Gaga has been showering us with classic cover songs

[Hexxx 2,244]

I think this is just because she wants the fans to get to know to classic songs!

Gaga did say that if you respect the artists that were before you in the past, then artists in the future will respect you. I think her main goal right now is to change her image from someone who is purely commercial based to an image of someone who is passionate about art. And any kind of art.

She did that with ARTPOP and they hated her for it. Mostly because the whole meaning was miss understood by the fan base and the GP

[Schwerk 6,810]

She's resetting the GP's brains, letting them focus on the music and not her. It's obviously a strategy and I love it.

She's already considered a legend instead of a popgirl. And a status of legend puts a little less pressure on what style music she should make next, how she needs to look and if she has to score hits.

The status of legend can set her free. It certainly made the GP finally see sides of her only us fans saw before.

[Tropico 4,145]

She covered IWALY by Whitney?  

[lego 44,165]

- 10 seconds of Billy Idol's Rebel Yell  

[Ryan Reid 173]

Yes, Gaga sang "I Will Always Love You" dozens of times during her live performances of "Do What U Want" ...

It began at the American Music Awards, where she did some very, VERY subtle notes from it at the end (skip to 4:46): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjoW-34MO9A  

And she expanded upon it during the last half of the artRAVE tour: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jKA--e76_s

[Ryan Reid 173]

Now you've got me started, LOL... Going a bit OT, but more about her IWALY cover...

When Gaga incorporated Whitney's IWALY into "Do What U Want" it was absolute brilliance. For those of you who know the song well, you know that DWUW is not about s-x at all, the s-xual lyrics are a metaphor. The song is actually about the music industry's destruction of the very artists they help create (and the media's role in this game). And all the injustice against the artist that ensues. Which is why the original lyrics sample Michael Jackson's 1995 song "Scream" which is about the exact same thing. (Much, much more of this a--lysis in my YouTube video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1ejU3pp1sQ )

Anyway, in the realm of pop music of Gaga's lifetime, there are no 2 artists who have been chewed up and spit out by media more than Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston --- they DIED because of it. DWUW, in it's opening verse, samples Michael. But there was nothing  (overtly) referencing Whitney until the live performances. But when she does it live and uses Whitney's song to close, it's the perfect bookend to Michael's opening lyrics. 

But she doesn't simply sample Whitney. She uses "I Will Always Love You" as a message to the fans. After singing such an aggressive, "f*ck you" song, telling us about the horrors of being in this industry, she ends it by telling the fans "but, I will always love you." She even **literally** bows before us and outstretches her arms to us to emphasize the point. (as seen in the pic above, during the end of IWALY at artRAVE)

So basically, she's saying to the media and industry "Do what you want with my body ---- you can't have my heart and you won't use my mind." But she's telling us, the fans, that we are what makes everything worth it. She's doing it all in an effort to share her love with us. And using Whitney's IWALY to do it. 

 

[Ryan Reid 173]

Part II --- the reason I said there was no "overt" references to Whitney in the original DWUW...

Gaga's collaborator on DWUW is R. Kelly (someone else who can COMPLETELY relate to the villification of an artist by the media). But R. Kelly's presence has direct ties to Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston on this song: 

- R. Kelly was one of the primary collaborators with Michael Jackson for his 1995 'HIStory' album (he wrote MJ's smash hit, "You Are Not Alone", which was the follow-up single to DWUW's predecessor, "Scream").

- R. Kelly was Whitney Houston's collaborator on her final comeback album 'I Look to You'... He even wrote the title track and sang it at her funeral. 

So, R. Kelly's inclusion in this collaboration is not simply for the sake of the music. There are layers of meaning behind it in pop music history.