Maybe ARTPOP deserved its "underperformance"

[Teri Hatcher 2,053]

P.S. ARTPOP is de best 

​

You know nothing Jon Snow

[Tove Lo 2,481]

​In my country both Applause and G.U.Y topped radio charts and people LOVE them, so clearly it isn't only about the music quality, it's not like the US is reflective of the whole world. I think that the fact that so many people don't like Gaga there has a lot to do with that

​If they did, that's cool, but it really doesn't matter. The US is where it matters. 

Sometimes it is about music quality and sometimes it isn't. Applause and DWUW did good here because they were songs made to be singles. They were really worked on and well produced. G.U.Y. flopped mainly because no one was promoting it but even then radio stations still played the song but it didn't catch on and people didn't try requesting it because it wasn't that good. Mainly in production like a lot of songs on ARTPOP.

 

I mean I hate Dark Horse, A LOT. Lyrically it's a terrible song, but the production is really good and it was doing a style that was becoming popular so they liked it. 

G.U.Y. was a dated genre (progressive house) so people didn't like it as much.

[Guest]

1. The production is brilliant and polished, and I'm tired of everyone bashing these "pre-made beats" that she used. Y'all act like she downloaded some **** off of ****ing SoundCloud and wrote lyrics over it. Zedd GAVE her that beat for Donatella and she wrote lyrics to it. She did the same ****ing thing with Marry the Night, you can watch that MTV interview from the Born This Way era and she talks about Fernando playing her the instrumental and her writing the lyrics over it and no one says "Oh well that song is good but I mean she used a pre-made beat." Like who cares? Aside from that the production is very clean and polished compared to Born This Way and even some of The Fame Monster. It's not everyone's cup of tea, but Gaga wanted it to sound clean, so that's how it sounds.

2. Gaga doesn't make radio friendly music, period. The only radio friendly songs she's ever put out is Telephone and Do What U Want. All of her other singles have at least one element (usually many elements) that could make them flop. She's just a musical genius and can create these brilliant pop songs with experimental elements. So when Gaga says something it "radio-friendly," it's not. And catchiness is different from person to person. ARTPOP has some of her catchiest material imo. Aura's chorus is her best ever period, Venus is almost as much of an ear worm as Applause, MANiCURE get stuck in your head for days, Do What U Want is one of her catchiest and best singles, ARTPOP is just brilliant, Swine, Donatella, Fashion!, and Mary Jane Holland are catchy as hell, Gypsy is beautiful and had me singing "TONIIIGHT" for about a year straight after it came out, and let's not forget one of the biggest ear worms of her entire career, Applause. So catchiness is different from person to person. I do happen to agree with you on the relatability, but I feel like Gaga needed to write for herself this time around especially after the hip injury.

3. All of the TV promo performances besides the VMAs, AMAs, Alan Carr, and Jimmy Fallon were subpar by Gaga standards, but once again, she had all of her Venus plans and ideas stripped away from her like 2 weeks before it was supposed to be released as a single. Can you really blame her for not putting in the same effort with Do What U Want when her label and Troy took all of her creative ideas away from her with the Venus switch? We know how Gaga works and how much creativity she has, but I mean, you know that's gotta be hard to start a conceptual single era completely from scratch about a week AFTER the single has been released. I feel for her and I let it slide for the most part because I feel like she started really getting a hang of what she wanted toward the end of the single era/November-December 2013 (the AMAs, Alan Carr, The Voice with Christina). Aside from TV, we had the iTunes festival, artRave, SXSW (my personal favorite), Roseland, and the artRAVE tour. I think each one of those brought something completely different to the table and was something different for Gaga.

With all of that said, I don't think ARTPOP was everything it should've been. You can see a very clear concept change from the I&V shoot, iTunes Festival, and the artRave album release show to the rest of the era. While I don't think the era lived up to what the original era was going to be, it didn't deserve to underperform. At all. The music wasn't the problem. As much as people want to brush off the "mismanaged" argument, it's true, and the way the album was handled from a promotional standpoint really didn't help it's performance.

[HighwayGuy 1,498]

I agree with you. ARTPOP production wise is not as good (I mainly blame DJWS).

