Who is a bigger Superstar? Gaga or Beyonce?

[Didymus 32,822]

56 minutes ago, Tom Hardy said:

The image factor DOES pose some importance, but you seem to put ALL emphasis on that, and have totally excluded the star power that they have garnered over the years.

Well, yeah.. because I remember very well that Gaga fans (and non-fans) were already comparing her to Madonna and many people already claimed her to be better just for being able to sing better, within the first months of her taking off. I'm sure you wouldn't jump into those discussions talking about how it was unfair because Gaga was just a new artist there, would ya?

56 minutes ago, Tom Hardy said:

I'm sorry but I would rather Gaga, and have respect for her choice, to be able to sing properly and dance less vigorously like Madonna.

Well.. for someone who likes to shine light on artists' previous career glory, you sure misrepresent Madonna there Madonna has a long ass touring history and right up to the Confessions Tour her vocals were actually fine, and during the first eight years of her career (choosing that because Gaga is eight years in) she was amazing and could impress vocally as well as physically. She won't belt out the notes Gaga does, but that's not necessary imo to be a vocal performer. Madonna had a vocal presence that was undeniable in the beginning of her career (and I'd say until about the Confessions Tour).

So that argument I will have to toss in the bin. Some audiovisual proof. Note, this is just performances that incorporate choreography, some of her ballad renditions are also mega impressive vocally, but they're not really relevant to what we're talking about.

Keep It Together (Blond Ambition Tour)

Fever (Girlie Show Tour)

No one would call her a better vocalist than Gaga, but still, many Gaga physical heavy performances from 2008-2015 would look, indeed, ridiculous compared to these, especially in the context of a tour. Just imagine Gaga being around in this time, who do you think would be called the best performer? It wouldn't be such an easy choice (for Gaga) despite her obviously better technical vocals (isolated from a physically demanding performance which Gaga can't even execute properly).

56 minutes ago, Tom Hardy said:

Of course the perfect Gaga would be able to dance and sing just as well but if she can't, vocals >>> dancing, and that's something to commend, not condemn and be deemed as ridiculous. Besides, Gaga dances decently in MANY (you are one of the very few exceptions, apparently you were expecting Gaga to dance like Michael Jackson, have you seen Katy Perry or Rihanna's dancing?).

Well, I'm not the first one to say it's ridiculous that Gaga doesn't play to her strengths. When she dances, her vocals suffer massively, and her vocals are supposed to be what elevates her from the rest of the pop pack, so why would you ever do that, especially when you're aware that your dancing isn't strong either?

And no, I don't think Gaga has enough examples of admirable dancing in the context of a tour. I couldn't use Bey's performance at Superbowl, so then you can't choose performances at award shows either (Born This Way at the Grammy's for instance, where her dancing is indeed perfectly fine). The fact is that she stands out among her dancers for the wrong reasons and her energy levels are usually so low that she can't even do the choreo properly. This has never been an issue for Madonna, so a comparison there is valid no matter who has the best vocals.

And I think you're being harsh on Katy. Rihanna I don't particularly mind, but Katy actually is someone who does play to her strengths. She's limited physically and vocally but her performances deceive you and she gets to shine like the star of the show while Gaga usually looks like she's struggling. So the key of my message is: play to your strengths. I don't think Gaga did that ever since 2009 and I think that's a shame 'cause her talent doesn't shine through in her own tours.

56 minutes ago, Tom Hardy said:

When have I discarded Beyonce's tour success though? And the statement of Beyonce being more successful because she's been in the business for longer is accurate and not a myth like you said? Let's give Gaga another 10 years and stop Beyonce from working for this period. Obviously Gaga would have better achievements by then? Do you not see the logic in this at all?

What the hell does that mean Of course Gaga would be more successful, but that's not what this thread is about. This thread is about who is the biggest superstar and I have already told you again and again and again and again that you can debut and have your superstar power noticed right from the start, despite you not having a multitude of accolades. Just like Madonna was already recognized as a superstar within her first three years of releases, just like Gaga was already recognized as a superstar within the first three year of releases, just like Beyoncé was already recognized as a superstar when she was in a damn girl band in the 90's.

