I liked Lady Gaga’s first three albums. Or rather, there are 2-4 really good songs on each. “ARTPOP,” not so much. No one seemed to like that one. (Even “Born This Way” seemed like something of a letdown, although I found that I had been combining the goodness of her first two albums into one package in my mind.) And now it seems as though it’s been years since she’s had a hit. A real hit. She also seems to have burned out her schtick. In 2009, it felt natural. Somewhere in 2011 or so, it started to feel forced. Now it feels simply irrelevant.
So I said to my friend, who has strong opinions on music, “Do you think Lady Gaga can come back?” He almost seemed to take offense, saying, “Back?! She never really went away.”
So I guess there might be difference of opinion on this one. To me, she feels totally gone from the spotlight, and her “edge of glory” seems quite distant. She needs to come back if she wants to be here IMHO.
The next question is: Can she? I think her No. 1 problem has been that she hasn’t been able to come up with the great tunes. If she can do that, then sure, she can come back. Man does not live on schtick alone. Mediocre tunes combined with more antics won’t do it for her. She probably can’t come back to her 2009 level, however. The reason is that she had the stellar tunes combined with the schtick when it was new and working. It was fun… for a time. “Bad Romance” has to be one of the greatest videos of all time, but you can’t pull that off time and time again. Even though that was just five years ago, it feels very distant.
So, she probably could–but will she? With sadness, I’m going to vote “no” on this. “ARTPOP” was truly directionless, and her hook machine was apparently not in working order. I think she’s out of songs. I wouldn’t say she was a super-strong tunesmith in the first place. Like most songwriters who make it, she was able to write some hits, but her material was on average pretty mediocre.
So I think the era of Gaga is over. I’m sad about that. It was fun, and she was an original (when she wasn’t ripping off Madonna). What do you think?
That’s what I thought when I saw the title. But then it should be noted that I really don’t care for her music and have a strong dislike for her schtick/act. As someone who doesn’t follow her and only hears here when she’s on the radio in a setting where I can’t change it, I didn’t notice that she ‘went away’.
If she’s been gone…to me that’s like not realizing that some random song I hate hasn’t been played for the last few weeks.
Lady Gaga just released “Cheek to Cheek,” an album of duets with Tony Bennett, a few months ago. It was the #1 album in the country during the week of its release and has sold more than a quarter million copies since. It’s not “set the world on fire” famous, but that’s still a pretty good reception.
The songs are pretty decent too, so it’ll keep selling.
I think she’s growing up and changing, as the latest album indicates. I don’t think she’s found herself yet in terms of coming back with a “big” album, but as others have said, she’s still around.
I don’t think I’ve heard a word about her for a year or so. Which did actually surprise me: I thought that she had the fame-management talent to stick around for the long haul.
A look at her discography shows that Lady Gaga is credited as the sole author of just 7 of the 50 songs on her first 4 albums. She is credited as a writer on all the rest, but let’s face it, Madonna is credited as a writer on her songs too, and I’ve never met anyone who tried to claim that Madonna was a songwriter.
I’m not saying that Miss Germanotti doesn’t write songs or have any musical talent (because she indisputably does), but her it would seem that her writing isn’t her strength, IMO.
ETA: As for the OP’s question, I dunno. I think she did very well with very little more than spectacle. To me, she clearly chose fame & fortune over any musical or artistic goals, but it remains to be seen if she shows that almost pathological drive required to stay at or near the top of that game.
Isn’t this kind of how a big star’s career goes? You make your way to the super-duper top, you ride it for a while and collect your dough, then take your massive money and dabble in whatever you want for a while until the loss of fans starts making your bank account drop below your comfort level, and then you come back with a blockbuster people-pleaser when it’s time to re-stuff the coffers.
She’s at the beginning of the “dabble because I can” part. She seems really excited to have hooked up with Tony Bennett, and it worked. Now she can dabble again in a different direction.
If you change that slightly to say “cute, fun pop numbers, but not a voice to last the ages” don’t you basically have Taylor Swift, who has basically conquered the world (and Mars)?
I agree with those saying it isn’t about vocal quality - its about what type of song you can put together. And, yes, Lady Gaga hasn’t left anywhere really.
I’ve never understood why she was as big as she was really. Decent voice, some danceable pop songs, but she was heralded as this amazing avant-garde creative artist, and I just never got it. Once people got used to the crazy outfits, I feel like they began to put her into the same box as Katy Perry, Taylor Swift et al, and I think there are more talented people in that genre - Sia for one.
As a person being interviewed I found her very interesting and likable - just never that the talent kept up with the hype.