ARTPOP: Ahead of its time?

[popkulture 357]

I don't think the music itself was as innovative or future-forward as many Little Monsters make it out to be. But the album still sounds fresh after 12 years and even aged like fine wine.

The album concept of pairing art and pop - this isn't a new idea, but she brought it out to the masses in a way and scale like never before. To create a music album, alongside partnerships with established art-world celebrities, and utilizing fashion to carry forth all the limitless inspirations and references on a daily basis, was quite badass. Mind you - this woman had work in the Louvre with Robert Wilson, had a sculpture of her made by one of the art world's most divisive yet successful art figure - Jeff Koons -  and she was a student of performance art godmother, Marina. Nobody else has come close to this proximity with commercial art and commercial music before. 

Edited 14 hours ago by popkulture

[27monster27 14,119]

Sadly I didn't get to this thread early enough but here are my two cents that cover a very important topic that a lot of people miss:

Albums don't have to be ahead of their time sonically. They can be ahead of their time lyrically. Lady Gaga as a privileged white woman made an anti-capitalist and anti-corporate album before it was trendy to do so. It's just like how Born This Way started getting renewed praise in 2016/2017 because of its discussion of social issues. Albums can be ahead of their time by way of lyrics, not just sounds.

With sonics though, I mean, it's clear that the ex-act crown liked it given the directions that Demi Lovato and Ariana Grande went in after this. Plus, she also did the trap-pop trend before Ariana Grande and Halsey made it trendy.

[Ladle Ghoulash 28,798]

4 minutes ago, 27monster27 said:

Sadly I didn't get to this thread early enough but here are my two cents that cover a very important topic that a lot of people miss:

Albums don't have to be ahead of their time sonically. They can be ahead of their time lyrically. Lady Gaga as a privileged white woman made an anti-capitalist and anti-corporate album before it was trendy to do so. It's just like how Born This Way started getting renewed praise in 2016/2017 because of its discussion of social issues. Albums can be ahead of their time by way of lyrics, not just sounds.

With sonics though, I mean, it's clear that the ex-act crown liked it given the directions that Demi Lovato and Ariana Grande went in after this. Plus, she also did the trap-pop trend before Ariana Grande and Halsey made it trendy.

I mean, I think there’s arguably only one track that’s explicitly critical of corporatism and capitalism and it’s the title track. I agree that her messaging about recentering the role of the artist in the industry in both the performance art and interviews was definitely important, but I don’t know how strong of a motif I’d say that is throughout the whole of the album itself.

Edited 13 hours ago by Ladle Ghoulash

[Controversiaga 12,008]

No   but that’s ok it doesn’t need to be

[Sugar Baby 874]

Sonically not at all it was actually dated already since EDM was on its way out

Conceptually and artistically it was tho 

 

[Controversiaga 12,008]

You know what actually noooo way not ahead of its time and dated actually because a hand full of the songs, the instrumentals were already made and already released as different songs by different artists before Gaga bought them.  Aura and donatella for example. Who knows which other 

[princedeeblebleble 2,131]

Not really sonically, but conceptually yes! If it were released as intended it would have been a bit more forward sounding, but the hip injury ****ed her over sadly  for me though, the album sounds still very fresh compared to most of the EDM music of thr time.

[Oriane 21,358]

She once said that she never made music that was necessarily ahead or behind, but different than what was going on at that point.

ARTPOP still hits hard after all these years. It was truly cathartic for her and I don't think she has made music that hit as hard ever since, even on the songs with important/painful subjects. I'm glad we have this in her discography, it's still one of her top albums for me.

[Gorehound 4,813]

5 hours ago, NUTELLA said:

Dated upon arrival

 

[Gorehound 4,813]

6 hours ago, NUTELLA said:

Funnily enough, Judas was dated upon arrival too

I love you Nutella but sometimes you really haven't got a clue what you're on about.

You seem to let personal taste cloud your judgement on music which is a capital mistake. Music isn’t that narrow.

 

Edited 8 hours ago by Gorehound

[RochestrMonstr 3,416]

No. I do love it though, and I love that it has been received better since its release. 

It contains some of be the weakest lyrics she’s done. But I definitely like it more overall than The Fame or Chromatica 
 

 

[Beatsss 404]

It's sound was not necessarily ahead of it's time imo. There are some experiemental songs/moments on there which if released today would be categorized as "hyper pop", but the album as a whole, back then, and now still sounds like a general pop album.

 

I think she originally intended for the album to be A LOT more hard hitting electronic ala Aura, Stache, Onion Girl demo, Swine, MJH, but she's a major label artist who had to probably bend to label demands and put out something that could "sell" so to say... which resulted in the album containing songs that fit the current sound at the time but now sounds a little dated.

 

I think had the album been put out with a full tracklist of the experimental hard hitting electronic songs, it could've been timeless, which imo is better than being "ahead of it's time".

