Can we talk about "The Fame"?

[Nagini 2,271]

14 minutes ago, lastpopicon said:

0 taste on this topic, y'all need jesus. 

Literally. The Fame top to bottom is a stellar album... hit after after, some that feel like 2025 and others that take you back in time. It's a very fun album with a coherent and consistent theme. There are a few weaker songs but none are bad. 

Think about J&D, Gypsy, MJH, Chromatica, Come To Mama, Highway Unicorn, Bad Kids... we have endured way, way worse. The Fame never ever dips that low. 

[Nagini 2,271]

Put it this way, I would take Disco Heaven over all of Chromatica any day. The best selling album of the 21st century did that. 

[lastpopicon 29,584]

3 minutes ago, Nagini said:

Literally. The Fame top to bottom is a stellar album... hit after after, some that feel like 2025 and others that take you back in time. It's a very fun album with a coherent and consistent theme. There are a few weaker songs but none are bad. 

Think about J&D, Gypsy, MJH, Chromatica, Come To Mama, Highway Unicorn, Bad Kids... we have endured way, way worse. The Fame never ever dips that low. 

It's literally one of the best debut albums of all time and it's timeless, it's really a shame these type of topics are made lol 

[lastpopicon 29,584]

and it shows a very very deep lack of taste 

[Nagini 2,271]

I think I need to start a Disco Heaven appreciation thread. If she plays that track at one of the Mayhem shows I will forgive her for not making GOE and VIY singles. 

[lastpopicon 29,584]

disco heaven is probably my fav gaga song ever (or close), RDF is a close candidate too.

There's just something very unique about TF, its a type of sound you don't see anywhere else, it's something only gaga could do, show some respect. 

[Monsta217 267]

Perfect debut album as a way to introduce her to the world, with some sprinkles here and there of the stuff that was to come later. And its also clear that she was still finding herself while she was making it. And it is also clear that it is an album that had a lot of external input that tried to make it as mainstream-friendly as possible. Which is perfectly fine and normal for a new artist and the right decision in the long term.

It is basic, but in a good and very special way and I wouldnt change anything about it. It needed to be that way, we needed to know that Gaga could do basic pop well before she took the wheel and did her own thing. If the first thing we heard of her was Bad Romance, we probably wouldnt be here today, we needed to see her bleeding and dangling on the VMAs stage before we heard the first "RahRah" for it to make sense and work.. or she would have just been known as some experimental weird artist that does weird chants, and would probably just be old history by now.

As for the difference in sound with TFM, I do not think its that big of a gap, the Monster Ball was basically about both albums combined and they all blended beautifully

 

 

[Ziggy 11,794]

On 7/28/2025 at 9:23 PM, AVeryGagaHolyDick said:

I mean, all her albums are quite eclectic except Chromatica. I don’t think it’s a negative thing at all!

The Fame is a brilliant album from start to finish. It portrays her lifestyle and her dreams in a very complete way.

Nearly all songs sound perfect to me. And to think it’s her debut album makes it even more impressive. I don’t wanna be mood killer but I think my favorite albums will always be The Fame, The Fame Monster and Born This Way. They were both well thought and spontaneous at the same time. 

I still love her music but I feel that nowadays she overthinks almost everything. She used to sh*t music and it was magical. I feel privileged to have witnessed The Fame days.

 

I’ll say that’s something on mayhem I felt was largely back—the Gaga who was at ease in music. I get why she became hardened around it, she has a HUGE reputation but all the same I think with mayhem she’s finding a way to get back to HER bc a lot of it reminds me of The Fame or pre TF

[Ziggy 11,794]

So I’m gonna answer the second question to answer the first also: TFM you have to remember was written and recorded in basically a few months. That’s an incredibly intensive period of a lot of change for Gaga—arguably the most of her entire life atp and in many ways still. So while it has sonic links to TF in some respects it’s also very much its own thing bc it was all cooked in such a small window. 

TF, by contrast, was done over YEARS like many debut albums are. I mean, some of the material or directions go back to 2006. It also very much tracks the genesis of the Gaga persona. Cuts like brown eyes are aaaaall Stefani but later added ones like pokerface complete Gaga. So TF sounds so different bc of the producer things others mentioned, but meaningfully they helped track the slow birth and development of LADY GAGA. We went from glam rock and queen and Bowie to space age fembot spitting crazy lyrics like disco stick over hip hop beats. But it’s all the emergence of Gaga as a crystallized identity. 
 

TFM continues the last notes of TF (Pokerface and the like) and continues exploring them even more but now with this tremendous pressure cooker on it.