MUSIC
Gaga’s Uneven Return to Her Past
Ariana Grande duet scores; not so much Elton John, Blackpink
BY STEVE ERICKSON
Lady Gaga sealed her ascension
from mainstream
pop girl to one of the defi
ning signifi ers of contemporary
gayness with “Born
This Way” in 2011. Although she’s
bi herself, it was calculated to land
with her gay male fans. But while
the song probably had a real political
impact, popularizing the idea
that LGBTQ identity isn’t a choice,
it contradicts her aesthetic as an
artist.
She was born Stefani Germanotta
but dreamed up Lady Gaga.
Even her best music wouldn’t land
with the same impact without her
reliance on visuals. When she
changed her sound away from the
image-driven dance-pop of “The
Fame,” “The Fame Monster,” and
“Born This Way,” she won some
new fans who thought she had
achieved a new authenticity, but
she seemed most real acting out
bizarre scenarios in $300,000 videos.
Had she started out with an album
of duets with Tony Bennett,
a major label probably would never
have signed her. And it wouldn’t
have gone gold without the benefi t
of her stardom. Just when her career
seemed to be fl agging, her role
in Bradley Cooper’s 2018 “A Star Is
Born” gave it a new push, possibly
making her safe for heterosexual
men at last. The soundtrack’s
breakout song, “Shallow,” got to #1
in the wake of its win for Best Song
at the Academy Awards. It also
stood out in the pop landscape
of the time; in the ascendancy of
gloomy trap beats, it could pass for
a Linda Ronstadt and Don Henley
duet from 40 years earlier.
But Gaga has constantly reinvented
herself. Her fi rst album
closed with a promise of “Disco
Heaven.” Her latest, “Chromatica,”
returns to it, drawing on house
music and synth-pop.
At the key moment of “Shallow,”
Gaga’s voice leaps an octave. In the
context of “A Star Is Born,” this
represents her character’s growing
confi dence about her songwriting
Lady Gaga.
and performing onstage. But even
just listening to the song alone, it’s
exhilarating, if also a bit gimmicky.
For a singer with an impressive
vocal range, she has always been
willing to sound fl at or robotic, as
well. (Take the nursery rhyme earworm
“Rah-rah-ah-ah-ah/ Roma,
Roma-ma/ Gaga, ooh la la” from
“Bad Romance.”) She’s also taken a
cue from Madonna and adopted an
occasional affected mid-Atlantic
accent. While “Enigma” takes her
voice to its highest reach, her duet
with Ariana Grande, “Rain on Me,
” powerfully contrasts Grande’s
R&B-derived emoting with her
colder tone.
This album’s lyrics rely on the
irony of the sad banger. Despite the
vast amount of music inspired by
recreational drugs, much less has
been written about psych meds.
Gaga tries to turn that around with
“911,” a catchy dance tune about
relying on antipsychotic medication
PHOTO NORBERT SCHOERNER
that fl ips the emergency phone
number into slang for pills. It’s one
of the album’s highlights.
But “Free Woman” turns her personal
experience surviving sexual
violence into a series of platitudes
out of early 2010s pop. “Plastic
Doll” sounds far more passionate,
referring to Pinocchio and Barbies
to describe her objectifi cation by
fame. It also features some of her
best singing on the album, as well
as a racing beat that enhances the
passion of the vocals. A few songs
follow a running theme of curdled
childhood imagery.
Instead of a dance club, “Chromatica”
is ready for arenas. When
it works, it’s thrilling: “Rain On
Me” achieves a glorious bombast.
“911” and “Plastic Doll” also rank
with her best songs. But when Elton
John joins her for “Sine From
Above,” it’s as empty as a Meat Loaf
comeback attempt.
The K-pop girl group Blackpink
barely make themselves felt on
“Sour Candy.” “Babylon” re-writes
Madonna’s “Vogue” just as “Born
This Way” pulled from “Express
Yourself,” only to much lesser impact.
Too much of the album, like the
fi rst single “Stupid Love,” is content
to be blandly pleasant, with no
real quirks. It’s fi lled with potential
hooks that don’t sink in. Song after
song relies on generic house music
piano chords. The genre “experimentation,”
such as the lifts from
gospel and drum’n’bass on “Babylon”
and “Sine From Above,” feels
random and gimmicky. Nothing
grates, but only a few songs really
stick.
“The Fame” debuted in a culture
where pop music was a dirty word,
and queer identity was far more
closeted than it is now. Her third
album, “Artpop,” tried very hard to
put Lady Gaga in the pantheon of
ever-changing, experimental yet
accessible artists like Prince, David
Bowie, and Bjork. Its excess
didn’t quite work, but its ambition
didn’t ring hollow. But despite some
very attractive songs, the sheen of
“Chromatica” does.
When Lady Gaga started out,
taking dance-pop as seriously as
indie rock and relying on elaborate
videos and stage shows to communicate
your vision would get you patronizing
reviews. Now, Dua Lipa’s
neo-Studio 54 “Future Nostalgia”
is one of the best-received albums
of 2020. The popularity of poptimism
over the past decade owes
something to the possibilities she
embraced and opened up, building
upon glam-rock and disco to take
a sensibility explicitly grounded
in queer culture (and MTV circa
1984) into cultural inescapability.
But Lady Gaga’s fi rst two albums
are now old enough to have become
nostalgic infl uences on songs
like Ava Max’s “Sweet But Psycho.”
“Chromatica” doesn’t really answer
the question of how an artist can
return to a world she shaped.
LADY GAGA | “Chromatica” | Interscope
Records | http://smarturl.
it/Chromatica
June 04 - June 17, 2 26 020 | GayCityNews.com
/smarturl
/smarturl
/GayCityNews.com
