Unpopular opinion: ARTPOP (2023)

[dimitristhe 1,556]

I think we can’t really discuss unpopular opinions about this album because that particular album had and still has the most mixed reception. So, I’m gonna post my opinions after 10 whole years.

Applause is a really good pop song and really deserved that video and single treatment.

Aura’s angry vocals should have been kept.

Sexxx Dreams demo bridge was way more sexier and proper for the song, but the album version one fits the album theme more.

Mary Jane Holland’s news intro and some demo vocals should have been kept, or at least released in an edit of the song on the deluxe edition.

ARTPOP album cover is messy and unpleasant to look at. The original photoshoot was breathtaking and it’s a pity it wasn’t used.

As much as I hate R.Kelly, he really brought something in DWUW and perfected it. He is a very talented person but he deserves jail. 

Gypsy is a beautiful song on its own but is overproduced, the last part is a headache.

Swine lacks the rock element of the live version, the album version is just a bunch of sounds blended together.

The SXSW performance of Swine is very artistic, revolutionary and epic. It showcases the angry theme of the song.

Venus is not single material, if it was released it would have been a flop. I still need the video though. 

ARTPOP (the song) is a masterpiece. PERIOD.

Early ARTPOP fashion was Gaga’s best. After GUY everything was messy, with some exceptions. 

[Cruelty 6,172]

1 hour ago, Ziggy said:

I totally get the concept she has for it sonically but thematically…an Amazon reviewer did it better by saying it takes you through suites of obsessions. Sexual, material, all that. I wish Gaga would have dropped the art talk and just gone into those early inspos like she talked about at the BTWB (an album without responsibility). It was kinda her Melodrama album. Hedonism and ****ery then reckoning with the self but she wanted to call it something else. Idk I think ARTPOP was all about the marketing and she sold it oddly. The title is good for the album, though! But relate it back to the actual concepts running through the album.

 

Venus is GOAT and she needs more rough demo-y releases.

 

her cleanest production hands down. It’s really really well done.

Swine is kinda crap and the bass levels were a choice. Needed to be more ferocious.

Instead of Act II she should have done SoundCloud drops with stuff like brooklyn nights. Great song, doesn’t really fit the album which actually does have a tight concept despite its explorations.

 

why didn’t she do more club work with this album? Remixes, club nights, ANYTHING. The marketing of this kinda writes itself and Troy leaving her is the reason, I get it, but oy there were some GREAT marketing opps she missed on that would have buoyed the album but I know she was onto jazz by then (two eras I adored coinciding tbh; do that again gagaloo; it was awesome).

For me it's just the way you're consistently the most articulate, intelligent and (tbh) correct poster on this hell-forum  I agree with every point.

I wonder as well whether all the "art and pop can belong together" shtick was just a kind of veneer added to 'Gaga-ify' the project. After the gloriously unhinged melting pot of genres that was Born This Way, I can see Gaga panicking that a (relatively) trend-chasing followup would be seen as a creative step down, just another EDM celebration of love and hedonism. So you get Abramovic/Botticelli/Louvre/Koons plastered onto the campaign, in the way that BTW fused stadium rock and techno and mariachi on the level of the music itself. (Not that she needed to worry; ARTPOP is fairly safe EDM but it's packed with very distinctive Gagaisms).

But ultimately, it's all surface. If she hadn't have come up with the "art + pop" idea until after she'd turned in the album, it wouldn't have made a difference. So I'm with you that, whilst it gave us a consistently creative and joyously unpredictable album era, that "art meets pop" shtick is ultimately meaningless – and almost works against the music, when you're trying to fit something like 'Mary Jane Holland' into a scheme into which it does not go. They're all songs about living life to the fullest, even if it might mean f*cking up a little along the way. They could have been sold that way.

[27monster27 13,154]

ARTPOP wasn't behind the times. EDM was still prominent until 2015. Also, and even I've made this mistake, fans who say that EDM died out in 2013 don't understand how it works as a genre. EDM is not one genre, it's hundreds of genres. She just used ones that weren't being referenced heavily in 2013 (except Gypsy). Before people say it she most certainly was NOT using genres popular in 2011-2012. The strings sections in Donatella and G.U.Y. prove that.

[Massive Monster 5,020]

The demos and Swinefest versions are 100% better in my opinion, I would have also removed some tracks.

I would have gone for the brunette aesthetic more. With that huge wig and weird space mask it looked amazing! It's giving "cosmic lover" which brings me to...

Aura with agressive verses is best, should have been the lead single!  

Maybe the whole album could have been more space themed rather than "art" themed. We even have Venus which fits so well as well as other songs due to their sound.

MANiCURE Swinefest version is so good with those "heal me...", could have been a single! 

Sexxx Dreams Swinefest version is superb and lets the synth and bass guitar shine through without unnecessary vocals.