Of course your length of time in the business is relevant to measure the amount of success you've had, but my entire point is that success doesn't necessarily equal star power. Otherwise Gaga would never have been called a superstar until she had beaten everyone else's achievements first. She didn't have to do that, nor did anyone have to do anything of the sort to be recognized as a star. I don't get why that's so hard to understand.

56 minutes ago, Tom Hardy said:

I'm starting to doubt your rationality, you sound like you genuinely want to shade all GGD members who defend Gaga here because they state opinions that are in your opinion delusional. I mean I don't support people being delusional but it seems like you despise them at Gaga's expense, by taking away credit that she deserves, and even now throwing her off the category where she now does not pose a threat to Beyonce at all, I hope Gaga wins over Beyonce in a major Grammy category next year to prove you wrong.

Well that's really rude tbh and I'm offended by that, especially since I have presented my own opinion as my personal opinion and have spent a lot of time on building up good counterarguments to the people who randomly decided to quote me. I mean, you didn't even have a good point that was relevant to me, and I'm trying to defend my point of view and now you're saying I'm trying to shade everyone for being delusional? Why?

The only reason I started bringing up Beyoncé's dancing was because another user seemed to imply that Beyoncé's and Gaga's dancing skills were comparable. The only reason I started bringing up Gaga's dancing was because someone accused me of using the worst examples possible (which I did NOT do) and the only reason I am forced to bring up Madonna now is because you decided to zoom in on one sentence in my post, which is about Gaga's PHYSIQUE and ENERGY LEVELS more than her talent or her dancing abilities.

I am not taking away the credit of her being a fantastic dancer because she's not. End of the ****ing story. Tell me where I have taken away credits from her, I would honestly love for you to try to find that sort of **** in my posts, how dare you.

I don't need to be proven wrong because I don't give a **** about all the awards and achievements you boring people like to bring up, I enjoy Gaga for my own reasons and I don't need ANYONE or ANYTHING to acknowledge Gaga's greatness or superiority to be a fan. Saying Beyoncé is a bigger super star is not in any way, to me at least, a diss at Gaga. I don't need to pretend she's the best singer, dancer, artist, whatever, to enjoy her. Sorry if that makes me unqualified to be on this forum, but I'm here and I deserve my spot, especially when I spend time to craft my arguments and my posts well and don't resort to some backhanded comments with shady gifs and compliment Gaga PLENTY.

Really disappointed tbh.

[Zilla 13,343]

We all have opinions, let's respect them please

[Didymus 32,822]

40 minutes ago, Tom Hardy said:

Honestly you have serious prejudice towards people who defend Gaga here @Didymus 

I mean I like you, you've shown kindness to me in our PMs but this is kind of annoying.

Not everyone who defends Gaga is delusional. 

Keep your ****ing personal insults to yourself. This is not on topic and you're being rude as all hell. You're obviously reading my discussions in a very biased manner and ignoring, once again story of my ****ing life, all the positive stuff I say about Gaga on a daily basis.

You don't wanna get my point of view? Fine.

But then don't, just DON'T try to lecture me or use your voice on this forum to misrepresent me and make a fool out of me. If you're annoyed, you did it to yourself, because I know damn well that I haven't attacked people who merely "defended" Gaga, I know damn well that I have attacked people who have used bs to tear Beyoncé down instead of presenting a well-constructed argument about why Gaga is the bigger super star, which should be the point of this thread.

Whatever man. Obviously you made up your mind about me so there's nothing I can do. Just don't do these cringeworthy posts designed to embarrass me publicly.

[MelbHawker 6,368]

Play nicely, gurls

I think both Gaga and Bey are megastars of the same calibre. 

End thread.

