Biggest mistake during ARTPOP era?

[TheARTPOPball 1,790]

Not releasing DWUW as a solo song.

although I will say the r Kelly verse elevated the song, but anyone could have done that. The album feels incomplete without it and her letting the internet bully her into taking the song down also kind of defeats the point the song was trying to make. 
 

Other than that I just think that releasing music is a gamble. We have great albums that do poor. We have terrible albums that top charts. Sometimes it simply is a luck thing and I think she just put the album out at a bad time 🤷‍♂️

[Purrrrrr 18,755]

13 minutes ago, mlmc1995 said:

trying to be controversial for the sake of being controversial and it’s an artistic commentary on rape. you don’t have to like it but sometimes life experiences are ugly and physically repulsive. that’s not victims trying to be controversial lol

Im talking about a lot of things that happened during that era

im well aware.

the performance didn't represent that, to me 

[bxr 3,927]

1 hour ago, dubstep111 said:

Her vomit thing is like my favorite performance from her. 

 

1 hour ago, ladyabramovic said:

SXSW performance is legendary in the pop and performance art worlds. Not a mistake.

 

44 minutes ago, Purrrrrr said:

^ this was a mess, it felt so try hard at the time just to be controversial, that whole performance was  *it's uncomfortable to watch because she's also clearly heavily under the influence of something during it

which is my main issue with the later AP era  nothing felt genuine it felt like trying to be controversial just to be controversial 

that's the biggest mistake imo 

 

40 minutes ago, mlmc1995 said:

The vomit performance for me made a huge statement. Not only in terms of the way rape can physically impact a victim, but also the immediate disgust in response to a performance with a bit of liquid spit on her - it’s actually really not that extreme lmao - as opposed to the way rape is treated. One of those things is actually disgusting, and the other isn’t. 

Just, for the sake of reference for the record … SxSwine x Millie was a definitively on-brand statement, as far as narrative continuity within The Fame Monster trajectory … 

 

Edited 4 hours ago by bxr

[Purrrrrr 18,755]

12 minutes ago, bxr said:

 

 

 

Just, for the sake of reference for the record … SxSwine x Millie was a definitively on-brand statement, as far as narrative continuity within The Fame Monster trajectory … 

 

i know it was the same person and was a re-enactment from this interlude btw, I just at that time during that era with a lot of other stuff in that era, saw it as not being artistic but just trying to be controversial without even getting a message across 

we can bring up that (snl?) performance with that too 

[bxr 3,927]

11 minutes ago, Purrrrrr said:

i know it was the same person and was a re-enactment from this interlude btw, I just at that time during that era with a lot of other stuff in that era, saw it as not being artistic but just trying to be controversial without even getting a message across 

we can bring up that (snl?) performance with that too 

Completely valid perspective … to your point, though, her speech leading into the performance sort of contextualized the message that would ensue through said performance (but, again, that could just be a subjective connection)

I love my fans so much… I love my fans, because they always let me be myself… they don’t care what anybody says… and the reason that that’s important… is because, something you probably don’t know, is that when you’re not yourself, it’s so much harder… it’s so much easier to be yourself, than it is to be someone else… because when you have to pretend to be someone else… like things you don’t like… do things you don’t want to do… it eats your soul inside, and makes you do stupid s—t… so I wrote this song about all the things I’m sorry for… and I’m mostly sorry to myself and I’m so sorry to myself that I, I don’t always be myself …

The SNL performance … from my POV, everything RK related is absolutely critical, but/and in increasing measure, a critical lens on the audience and industry, as well … I see parallels between the SNL performance and SxSwine, to the extent of Gaga as a living effigy … effectually burning herself at the stake …

And, so much of DWUW, does reflect back on the support system sabotage … a collaboration at that level is in no way a unilateral campaign completely enacted by the artist alone, DWUW was truly a team effort across the board, that there was no intervention or crisis communication speaks volumes …

Regardless of how “I’m the boss” Gaga is, you really can‘t have it both ways of “She‘s in complete control of her brand and campaigns” and “She was completely under the influence” as a global consumer product apparatus (but, I guess, the reality is that we can and did witness said dialectic)—the label, the advertisers, the sponsors, NBC as a network (Universal as the parent corporation), the marketing team, the creative team, the legal counsel, etc. it took a village to launch that campaign …

So, yes, the SNL (and AMA?) performances speak volumes about the state of that entire era … and, again, the reality of a “support system” in the celebrity media industrial complex—because: show business runs on human capital … pop prophets and top profits, whew!

 

But/and/so, I digress!

