The only difference is Lady Gaga can write music - Madonna mines the various writing houses and buys music from an artistand slaps her name on the credits to retain publishing royalties.
Other than that the two are twins.:rolleyes:
Have to fall back on SDMB habits here - cite for the statement on Madonna?
I have heard many, many things about her, but not that she rips off songwriters…
Why’d you pick Shodan of all people to argue with? He just doesn’t like this song. Other people are saying that she’s exactly like Madonna. He’s just saying this one song sounds too similar.
Plus, just because you write music doesn’t mean it’s okay to get 95% of it from somewhere else.
That, and the first line is
“It doesn’t matter if you love him, or capital H-i-m”
Capital Him, like the religious way to refer to God.
And she repeats the line about “'Cause God makes no mistakes”
What this feels like to me is an attempt to stick “Express Yourself” into a christian perspective. YMMV.
I like “Express Yourself”. This is meh.
That’s the one where she confuses Paparazzi (aggressive photographers) with stalkers (psychos fixating on the famous). Yeah, that’s a good one. :rolleyes:
It’s a metaphor.
The whole “she just puts her name on the credits” is something that gets levelled at many female pop singers - Beyoncé is another one who gets it a lot, Katy Perry got it in a different thread a while ago - to try and discredit them. We cannot possibly know who wrote what unless we’re in the studio with the writers.
Obviously there are several references to religion. My point is that a song’s references are not the same as a song’s message or theme.
The line you mention is just a pro-tolerance one, including tolerance by religious people of gay people.
I agree with you. It feels like she’s trying too hard, spoon-feeding us her powerful, all-accepting message.
Even though I love the song I absolutely agree with the James St. James link posted above - gay anthems become gay anthems because the gay community identifies with them (you’ll notice many don’t have specifically homosexual themes), not because they were specially written to be gay anthems. Let’s see how many more times I can say “gay anthems”: gay anthems gay anthems gay anthems.
The song itself: great. The overly calculated way in which it appears to have been conceived: not great.
I agree with you. The Lady Gaga persona is not long for this world.
But frankly the album’s title, Born This Way, could just as likely mean she’s going to be Stephanie Germanitalianlastname instead of Lady Gaga this time. You could even tie it into some of her costume choices:
The first Born This Way song she ever performed in public was on the Today Show last year, which she did while wearing regular clothes and not some crazy costume. Link: http://www.popeater.com/2010/07/09/lady-gaga-today-show/
And now, she shows up at the Grammys in an egg… because a new persona is going to be born.
I didn’t say rip off. Take Ray of Light for instance. I’m too busy to dig it up but, the song was written by one of the guys whose name is still on the credits.
Instead of just doing what a most other artists do (just pay the guy and use the song), he got paid less the standard and she put her name on as a co-author. This allows her to get a piece of the publishing. The guy agreed to it because he wanted his name out there. It was his call but most other artists would have just treated him the correct way.
I have a bone to pick with established artists who treat unknowns like crap, allowing them to be “honored” by being associated with them. Like Chuck Berry paying guys less than scale to play at his gigs, so they can say they played with Chuck Berry. Bowie even did this to a touring band, literally paying them scale.
William Orbit.
I am not sure what to say - I get your point and your frustrations can be valid in a lot of situations. I know Stevie Ray Vaughn quit the Serious Moonlight Bowie tour because he was offered scale (and was recording Texas Flood and wanted to support his own album). But, by the same token, are you a professional musician? I don’t mean you, per se - I mean, they have a specific perspective what a civilian may not understand. I have friends who are, and believe me, if they could get a smaller piece of a piece of work associated with Madonna vs. other options, 99% of the time they would go with Madonna. It’s a very piecemeal existence for the regular player; while I agree with your fundamental concept, getting paid real money is getting paid.
I remember when Graceland came out, folks tried to accuse Paul Simon if “using” his African musicians and ripping off their music. Those musicians were the first guys who replied “would you shut up!? Don’t put this great-paying gig that gets South African music heard on a much larger scale in jeopardy”…
YMMV
‘Ray Of Light’ wasn’t a straight cover though, it was changed from the original, which was called ‘Sepheryn’. The reason Madonna and Orbit have a credit is because as co-producers of the song they changed some of the melody and added all sorts of instrumental work that wasn’t there before. It should be noted that it wasn’t a case of just covering the song like she did with, for example, ‘American Pie’ or ‘Fever’.
For reference here’s the original and here’s Madonna’s version.
Rolling Stone reports that Gaga has heard from Madonna and things between them are fine.
Whew - thank gosh for that. 
I totally agree. It doesn’t have the same originality and undoubtedly Gaga factor as Paparazzi or Poker Face, but I must admit I turn it up when it comes on. This new album better be as good as the last.
I imagine that this is Gaga’s way of pushing the same message behind Dan Savage’s “It Gets Better” campaign. I also tend to think (based on the lyrics, her history of drug use and her general outrageousness) that she is not at all religious, but trying to convince religious people to agree with her.
I haven’t listened to the song yet, but it is not fair to say that Christianity is tolerant of gays, “yet” (if ever). I think the message is extraordinarily topical. Anything that gets religious teenagers more accepting of LGBTs, the better.
As always, YouTube provides.
I know. I’m a straight guy who has been a Kate Bush fan since 1978, but in the last decade or so, she has become a gay icon. She had one song on her second album that was specifically about a gay character, and I doubt it had anything with her becoming one.
Kate is an excellent example of an artist who made a connection with her gay fanbase without ever specifically targeting them. I’m sure there would be multitude of theories as to why that connection exists (constant outsider themes, over-the-top performance style, etc.) and most of them would probably apply to Lady Gaga as well, but with Gaga it all feels so… obvious.
In ‘Born This Way’ there’s no subtext of gay freedom and acceptance like there was in ‘Express Yourself’ (for example), instead it’s all spelled out a little too clearly for the listener. I still really like the song so I can’t complain that much, it’s just one of those little things.