[Brian Ryan 1,468]

I like Lady Gaga more... but obviously Beyonce' she's been in the game for like 20 years and still getting massive sales and everywhere. She has not had a flop yet. Rather you like Lady Gaga or Beyonce' more it would be delusional to think Beyonce' isn't the bigger superstar.

[StrawberryBlond 13,346]

At the moment, Beyonce. But consider this...

Comparing album and single sales, etc. they're actually more evenly matched than you realise and Beyonce only has more Vevo views because she releases so many singles per album and has a video for every song on her self titled album. Remember that Beyonce didn't even start becoming a touring force until her third album and she's only properly toured for 3 out of 6 albums (including Lemonade) thus far. Gaga's given the world a proper tour for every album thus far and ARTPOP didn't even sell as much as 4, yet it got its own tour whereas 4 did not (no, The Mrs Carter Tour did not support it, it was merely a mish mash of everything and it changed completely for the 2014 segment to support her new album). I was shocked when the first week UK sales of Lemonade came in - 73,000 and that's sales+streaming. Streams accounted for 10,000, meaning she only had 63,000 pure album sales. In today's climate, that's good, no doubt, but all things considered, she should have sold so much more. ARTPOP, an album that didn't even have a performance of the lead single in the UK (bar the itunes festival), sold 67,000 in its opening week. And this is when Gaga was supposedly flopping. Beyonce, on the other hand, had just come back from a record breaking tour. The Mrs Carter Tour pulled in a UK audience of 353,025. If you add the people who saw her at the Chime For Change concert in London in addition, that number rises to 398,085. The total gross exceeds $38.4 million. The additional album sold over 418,000 copies and had a top ten hit, Drunk In Love. Her current stadium tour in the UK is almost completely sold out, I believe. So, after all that, how come she can only debut with 63,000 album sales (yes, I know she didn't have a full week, but still)? When it all comes down to it, she's really more of a touring force than anything else nowadays. People will see her live because she's a great performer, but are they really interested in her music, especially outside the US? It doesn't seem like it. Madonna's a big touring force too (well, she was up until very recently) and she can't sell an album now. It's not a new concept - selling tickets but not albums.

So saying, I have my doubts that Gaga could have announced a bunch of tour dates all over the world for no reason and just toured with old material and been as succcessful as Beyonce was during her last tour. But we'll never know because Gaga only tours when she releases an album. I think Beyonce has done this whole tickets before an album idea because she's worried about how the public will receive her new material after the unexpected underperformance of 4. Gaga has the confidence to put out an album, let the public decide if they like it and then tour, with demand worked out. I don't know how Beyonce can perform for a sold out crowd when she isn't sure if everyone there even likes her new album or if they're just there because they didn't want to miss out on the tour if the album was good (but they actually don't like it). At least Gaga can perform with the knowledge that everyone is there because they truly want to be and weren't tricked into buying tickets without knowing what they'd get for it. I can only think someone is so much of a superstar if they have to use tricks to sell tickets and make people pay for tickets blindly, without using the new music as the deciding factor, like the old days. It means you're more of a celebrity than an artist. Also, dropping an album with no singles is a bold move when you're a big name like Beyonce and that alone will generate sales, rather than the music itself. Every album is an event for her now because she engineers it to be an event. There's nothing organic about it.

[Yanko 9,860]

11 pages  

bey is bigger than gaga rn like how is this even up for a debate   

[Fiona Apple 13,006]

8 hours ago, Didymus said:

Don't even gurl

vs.

I love Beyonce but that comparison is beyond stupid

You compare a SUPERBOWL performance to a RANDOM TOUR performance

[Fiona Apple 13,006]

Btw Beyonce is obviously bigger.Not even a question

[Didymus 32,822]

1 hour ago, StrawberryBlond said:

So saying, I have my doubts that Gaga could have announced a bunch of tour dates all over the world for no reason and just toured with old material and been as succcessful as Beyonce was during her last tour. But we'll never know because Gaga only tours when she releases an album. I think Beyonce has done this whole tickets before an album idea because she's worried about how the public will receive her new material after the unexpected underperformance of 4. Gaga has the confidence to put out an album, let the public decide if they like it and then tour, with demand worked out. I don't know how Beyonce can perform for a sold out crowd when she isn't sure if everyone there even likes her new album or if they're just there because they didn't want to miss out on the tour if the album was good (but they actually don't like it).