 

Funny side note, I think the album of hers that was actually ahead of the curb, and is not necessarily referred to as that because it saw mainstream succes, is Born This Way. In 2011 everybody was releasing the EDM/Club songs with the big drops and modern sound, but Gaga went for the 80's sound, pivoting away from what was trendy at the time. In dance oriented music the 2010's and early 20's, the 80's sound has been extremely prominent in the mainstream, so I think BTW both semi-influenced the start of this trend, but is also the album that should be referred to as "ahead of it's time" moreso than ARTPOP.

[Gorehound 4,813]

Ok here’s my take.

 

I think the initial concept is admirable and very forward thinking, yet the message is bloated and confused, and totally gets lost in the mix. And the overall execution of the album and era fell flat in comparison.

 

Having been an art scholar I can’t help but think that Gaga’s perspective and incorporation of art in the era was quite meek and surface level, considering all the incredible modern and traditional art there was out there at the time. Imagine she’d done something with Banksy, Hirst or Emin for example. But collaborating with big names in the art world is expensive af and difficult logistically so props to her attempt. But a lot of it felt more 'arts-and-crafts' rather than fine art (but I guess she was trying to baby-proof it all a bit so the average person could understand it better idk). Though there were a handful of genuinely great moments such as the puking paint performance, which is the closest she came to real provocative performance art, but the main majority of the fans couldn’t stomach it so I guess she was fighting a losing battle by then.

I’m personally a massive fan of heavy electronic rave music so it was lush af for me with Gaga finally having ultra-crisp clean production with major emphasis on hard beats and fat squelching bass synths, and her voice had never sounded so powerful and pure imo. But she really limited herself with current 2010s commercial EDM trends, when there was a plethora of already established and timeless electronic dance and rave genres for her to explore and mix into pop (Dub, Hardstyle, Deep House, Psytrance, Techno, Breakbeat, Etherial, Jungle, Garage, D&B etc…), and lots of new exciting underground genres already beginning to appear at the time (such as Hyperpop, and actual Art Pop). So the ‘art’ in the pop seemed kinda unimaginative and stunted. I don’t think she worked with the right producers honestly (other than Infected Mushrooms). They were too commercial. I think she should’ve branched out to all kinds of producers and DJs to submit experimental work, then had one top-tier pop producer to help her curate it all into an album and maintain some kind of consistency.

And thematically I feel like Gaga actually had little to say on the album other than her usual personal experiences with love, fame and trauma etc, when art in pop culture explores all kinds of interesting topics. She typically made the album more about herself rather than having a broader scope. E.g. the drug element. She dabbled vaguely with her personal experiences with drugs, but totally dismissed how massively involved drugs have been in art and pop history. Using them for creative inspiration, to cope with the pressures of it, the dark hedonism of it all (look at Van Gogh and absinthe, or Lord Byron, Jackson Pollock, rockstar and celebrity culture, Amy Winehouse e.g.) The album could’ve been such a provocative statement on art and pop culture combined.

But I think the whole thing all comes down to “The Box” that the music industry puts pop artists in. There are heavy restrictions put on mainstream musicians to follow a certain formula which doest leave much room for real experimentation, and I think Gaga has always battled with that. She can be as alternative as she wants, but as long as the music is still as radio friendly and pop coded as possible. It’s not so bad now, but it was at the time, and you can tell the album really suffered from that. Gaga even mentioned trying to break out of this box at the SwineFest but she didn’t rly with ARTPOP. Had she been given more freedom maybe the album would've been more future forward, but she was already making very bad decisions anyway so idk (R Kelly, Azealia Banks, Robin Thicke, the current Trap music trend etc.)

 

You could say that ARTPOP was ahead of its time due to her trying to make pop music more artistic, and trying to popularise an interest in the arts within the general public, but Gaga had already been doing that with every previous album and performance imo, so idk. And the concept of ‘Art Pop’ already existed as an established genre at the time so ye the whole project felt kinda superficial. In a nutshell I think that Gaga only just scratched the surface of what ARTPOP could've been, but I still absolutely love the album tho and it does house some of her best and most ambitious, fierce work to date imo.

 

Jesus I could honestly write a book on this bloody album 

 

Edited 7 hours ago by Gorehound

[River 119,225]

ARTPOP is the example of what happens when u control her artists choices.

mayhem is the example of what happens when u let her art go wild.

ARTPOP missing her "daring" and "rude" approach when making music, something that u can feel with the demos, what is amazing about Gaga is that her songs sang by any other person, would sound generic and basic, but she adds her "gaga" into them and makes them unique, over the top, and mind blowing.. but with ARTPOP, she was not there, they stayed the generic basic songs that any other person could release...

Only Aura and Venus are exception there. but yet, Aura is not even her song, it's Infected Mushroom...

I think making DJWS the head producer was a mistake to begin with, he was not ready for a big project, that even Gaga struggled to fully understand it to these days..

[elijahfan 26,560]

The EDM aspect of it sounded dated by the time it came out, but since everything is a constant cycle and brat has helped usher in this type of sound back to the mainstream, suddenly ARTPOP has never sounded so fresh and current.