​Exactly, the production is just not up to Gaga's standard

I really don't know why people love DJWS so much

[Creyk 17,796]

​Exactly, the production is just not up to Gaga's standard

I really don't know why people love DJWS so much

​Well I mean he did make Applause and ARTPOP (song), both have great production.

 

Anyway, I agree with OP in the sense that the album's underperformance might have been deserved, but I don't think that G.U.Y deserved to flop the way that it did. Radio denied playing it because "it didn't sound like a hit". How would it become a hit if people dont know about it? I still think it's the best song on ARTPOP and the one actually worth listening to after so much time passed since the album release

[Head Empty 25,040]

​Exactly, the production is just not up to Gaga's standard

I really don't know why people love DJWS so much

​The Edge of Glory, Bloody Mary, Black Jesus † Amen Fashion, Electric Chapel, Government Hooker, ARTPOP, Do What U Want, Sexxx Dreams.

Say what you want, he has worked on some AMAZING tracks with great instrumentals. That said, you don't even know what parts of the songs he's responsible for. Gaga is a very dedicated co-producer, so saying any producer is "responsible" for an album sounding "bad" is really unjustified. In the end Gaga is the one responsible for the sound of her album; it's her vision.

[giskardsb 12,565]

She probably  shouldn't have named it ARTPOP.  Art is a loaded term that set people up with all kinds of different expectations.  Most of her fans don't even know what she meant by it even if she explained it a bunch of times.  Unfortunately in the Pop world it's better to be generic so people don't have to think much or be involved to understand the artist. 

[Creyk 17,796]

get over it for god's sake its over now

​Actually, it's not over until the next POP album comes out.

A new thing has to happen which makes us forget about the old one, that is how it works with album cycles  

[Nein 508]

iT WAS RELEASED TOO LATE 

[HighwayGuy 1,498]

​The Edge of Glory, Bloody Mary, Black Jesus † Amen Fashion, Electric Chapel, Government Hooker, ARTPOP, Do What U Want, Sexxx Dreams.

Say what you want, he has worked on some AMAZING tracks with great instrumentals. That said, you don't even know what parts of the songs he's responsible for. Gaga is a very dedicated co-producer, so saying any producer is "responsible" for an album sounding "bad" is really unjustified. In the end Gaga is the one responsible for the sound of her album; it's her vision.

​He didn't produce The Edge of Glory though  that has great production

And some of the songs he's produced are good, but are they GAGA's standard? No way 

DJWS isn't consistent either, he ruined the potential Sexxx Dreams had 

And yes Gaga co-produced but she needs a professional to help and DJWS wasn't the right person to help 

[Head Empty 25,040]

​He didn't produce The Edge of Glory though  that has great production

And some of the songs he's produced are good, but are they GAGA's standard? No way 

DJWS isn't consistent either, he ruined the potential Sexxx Dreams had 

And yes Gaga co-produced but she needs a professional to help and DJWS wasn't the right person to help 

​The fact that she continues to support him means that he's definitely up to Gaga's standard. Gaga is happy with his work, which means he's doing a good job in delivering her vision. The changes in Sexxx Dreams we probably mainly Gaga's choice, so blaming him for it isn't right. Just listen to her track-by-track explanation of the song.

[JGD 12,008]

ARTPOP is my favorite.

I just think it's the single choices and their order that dragged ARTPOP's performance.

First - Venus

Second - DWUW

Third- MANiCURE

Fourth - Applause or Gypsy

Fifth - Applause or Gypsy

[OBEY 57,109]

iT WAS RELEASED TOO LATE 

​Didnt she announced it in 2012 and it got released almost one year later?
#ARTPOP2012 tbh 

[Chromatislaps 34,840]

Applause still slays other faves tbh....that song has grown on me like no other...its the only song of ARTPOP I play a lot...surprisingly it was the song I didn't like that much when I heard ARTPOP in full.....Applause the longevity hit single  

[ARTPOPchamp 292]

1. The production is brilliant and polished, and I'm tired of everyone bashing these "pre-made beats" that she used. Y'all act like she downloaded some **** off of ****ing SoundCloud and wrote lyrics over it. Zedd GAVE her that beat for Donatella and she wrote lyrics to it. She did the same ****ing thing with Marry the Night, you can watch that MTV interview from the Born This Way era and she talks about Fernando playing her the instrumental and her writing the lyrics over it and no one says "Oh well that song is good but I mean she used a pre-made beat." Like who cares? Aside from that the production is very clean and polished compared to Born This Way and even some of The Fame Monster. It's not everyone's cup of tea, but Gaga wanted it to sound clean, so that's how it sounds.

