Is Gaga a Mediocre Songwriter?

[ALonelyNight 756]

1 hour ago, nATAH said:

chormatica has some great song writing on it though?

Not at all. Songwriting is so much more than just poetic lyricism, and Gaga's strength has always lied in taking catchy memorable lines and packaging them into a killer hook. It's almost like baking, it's pure chemistry.

On Chromatica, that ability was stunted. Where an anthemic chorus would have been, a drop was placed, and a cheap, even lifeless one at that. It also didn't help that her lyricism was at its weakest too, as she tried to be confessional and descriptive of her pain but wound up making clumsy references and awkward one-liners.

It sounds harsh but there's a reason she's moved on from that time

[PartySick 174,366]

She doesn't have the most creative or expansive lyrics when compared to some of her peers but her ability to use those "mediocre" lyrics to convey incredible themes and build entire worlds is pretty much unmatched imo.

If lyrics were paint colors, some girlies are using turquoise, maroon, verdant green, papaya, and eggshell to paint something that belongs on the fridge while Gaga is using red, blue, green, and the occasional yellow to paint works that belong in museums.

She manages to be thought provoking without having to crack open the dictionary or reinvent the metaphor. And I appreciate that, personally.

[nATAH 57,952]

23 minutes ago, ALonelyNight said:

Not at all. Songwriting is so much more than just poetic lyricism, and Gaga's strength has always lied in taking catchy memorable lines and packaging them into a killer hook. It's almost like baking, it's pure chemistry.

On Chromatica, that ability was stunted. Where an anthemic chorus would have been, a drop was placed, and a cheap, even lifeless one at that. It also didn't help that her lyricism was at its weakest too, as she tried to be confessional and descriptive of her pain but wound up making clumsy references and awkward one-liners.

It sounds harsh but there's a reason she's moved on from that time

no

[ALonelyNight 756]

22 minutes ago, PartySick said:

She doesn't have the most creative or expansive lyrics when compared to some of her peers but her ability to use those "mediocre" lyrics to convey incredible themes and build entire worlds is pretty much unmatched imo.

If lyrics were paint colors, some girlies are using turquoise, maroon, verdant green, papaya, and eggshell to paint something that belongs on the fridge while Gaga is using red, blue, green, and the occasional yellow to paint works that belong in museums.

She manages to be thought provoking without having to crack open the dictionary or reinvent the metaphor. And I appreciate that, personally.

Great explanation

[ALonelyNight 756]

2 minutes ago, nATAH said:

no

To each their own

[Ladle Ghoulash 55,297]

29 minutes ago, ALonelyNight said:

Not at all. Songwriting is so much more than just poetic lyricism, and Gaga's strength has always lied in taking catchy memorable lines and packaging them into a killer hook. It's almost like baking, it's pure chemistry.

On Chromatica, that ability was stunted. Where an anthemic chorus would have been, a drop was placed, and a cheap, even lifeless one at that. It also didn't help that her lyricism was at its weakest too, as she tried to be confessional and descriptive of her pain but wound up making clumsy references and awkward one-liners.

It sounds harsh but there's a reason she's moved on from that time

While I do think Chromatica’s writing gets a bit unfairly ragged on because I do think the melodies and lyrics are generally pretty good, I agree on the whole. MAYHEM, imo, incapsulates so much of what she’s great at as a songwriter: hooks on hooks, delicious vocal and instrumental harmonies, layered production and instrumentation…the instrumental component in particular is what I think is missing from Chromatica: the production is often very on the nose and one dimensional and I do think, with better production, the actual top line melodies and lyrics would be better served, but yeah, she obviously wasn’t firing on all cylinders there.

[Ivy 13,807]

On 7/31/2026 at 4:35 AM, ALGAYDO said:

Love it when you call me “Legs,” 

in the morning, buy me eggs 

Not even joking this is one of my favorite lyrics  specifically when it's together with the part after

"Watch your heart when we're together,

boys like you love me forever" 

[PartySick 174,366]

39 minutes ago, ALonelyNight said:

Great explanation

Yeah, like idk how to explain it further other than to give an example.

For a while, my favorite song from Mayhem has been LoveDrug and that second verse really gives what I love most in her music.

Thought we'd last a lifetime
When I'm mumblin' alone
I taste the last words that you spoke to me like wine
My heart is in a bind
If I could bear it on my own
I wouldn't try so hard to numb what's left behind

On their face, these lyrics aren't really revolutionary. But the way the song is produced with that driving, dull beat, droning bassline, and guitars that almost sound like a ticking clock underneath her incredible, emotional delivery?

Anyone else producing and singing a song with these lyrics would probably fall flat but Gaga? You can FEEL the grief. She excellently conveys not only this desire to dissociate but that dissociation is familiar and a safe place to be, especially when things hurt as bad as neglect, abandonment, or betrayal.

The way you can feel this is sung by someone who is extremely aquatinted with numbness and chasing down pain with vices.

She does this sh*t all the time and NOBODY DOES IT LIKE HER  

ARTPOP and Joanne are also full of these moments that just send me into a f*cking spiral, god I lover her

[Ladle Ghoulash 55,297]

10 hours ago, PartySick said:

Yeah, like idk how to explain it further other than to give an example.