 

 

[Werewoof 2,476]

It’s my favorite era and concept. Her pain into art the entire era is so raw. I feel like if you get it, you get it 

[HotLikeMexico 5,194]

Dope doesn’t deserve this hate it gets. 
 

Swinefest > than entire album. What we actually got was not great and is Gaga’s worst album. 

[HotLikeMexico 5,194]

4 hours ago, heavymetalARTPOP said:

The ones who hate this album…how do you call yourselves true Little Monsters?? 

Because you can be a little monster and not love every single little thing Gaga does. That’s how. 

[Bronco 11,530]

Not really an unpopular opinion but this album definitely has super high highs and then rock bottom lows with no inbetween. 

That said, I've seen folks dunk on Donatella on here occasionally and I don't agree. That song is just perfect campy cuntiness and I love it. 

Also I wanna be with you >>>>>>>>>>> Dope. 

[LaFama 4,651]

- While I don't think the album was ahead of it's time, I don't find it dated at all, actually I believe it holds up pretty well 10 years later (you can't say the same for other of her earlier albums). 
 

- I agree with the fact that some songs seem to be overproduced. Like others have said, the Swinefest versions sounded better. 
 

- Donatella and Fashion! are overhated, both are fun and camp in the best way. 

- Gipsy is like top 15 on the album. 

- DWUW solo version >>>>>>>>>> the Christina one.

- As an artist who takes so much pride on writing her own material, I was lowkey disappointed finding out that some songs were already preexisting instrumentals. 


- As much as I liked the G.U.Y. music video, I can't help to feel that after the mess that the era was, she was role playing as the Gaga she knew her fans and general public were expecting her to be. 
 

- Brooklyn Nights is no better than anything that actually made it into the album. 
 

- The idea of an Act II as a proper album was excting in 2014. In 2023, as leftover songs for fans, not so much. 

[DelusionalGaga 29,580]

I adore it. I don't think it's as strong of an artistic statement as Gaga tried to sell it, but it's still a damn good dance pop album. I'd take it over Joanne or Chromatica any day. 

[Ivy 12,562]

-One of her best albums, there's so much energy in it, along with creative lyrics and great production 

-MANiCURE is really good and underrated 

-DWUW is overrated  (still good tho, just not best on the album)

-It's not as "weird" as a lot of fans seems to think 

-ARTPOP song is one of her all time best 

[Poltergeist 3,623]

Imo it's her best album

Now this one may be REALLY unpopular, but I find Applause and DWUW to be the weaker points of the album, I feel like they don't fit the rest

G.U.Y is in top 3 of her best music videos

Gypsy is not amazing, it's just fine. Took me a lot of time to enjoy it

The album's very cohesive in its chaos

ARTPOP era kept on feeding us, even though there were many empty promises

[Railing 2,799]

• It's Gaga's most perfect album, literally 5 stars for me. As much as I love the demo versions and Princess Die etc, I genuinely don't think I would alter the finalized tracklist. With that said, it'll still be nice to hear the full 18-track experience noted in the legal docs, whenever Temple leaks (or comes out on Act 2).

• I think it's cohesive. Yeah, it's a total mish-mash of sounds, but it still feels like a proper album and each track flows nicely into the next (if DWUW still exists, that is).

• I don't think ARTPOP itself did damage to her career in the extreme way that people say it did. She didn't need to "recover" from ARTPOP, she needed to recover from trauma, addiction and betrayal. ARTPOP isn't a symbol of her crash and burn, it's a symbol of her perseverance in a time of mental/physical turmoil.

[TEANUS 15,079]

2 hours ago, LaFama said:

The idea of an Act II as a proper album was excting in 2014. In 2023, as leftover songs for fans, not so much. 

I don’t understand this when anyone says that. How is it so far fetched or unappealing to y’all, the concept of Gaga potentially releasing outtakes for fans? Is that not what countless other artists do all the time? 

I personally would love to enjoy some new-to-me Gaga material from any era intended as fanfare because I’m a huge Gaga fan. If chart success and sales aren’t a necessity for these releases there’s truly no con to dropping them for fans to enjoy and to answer the decade-old question: “What do TEA, Temple, etc. sound like?”

[Ladle Ghoulash 24,876]

3 minutes ago, TEANUS said:

I don’t understand this when anyone says that. How is it so far fetched or unappealing to y’all, the concept of Gaga potentially releasing outtakes for fans? Is that not what countless other artists do all the time? 

I personally would love to enjoy some new-to-me Gaga material from any era intended as fanfare because I’m a huge Gaga fan. If chart success and sales aren’t a necessity for these releases there’s truly no con to dropping them for fans to enjoy and to answer the decade-old question: “What do TEA, Temple, etc. sound like?”

Completely agreed. Don't really get the avid ACT II naysayers.