Isn't that a bit of a reach though? I mean, I always thought that the reason Gaga's tours don't start with her album releases is because she's so rushed to make albums in the first place.

After all, her first Monster Ball started on November 27th which is only nine days after her album was released. Granted, Beyoncé's tour started only four days after her album release but that's not a big difference, especially when you can damn well assume that most of the fans would've listened to the album by then in both time spans.

The Monster Ball, then, ended on May 11nd, which is right before BTW was released (indeed, she was forced to play BTW the song on the tour supporting her previous album), so obviously the next tour wasn't coming until a lot later. The same counts for ARTPOP, she was nowhere ready to start a next tour so soon after the BTWB.

So.. yeah, I think that has nothing to do with artistic integrity. It's just that Gaga was so rushed to death that she didn't even have time to take a well-deserved break after her tours ended, which obviously led to her breaking down physically and emotionally both in 2012/13 and at the end of that same year.

Also, Beyoncé has never went on tour to perform songs exclusively from her new album In fact, I always criticized her for performing way too many old songs. Usually she adds more songs of the new album when the public has had the time to assimilate them (as happened during the Mrs. Carter Tour). She also did numerous legs for that one, so the people who didn't feel the need to go the first time had the chance in many cases to go back and explore a reinvented show that was built more on the newer material.

1 hour ago, StrawberryBlond said:

weren't tricked into buying tickets without knowing what they'd get for it. I can only think someone is so much of a superstar if they have to use tricks to sell tickets and make people pay for tickets blindly, without using the new music as the deciding factor, like the old days. It means you're more of a celebrity than an artist.

That's so harsh though Why would you call it tricking if there's a substantial amount of time between the tours? You know she's gonna bring plenty of her old hits, it's not like she's only bringing brandnew material. The setlist of Formation shows that she was a lot more focused on her other albums actually I'm assuming the fans who are familiar with her shows know they don't need to expect a super conceptual, new-album-heavy show they're never gonna be able to enjoy. That's not even what her act is about. It's about seeing Beyoncé, the star, singing and dancing live. I don't see how that promise, which she delivers every time, is a trick.

I also think you're misrepresenting the industry as a whole. Beyoncé is not the only one who goes on tour before she has properly promoted an album. Tons of artists and bands do that, including ones who aren't by far famous enough to use that situation to have a commercial benefit.

Examples of major tours that started either before or right after a new album release:

Who's That Girl World Tour, Madonna (1987): started before True Blue's release
Bad Tour, Michael Jackson (1987): 12 days after Bad
Blond Ambition World Tour, Madonna (1989): less than a month after LAP
The Division Bell Tour, Pink Floyd (1994): 2 days after TDB
Bridges to Babylon Tour, The Rolling Stones (1997): a day before BTB
A Bigger Bang, The Rolling Stones (2005): about 20 days before ABB
Black Ice World Tour, AC/DC (2008): 11 days after Black Ice
Wrecking Ball World Tour, Bruce Springsteen (2012): 13 days after WB
Out There, Paul McCartney (2013): about 6 months before New

Surely you wouldn't call Michael and Pink Floyd mere celebrities. And this is just examples from some of the most successful tours of all times (which include tons of tours that start only a month after the supported album's release, which is also too short - obviously people would've secured their tickets already before that), and I know plenty of unknown bands who I've seen when their album was coming out in the next couple of weeks. Touring can also work to promote your album instead of the other way around

Anyway. I'm used to you pulling things out of your ass to diss Beyoncé but this was quite weak if I may.

