RARELY has a pop star just starting out been as loved and as loathed as Lana Del Rey. The 25-year-old has filled acres of newspaper column inches even before her debut album, Born To Die, hits shelves in the US and UK this week.
First came the "breakthrough", when her video for the song Video Games was viewed millions of times on YouTube after it was released last June, leading to the sultry chanteuse becoming the talk of the music business.
A few months later, she was scooped up by Interscope Records.
That success prompted the question "just who is Del Rey?", and inquisitive fans quickly found out that the New York native, whose real name is Elizabeth Grant, is the daughter of wealthy Internet domain investor Rob Grant.
Then, it was revealed that she had previously been signed to a label, which fuelled debate about her authenticity as an indie music artist garnering success through a viral video.
The backlash picked up steam after Del Rey's recent shaky singing as the musical guest on US sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live.
It was attacked with vitriol by fans and critics alike.
"She's hit a nerve in some way, which is both a good thing and a bad thing as people are talking about her," said Lyndsey Parker, managing editor at Yahoo! Music.
"There's a huge curiosity about her, and if that was what the label wanted, they've done a great job."
But rather than addressing the criticism directly, Del Rey's response has been to retreat from the public eye and shun live performances ahead of her album's release - a rarity these days, when promotion is the name of the game in showbiz.
She appears to have given only one interview after the Saturday Night Live performance, which was published last week in British newspaper The Telegraph.
She was quoted as saying: "I don't want to talk about how (the criticism) made me feel because I think it's disrespectful to God to go to a dark place with this kind ofthing.
"People just want to see me go off the rails. That's the only reason they're watching."
That interview seemed only to add to the intrigue surrounding the singer, whom many have tipped as the next big thing among female solo acts.
Said Bill Werde, editorial director of music publication Billboard: "It's really hard to get people to stop and pay attention to you, and Lana Del Rey has done that.
"So, she's cleared a hurdle that 99 per cent of millions of artists never clear. The next hurdle is, can she deliver a hit song or hit album?"
Part of Del Rey's appeal has been her manicured, vintage-inspired appearance, with waves of tumbling auburn hair framing an often-expressionless demeanour in a look that Yahoo's Parker likened to an "icy, Hitchcock heroine".
Del Rey has denied that her look - which has earned her a modelling contract - and on-stage persona are a gimmick.
Said Parker: "The image matches the music, and it does make her stand out... Her throwback image is kind of cool."
