Seven Things Lady Gaga Needs Her Next Album To Deliver

[PopBitch 1,218]

I've been back to listening to Bowie nonstop  I am just blown away by him and his progression.  He's a genius and was changing musical styles at warp speed from album to album every year.  He wasn't massive in America until he went commercial for Let's Dance ten years later, but his first decade was revered and untouchable in fearlessness, following his own muse, refusing to stay safe.  What an artist.

 

Gaga, just do you, and get more prolific in putting out music so all this pressure isn't so huge..

[Sister 9,907]

What a joke. Did a thirteen year old write this piece? Gaga is beyond this and their wants.

[LilVenusian 579]

Was on board until the Venus shade...

[Computer 10,973]

On 4/22/2016 at 0:58 PM, Sizzily said:

"Remember when a Lady Gaga album was just hit after hit after hit? It was a much simpler time, right? At a mammoth 15 tracks, ARTPOP came with more filler "

No, I remember when The Fame had 14 songs with all the singles in the first tack slots and then the end was Paper Gangster, Brown Eyes, Summerboy, and I Like It Rough. The standard edition of Born This Way had 14 songs but the deluxe had 17 with the middle being Black Jesus, Bad Kids, Fashion of His Love, and Highway Unicorn. 

This Thank you 

[Spanish Eyes 2,279]

Hmmmm....I disagree with most of this, but to focus on a few issues I have:

First of all, what's considered filler and what's considered quality is entirely subjective. To many people, for example, "Highway Unicorn" is excellent, but to me, it's just meh. Completely forgettable. And the opposite is certainly true of other songs. What the author should say is that Gaga should aim for the "most, best songs" -- it's not about quality versus quantity, it's about getting the best of both. 

 

Second, the standard form of pop music isn't too necessary. Plenty of hits are breaking the verse-chorus theme. That isn't to say that she shouldn't have a killer hook, but she can do it in different ways, and she SHOULD do it in different ways. Gaga is at a point in her career when, in my opinion, she can't simply regurgitate what is most likely to sell. She has to strike a balance between getting her tracks to sell AND pushing boundaries. 

 

Finally, and what I think needs to be said, but never is, is that The Fame is, musically, her least interesting album. She follows a lot of conventions, and she generated a lot of filler. If you tell me that "Boys Boys Boys" ("Love it when you call me legs, in the morning, buy me eggs") is better than most of the non-single tracks of BTW and ARTPOP, I'm going to be expecting some good reasoning. The Fame had killer singles, and The Fame Monster was like the perfect one-two punch. We need to remember that she was riding off the some of the biggest hype of our generation and everyone was looking to Gaga. The Fame didn't earn those Grammy nominations (including Album of the Year) because it contained a plethora of tracks with interesting musicality and profound lyrics; it did so because she was THAT popular.

 

The Fame Monster is a different story. It really did pack a ton of awesomeness into 8 tracks. ARTPOP certainly had its own duds (e.g. "Fashion!"), but that doesn't make it a bad album. In fact, I really dislike how people confuse commercial success for the quality of an album. Commercial success is more readily tied to hype, popularity, and continuing hits. There are so many things that ruined ARTPOP's success (namely the endless comparisons to Katy Perry).

 

So it comes down to this: Gaga has to both deliver in quality of songs and in commercial success in order to keep everyone happy. The two aspects are certainly related, but not too powerfully. This can be achieved if she maintains a level-head and continues to use the musical knowledge she was trained with and blends it with the styles of her producers. That will give us quality music. Commercial success will come with a smash lead single, enough media hype, and continued single success. In other words, if she releases at the right time, with the minimum amount of competition and with the best material she can make -- she can reclaim her pop throne.

 

She's coming off of a complete revamp in her image. The public may not be thirsty for Gaga, but they are certainly receptive and open. If she delivers, they will at least listen. And that's really all we can ask, isn't it?

 

Sorry for the (probably incoherent) novel that I just wrote....

