How old is Chromatica?

[Italian 573]

Weren't there also rumours that 1000 Doves dates back to ARTPOP

 

[adamsenigma 9,520]

This is Gaga’s problem IMO. Lately she's taking too much with her albums and they sound dated. For example "Free Woman" is a bop bit it sounds terribly dated, it's literally a Kygo 2015 song, it's like a more upbeat "Firestone"  1000 Doves (one of my favorites) is hella dated, literally a 2010 Jlo radio track. Sine From Above also sounds too dated, the Eurovision vibes is strong on that one. 

I love Chromatica but I can't help but feel the production sounds dated on most tracks, tho that's mostly the case with 4 on the floor beats, that's why pop music usually ages worse than, for example, R&B. 

[xoxo Craig 55,649]

37 minutes ago, Gracious Gaga said:

I don't agree   

but  we got some great songs out of this album! 

I think the problem is that fans hear a particular sound that resonates with them, right? And then you try put it in a box and say "oh that sounds like that...". But y'all need to understand how music evolves and what genre is what. 

Tropical house is Latin American inspired dance music. The majority of latin American songs have more of a reggae beat to them. Tropical house took influence from this and made it "mainstream".  Examples of tropical house sounding songs:

Spoiler

 

You'll notice I put DiC in there because it follows the same pattern. 

This kind of evolved even more and it became modern day pop music. Its why The Cure did so well. Songs like Wolves with Selena Gomez, Havana, Sun Comes Up, Stay, In The Middle (list goes on). 

Then obviously we had a trap/rap phase. Where in Chromatica does it sound like tropical house? And lemme say this. Vocal samples have been used in songs well before 2015. Infact, its very common in the 90s and early 2000s dance music to have either a vocal sample or an instrument sample. 

I just don't see (or rather hear) any song on the album that remotely resembles tropical house, I'm sorry. 

I'll also say this. The 90s and early 2000s dance era is hailed as the golden era of dance. You had 80s (golden era of pop), 70s (golden era of disco), 60s (golden era of swing and rock n roll). If you are making a dance song (4 on the floor, synth heavy, bass heavy), then it is going to take influences from the 90s and early 2000s dance music. So just because someone sampled a 90s House beat in 2015 or 2017 does not make Chromatica dated. Especially when they are modernising it and bringing dance back to the forefront. Its what Gaga does best. It literally birthed her career. 

Of course its your opinion to have, but I really cannot understand how anyone could say this album is dated. 

Spoiler

I will say Sine From Above sounds dated as it reminds me of this:

And 1000 Doves reminds me a little bit of this:

But those are the ONLY songs on the album you could begin to argue they sound dated

 

[xoxo Craig 55,649]

19 minutes ago, Lord Temptation said:

 

I agree with both of you. The trouble is in finding the dividing line between “classic” and “dated”. Usually songs that are deemed dated are from genres that seem frozen in time, instead of having evolved into contemporary forms. Or the term is just used in a lazy way, an inarticulate way of saying “I don’t like it and i don’t want to explain why”. Like, a real artist can turn old into gold.

I don’t hear any of the main 2010s genres (trap, tropical house) in Chromatica but i do hear layers of 70s, 80s, 90s and early 2000s, and these periods are all long ago enough to be deemed classic rather than dated. And besides Gaga has a knack for mixing sounds so that they always sound fresh. 

Like Hair from Born This Way is an obvious example of a song that is inspired by and incorporates elements from 80s glam metal; yet it sounds like no song from that era.

Same with Chromatica. You would never mistake Free Woman for an actual early 90s house track, even though the influences are all there.  The way she expresses and reinterprets old and new sounds in a non-obvious way is what makes her so unique.

And sorry but Sine From Above does not sound like 2012 EDM. Chromatica is actually a very modern album. It’s nostalgic on one level but forward thinking on a much deeper level. 

I absolutely agree with this.

[Gracious Gaga 17,163]

6 minutes ago, xoxo Craig said:

Of course its your opinion to have, but I really cannot understand how anyone could say this album is dated. 

I know lol thats why I didnt bother to further explain my opinion (which still is that a great handful of tracks on this album sound dated)

[Gracious Gaga 17,163]

18 minutes ago, adamsenigma said:

This is Gaga’s problem IMO. Lately she's taking too much with her albums and they sound dated. For example "Free Woman" is a bop bit it sounds terribly dated, it's literally a Kygo 2015 song, it's like a more upbeat "Firestone"  1000 Doves (one of my favorites) is hella dated, literally a 2010 Jlo radio track. Sine From Above also sounds too dated, the Eurovision vibes is strong on that one. 

I love Chromatica but I can't help but feel the production sounds dated on most tracks, tho that's mostly the case with 4 on the floor beats, that's why pop music usually ages worse than, for example, R&B. 

YES KYGO !!! so much of the album sounds like Kygo!! 

[OCD 405]

Plastic Doll gives me Team Love Child vibes, I fell dirty listening to it as if I stole a pre-The-Fame unreleased. I love it 😂

[God Control 2,181]

So much of the album feels like a mixture of Born This Way. I noticed. That’s not to say it’s bad. I absolutely love it. 

[OCD 405]

2 minutes ago, God Control said:

So much of the album feels like a mixture of Born This Way. I noticed. That’s not to say it’s bad. I absolutely love it. 

BTW and TFM had a baby, AP is the godfather.

[God Control 2,181]

Just now, Amir said:

BTW and TFM had a baby, AP is the godfather.

Yessssss perfect comparison. 

[GagaUnderYou 4,981]

It seems like an album that was just thrown together by Bloodpop. Definitely not her best album but I enjoy it. Everyone always says "it's her best work" when the album drops. The acclaim Joanne got was real too and now everyone is like "no ballads". 

[juicyjuicy 1,985]

1 hour ago, ARTGOD said:

ARTPOP and Chromatica’s production are on whole different universes lol .

One is an EDM odyssey while another serves “Generic DJ feat. Pop singer” production for half the runtime.

I hate how often the production on Chromatica undermines Gaga’s songwriting. There are a couple cool moments throughout, but a lot of the album is so empty and generic it’s actually painful.

OMG @ "Generic DJ ft. Pop singer" ...I can't unhear it now. 

[riotx 1,300]

"When we sat with Gaga, we all talked about how it should feel. There was this general consensus that the music should feel classic and familiar, but also fresh and new at the same time. Something I thought about a lot when finishing these records: What sound would work here to make the listener almost feel comfortable, like they’ve experienced it before?”

All three of the collaborators immersed themselves in Nineties house culture. They covered the studio in acid house posters and Burns would send Gaga and Tucker Spotify playlists of classic house music to further educate them. The trio took the tribute to house so seriously that they even had the album’s mixer Tom Norris avoid using technology or mixing trends that were too modern.

“I was told not to use any sidechains throughout the album,” Norris explains. “Sidechains are a way of ducking one instrument out to make room for another, and it’s a really common thing in EDM. It wasn’t even possible to do when these classic Nineties house records were made. So I tried to steer clear from those to be true to that sound.”

“I would reverse engineer some Daft Punk songs to figure out what went into the making of that. Some of that didn’t make it on to the final record, but it helped us figure out how we evoke that French Touch sound in a 2020 way.”

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/lady-gaga-chromatica-making-of-bloodpop-axwell-1007139/

[Jose P 23,341]

I’m so tired of this “dated” narrative. I feel like I don’t understand what’s considered dated bc I see almost every single thing being criticized as sounding “dated”. What even is the not dated sound? Minimalistic trap beats?