[Didymus 32,822]

21 minutes ago, Britney Spears said:

I love Beyonce but that comparison is beyond stupid

You compare a SUPERBOWL performance to a RANDOM TOUR performance

I already covered that Second page. It was misleading, I guess, but on the other hand, it doesn't make a difference whether or not I post a random Beyoncé tour performance or not, her dancing will always be better

Wasn't trying to prove anything, I was just trying to create a very dramatic comparison to someone who seemed to claim (which turned out not to be true) that Gaga was as good a dancer as Bey.

[Didymus 32,822]

1 hour ago, StrawberryBlond said:

Also, dropping an album with no singles is a bold move when you're a big name like Beyonce and that alone will generate sales, rather than the music itself. Every album is an event for her now because she engineers it to be an event. There's nothing organic about it.

I don't get this either tbh. Her last two releases have been surprise releases, yes, but the focus has been most exclusively on the music. Which is why her albums are getting better reviews compared to her earlier ones: because there's a lot more thought put into the music and it's no longer some run of the mill substanceless pop jangles.

I mean, are you really claiming that reviewers have been misled by the force of the "event" of the whole thing? Because all I'm seeing is Beyoncé just dropping an album. Why would that matter? Tons of artists do it, especially the ones who aren't famous enough to bother to do a big promo sprawl. If the music had been bad, I don't see how reviewers wouldn't have picked up on that. Her name has never inspired reviewers to imagine fantastic music, so why would it now?

You could argue, actually, that just dropping your album and letting it speak for itself, without anticipated expectations, is a lot more organic than to systematically try to get people to care about your work by appearing everywhere and talking about it to make it look appealing. Look at Miley's surprise record. Basically, no one cared and it got trashed. So how does your point still stand up then?

1 hour ago, StrawberryBlond said:

It's not a new concept - selling tickets but not albums.

That's wildly unfair too. Her U.S. success with Beyoncé was extremely good (the largest opening week for a female artist in 2013, yes that's right, I get that you're trying to evade her selling more than Gaga by flipping to the UK, but I think that's a strange strategy when you then won't mention Beyoncé outdoing Gaga in other parts of the world). The highest opening week of her entire career and that with no promo. Also three largest sales weeks in total by a female artist ever.

It was also the fastest selling album in iTunes history, both in the U.S. ànd worldwide as confirmed by Apple. It topped the charts in 104 countries and sold a million worldwide (all on iTunes) after six days. Besides, your UK comment is weird, since charts executives have noted how the album sold more than any other digital album in recent years in the country. It also was a success that grew, since it actually gained a peak in its fifth week. I don't have recent numbers, but she sold over 400.000 copies in the UK by November 2014. When we compare that to ARTPOP, Beyoncé was most definitely a bigger success, and combined with their respective tours it's clear that Beyoncé was a much bigger commercial force in total compared to Gaga on all levels.

Besides, Lemonade is proving to be a massive success in terms of the actual music on the album. Unlike Beyoncé it's topping the charts in the UK right now, so her success over seas clearly isn't dwindling. I don't get why you have to play this card, it's obvious Beyoncé is one of the only pop girls that can actually come up with fresh strategies to get her albums sold, and, ironically, it's by letting the music speak for itself. How is that not praiseworthy?

I feel like you're just gonna twist everything Beyoncé does in order to diss her. Remember when Troy said he wanted Gaga to release her music for free at some point because he felt album sales were becoming redundant? I'm beyond sure that if Beyoncé would do something like that you'd just say: "Oh, this is an obvious strategy because Beyoncé can't sell albums anymore and this way she doesn't look like a fool". I've already seen that trend with Miley and with Madonna (people who thought she leaked the album on her own 'cause she knew her sales would suck). That kind of cynicism is see-through, especially when you're using misleading and not even completely accurate facts to back up your own arguments

[shaneybaby 450]

Ask me this after Gaga's next album. Beyonce is hot right now because she just dropped another surprise visual album. Gaga is hands down more interesting though. I don't find someone talking about cheating shocking and groundbreaking... 

[KinneyUnderYou 0]

Ariana Grande

Spoiler

 

[monstereo 1,232]

I come back to the thread I created 6+ hours later...