[XoXoJoanneGaga 629]

27 minutes ago, Spanish Eyes said:

Hmmmm....I disagree with most of this, but to focus on a few issues I have:

First of all, what's considered filler and what's considered quality is entirely subjective. To many people, for example, "Highway Unicorn" is excellent, but to me, it's just meh. Completely forgettable. And the opposite is certainly true of other songs. What the author should say is that Gaga should aim for the "most, best songs" -- it's not about quality versus quantity, it's about getting the best of both. 

 

Second, the standard form of pop music isn't too necessary. Plenty of hits are breaking the verse-chorus theme. That isn't to say that she shouldn't have a killer hook, but she can do it in different ways, and she SHOULD do it in different ways. Gaga is at a point in her career when, in my opinion, she can't simply regurgitate what is most likely to sell. She has to strike a balance between getting her tracks to sell AND pushing boundaries. 

Filler is any song that doesn't touch on or expand upon the album's central theme or aesthetic, any track that's redundant musically or lyrically really, out of place, etc. A lot of mainstream pop albums don't even have a central theme or idea or aesthetic to begin with so in those cases they're pretty much just compilations, and any song could be considered filler really. That's why people always say ARTPOP was loaded with filler, and The Fame and Born This Way have a couple as well, regardless of the songs being enjoyable or guilty pleasures (ex: Boys Boys Boys, Highway Unicorn). Any time you see a mainstream pop record with a long tracklist chances are it will have tons of redundant tracks, like Drake's new tracklist that he revealed today is 20 tracks and I'm already dreading the filler that's gonna be on that record given his track record and the singles he's already released.

Completely agreed on the second point though, I would love to see Gaga break out of the traditional pop song format, as she's already mastered it a few times. 

[Spanish Eyes 2,279]

4 hours ago, CoCo1 said:

Filler is any song that doesn't touch on or expand upon the album's central theme or aesthetic, any track that's redundant musically or lyrically really, out of place, etc. A lot of mainstream pop albums don't even have a central theme or idea or aesthetic to begin with so in those cases they're pretty much just compilations, and any song could be considered filler really. That's why people always say ARTPOP was loaded with filler, and The Fame and Born This Way have a couple as well, regardless of the songs being enjoyable or guilty pleasures (ex: Boys Boys Boys, Highway Unicorn). Any time you see a mainstream pop record with a long tracklist chances are it will have tons of redundant tracks, like Drake's new tracklist that he revealed today is 20 tracks and I'm already dreading the filler that's gonna be on that record given his track record and the singles he's already released.

Completely agreed on the second point though, I would love to see Gaga break out of the traditional pop song format, as she's already mastered it a few times. 

It's interesting. I would define filler differently -- to me, filler tracks are basically the ones where you could tell they didn't spend too much time on it....or it doesn't have that special something that makes it catchy. Like, the track is just simple, basic, with nothing noteworthy musically or lyrically. I do feel that way about tracks like "Fashion!" "Highway Unicorn," "Paper Gangsta" and others.

[Didymus 34,380]

"Just stick to the trusted verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus-fade formula please."

NSFW:

Spoiler

How can you say that omg. That's like everything that was wrong about BTW/ARTPOP.

[Didymus 34,380]

31 minutes ago, Spanish Eyes said:

I do feel that way about tracks like "Fashion!" "Highway Unicorn," "Paper Gangsta" and others.

But those are like eventful, interesting tracks. Their songwriting is thorough, their production is exciting and fresh in the album contexts, their structure doesn't feel contrived. I dunno, weird that you picked those to me..

Imo, a list of Gaga fillers would go more like this:

_ I Like It Rough
_ Again Again
_ Fashion

And in fact, that's really all the fillers I can find in her discography. And they're not even bad, so that's fantastic.

[Spanish Eyes 2,279]

8 hours ago, Didymus said:

But those are like eventful, interesting tracks. Their songwriting is thorough, their production is exciting and fresh in the album contexts, their structure doesn't feel contrived. I dunno, weird that you picked those to me..

Imo, a list of Gaga fillers would go more like this:

_ I Like It Rough
_ Again Again
_ Fashion

And in fact, that's really all the fillers I can find in her discography. And they're not even bad, so that's fantastic.

Isn't it awesome that she can create such a variety of works that appeal to different people?