For a while, my favorite song from Mayhem has been LoveDrug and that second verse really gives what I love most in her music.

Thought we'd last a lifetime
When I'm mumblin' alone
I taste the last words that you spoke to me like wine
My heart is in a bind
If I could bear it on my own
I wouldn't try so hard to numb what's left behind

On their face, these lyrics aren't really revolutionary. But the way the song is produced with that driving, dull beat, droning bassline, and guitars that almost sound like a ticking clock underneath her incredible, emotional delivery?

Anyone else producing and singing a song with these lyrics would probably fall flat but Gaga? You can FEEL the grief. She excellently conveys not only this desire to dissociate but that dissociation is familiar and a safe place to be, especially when things hurt as bad as neglect, abandonment, or betrayal.

The way you can feel this is sung by someone who is extremely aquatinted with numbness and chasing down pain with vices.

She does this sh*t all the time and NOBODY DOES IT LIKE HER  

ARTPOP and Joanne are also full of these moments that just send me into a f*cking spiral, god I lover her

This just inspired me to listen to the REQUIEM version of LD. I feel like that version in particular really captures the almost cozy/dreamy comfort in dissociation, like you described. But to your broader point: agreed that her ability to use relatively simple lyrics as a hook to use music, production, and performance to bring you into a fully realized fantasy/emotional experience is 100% of her greatest strengths as a musician.

Edited August 7 by Ladle Ghoulash

[Jarpad 139]

I love most of Gaga's songs, but there are definitely some bad songs and lyrics in otherwise great songs that make me cringe hard. Example of a great song with a really weak section: the second verse of Shadow Of A Man. 
 

But even some of Gaga's weakest songs lyrically still slap. (Fashion of His Love)

Perfect Illusion is gold from start to finish, I don't know what OP is talking about.

[bxr 2,914]

12 minutes ago, Jarpad said:

Example of a great song with a really weak section: the second verse of Shadow Of A Man. 

Just for the sake of a one off observation / neither here nor there interpretation …

Hard to be the yellow in a purple sky (Sky)
Peekin' through the eye of the storm (Eye of the storm)
Gotta be the truth or you'll become a lie (Become a lie)
Piercing like your skin from a thorn (Oh, oh, I)

Yellow and purple are complementary colors on the color wheel (RYB), so when they are adjacent to one another they stand out with pronounced distinction, however when they are blended together they mute each other‘s vibrance … so … from that vantage I appreciated the metaphor … then to contextualize yellow in a purple sky … opens up the metaphorical domain to the relationship between stars (yellow) and the dusk or nocturne or fading into sunset / purple (or maybe the sunrise … ? just now in immediate retrospect it could be the sky in transition, which is that much more difficult for stars to shine against the sun and or the stars to shine amidst ebb and or flow or in the limnal … but this is really rambling) … then to go cultural contextual … purple and yellow are Lakers colors … so that layer of the difficulty for natural stars to shine in Hollywood Angeles … the capital of manufactured stardom … sort of emphasizes an otherwise apparently simple lyric …

Then there‘s the eye and the storm … and the truth and the lie … and the piercing skin / thorn … which I haven‘t really considered in depth but something about that thorn makes me think of the entire realm of Rose/Passion symbolism … which could be entirely unrelated (admittedly, as all of the aforementioned could be) … but that‘s just a one off observation … as always just salt grain musing into the airwaves … 

[Cherry Blues 571]

20 hours ago, ALonelyNight said:

Not at all. Songwriting is so much more than just poetic lyricism, and Gaga's strength has always lied in taking catchy memorable lines and packaging them into a killer hook. It's almost like baking, it's pure chemistry.

On Chromatica, that ability was stunted. Where an anthemic chorus would have been, a drop was placed, and a cheap, even lifeless one at that. It also didn't help that her lyricism was at its weakest too, as she tried to be confessional and descriptive of her pain but wound up making clumsy references and awkward one-liners.

It sounds harsh but there's a reason she's moved on from that time

There are lyrically good and bad things on Chromatica. However, this was the case with all of her albums. Lyrically i find Babylon interesting - i think it's well written on Chromatica, i like how it describes the decadence of the empire and how Lady Gaga cheers it up that it is fighting for its existence. For me, lyrically, she was strongest the on The Fame and The Fame Monster.

[Mr S 8,833]

As a lyricist, she's mediocre. Maybe even below as she has quite a few duds

As a composer (melodies) she is top notch imo

Both are part of songwriting 

[RetroStrawberry 41]

On 7/31/2026 at 1:32 PM, nkta said:

from contemporaries: Lana Del Rey, Madonna of the 80’s - 90’s early 2000’s, I also think Miley Cyrus is amazing songwriter (her last album was criminally underrated)

From Music History: Michael Jackson, Freddy Mercury, Elton John… maybe Dolly Parton? Did Whitney Houston write her some of songs - not sure here

Madonna!  If you consider Gaga Mid, you might as well put Madonna and Taylor Swift Right next to her!  They aren't any better!

Edited 17 hours ago by RetroStrawberry

[loveandpeace 2,122]

omg I love this iconic thread making a comeback