, Rob Bisel
10. Crybaby – produced by ThankGod4Cody, Carter Lang and Declan
11. Kitchen – produced by ThankGod4Cody
12. Get Behind Me (interlude) – produced by Michael Uzowuru
13. Drive – produced by ThankGod4Cody and Billy Lemon
14. Another Life – produced by Michael Uzowuru and Dylan Wiggins
15. Saturn – produced by Carter Lang, Rob Bisel, Solomonophonic and Monsune
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