2. Gaga doesn't make radio friendly music, period. The only radio friendly songs she's ever put out is Telephone and Do What U Want. All of her other singles have at least one element (usually many elements) that could make them flop. She's just a musical genius and can create these brilliant pop songs with experimental elements. So when Gaga says something it "radio-friendly," it's not. And catchiness is different from person to person. ARTPOP has some of her catchiest material imo. Aura's chorus is her best ever period, Venus is almost as much of an ear worm as Applause, MANiCURE get stuck in your head for days, Do What U Want is one of her catchiest and best singles, ARTPOP is just brilliant, Swine, Donatella, Fashion!, and Mary Jane Holland are catchy as hell, Gypsy is beautiful and had me singing "TONIIIGHT" for about a year straight after it came out, and let's not forget one of the biggest ear worms of her entire career, Applause. So catchiness is different from person to person. I do happen to agree with you on the relatability, but I feel like Gaga needed to write for herself this time around especially after the hip injury.

3. All of the TV promo performances besides the VMAs, AMAs, Alan Carr, and Jimmy Fallon were subpar by Gaga standards, but once again, she had all of her Venus plans and ideas stripped away from her like 2 weeks before it was supposed to be released as a single. Can you really blame her for not putting in the same effort with Do What U Want when her label and Troy took all of her creative ideas away from her with the Venus switch? We know how Gaga works and how much creativity she has, but I mean, you know that's gotta be hard to start a conceptual single era completely from scratch about a week AFTER the single has been released. I feel for her and I let it slide for the most part because I feel like she started really getting a hang of what she wanted toward the end of the single era/November-December 2013 (the AMAs, Alan Carr, The Voice with Christina). Aside from TV, we had the iTunes festival, artRave, SXSW (my personal favorite), Roseland, and the artRAVE tour. I think each one of those brought something completely different to the table and was something different for Gaga.

With all of that said, I don't think ARTPOP was everything it should've been. You can see a very clear concept change from the I&V shoot, iTunes Festival, and the artRave album release show to the rest of the era. While I don't think the era lived up to what the original era was going to be, it didn't deserve to underperform. At all. The music wasn't the problem. As much as people want to brush off the "mismanaged" argument, it's true, and the way the album was handled from a promotional standpoint really didn't help it's performance.

​The Marry the Night instrumental was specifically made for Lady Gaga by Fernando, it wasn't some scrap instrumental he made for someone else like what Zedd and Madeon did - scraps made for someone else, they treated Lady Gaga like a dog, giving her scraps. Also, Lady Gaga composed and co produced Marry the Night, she even talked about she and Fernando loving the idea of adding electronic bells to the track, etc, show me the interview where Lady Gaga said what you're claiming she said. Furthermore, the problem with the promo is that it was too front heavy, all the promo was for applause and the release of ARTPOP, there wasn't any promo carried through the era, during all her other eras there was an amazing amount of promo throughout the entire era of the album, performances, interviews, tv appearances, etc etc. With ARTPOP, Gaga didn't show she believed in the music like she did previously in other eras. The main problem with ARTPOP, is the timing of it and who it was directed towards. It was released at the bottom end of the mainstream popularity of edm music that existed from late 2011 - mid 2013. EDM reached it's peak around back end of 2012, ARTPOP shouldn't have been so edm heavy, it should have had more rock tracks like MANiCURE and Sexxx Dreams. People have come to expect Lady Gaga to create a new sound, not follow what everyone else does, and musically ARTPOP kind of followed a trend of what was popular. And also, I think Gaga kind of wanted ARTPOP to not do well, she has said more than once its music inspired by her rage and fury - possibly at the industry, possibly at the public, maybe even the fans who try to put her in box - she knew everyone wanted her to go in one direction and do the pop stuff she's always done, but pissed by what everyone expects of her and how we treat her, she said "no, I'm going to give them this instead, if they don't like,they can F*ck off."  She knew the real fans will stick by her no matter what, and ARTPOP flushed out a lot of the fakers. She was even able to flush out Troy, who was also in it for the wrong reasons.