[Controversiaga 17,565]

R kelly

[Nagini 4,307]

Gaga does a lot of weird and controversial things but gets away with them because people like her music. She can get away with a lot (Abramovic stuff, interviews with fake accents, maybe even the vomit performance). Applause (despite some of the controversy with Katy) was successful. DWUW was gearing up to be a big hit but didn't have a music video... and then she disappeared. I think her unconventional behavior turned off the public, but that doesn't mean that she couldn't have had hits. I'd say 2 successful hit songs from an album is a win. Heck maybe she would tacked on a third after DWUW. 

[Nagini 4,307]

I don't think R Kelly killed the ARTPOP era. DWUW was still charting and gearing up to be another smash for Gaga. This is the same public that still runs up Chris Brown songs to the top 10 in 2026. Like let's be real. 

[Purrrrrr 18,755]

3 minutes ago, bxr said:

Completely valid perspective … to your point, though, her speech leading into the performance sort of contextualized the message that would ensue through said performance (but, again, that could just be a subjective connection)

I love my fans so much… I love my fans, because they always let me be myself… they don’t care what anybody says… and the reason that that’s important… is because, something you probably don’t know, is that when you’re not yourself, it’s so much harder… it’s so much easier to be yourself, than it is to be someone else… because when you have to pretend to be someone else… like things you don’t like… do things you don’t want to do… it eats your soul inside, and makes you do stupid s—t… so I wrote this song about all the things I’m sorry for… and I’m mostly sorry to myself and I’m so sorry to myself that I, I don’t always be myself …

The SNL performance … from my POV, everything RK related is absolutely critical, but/and in increasing measure, a critical lens on the audience and industry, as well … I see parallels between the SNL performance and SxSwine, to the extent of Gaga as a living effigy … effectually burning herself at the stake …

And, so much of DWUW, does reflect back on the support system sabotage … a collaboration at that level is in no way a unilateral campaign completely enacted by the artist alone, DWUW was truly a team effort across the board, that there was no intervention or crisis communication speaks volumes …

Regardless of how “I’m the boss” Gaga is, you really can‘t have it both ways of “She‘s in complete control of her brand and campaigns” and “She was completely under the influence” as a global consumer product apparatus (but, I guess, the reality is that we can and did witness said dialectic)—the label, the advertisers, the sponsors, NBC as a network (Universal as the parent corporation), the marketing team, the creative team, the legal counsel, etc. it took a village to launch that campaign …

So, yes, the SNL (and AMA?) performances speak volumes about the state of that entire era … and, again, the reality of a “support system” in the celebrity media industrial complex—because: show business runs on human capital … pop prophets and top profits, whew!

 

But/and/so, I digress!

very valid

but that speech has absolutely nothing related to her then having someone drink a bunch of milk and then start puking it up on her  which then completely hijacked any of what she just said about the actual song getting any attention

[Tyler1992 2,361]

G.U.Ys music video being 11 minutes long, but a quarter of it is just credits so MANiCURE could be shoehorned in. 

[Starmie25 23,105]

Just now, Tyler1992 said:

just credits so MANiCURE could be shoehorned in. 

She really likes that song 

 

[bxr 3,927]

14 minutes ago, Purrrrrr said:

very valid

but that speech has absolutely nothing related to her then having someone drink a bunch of milk and then start puking it up on her  which then completely hijacked any of what she just said about the actual song getting any attention

I guess my subjective connection was that

when you’re not yourself, it’s so much harder… it’s so much easier to be yourself, than it is to be someone else… because when you have to pretend to be someone else… like things you don’t like… do things you don’t want to do… it eats your soul inside, and makes you do stupid s—t… so I wrote this song about all the things I’m sorry for… and I’m mostly sorry to myself and I’m so sorry to myself that I, I don’t always be myself

read like a lucid preface into a song about industry exploitation … and doing things you don‘t necessarily want to do that eat your soul inside … those times when you are sorry to yourself about not always being yourself … like an artist who intends to usurp the industry for the sake of human creative liberation, only to end up on a corporate conference stage getting sponsored by a consumer snack brand to get vomited on in front of fans and tech bros the day before a keynote speech about said liberative campaign

For me it just read like “… this is a performance about why I’m sorry to myself that I don‘t always be myself … and for those of you who don‘t know … this is what it looks like when your soul gets eaten from the inside …” also, neither here nor there, but it also felt like Millie was a real one for exorcising from the trenches with our girl at the depths of that nadir

But/and/again, just my subjective take—I digress!

Edited 3 hours ago by bxr

[DESTROY UR DISEASE 22,432]

I think the whole Applause vs Roar thing. Like you're starting off your era by "competing" (even though it was never a competition, it just happened that they were releasing their singles at a similar time) with another hugely succesful (at the time ) pop star and you're "losing" to her? Yeah, that doeasn't sound too good. I don't think it would do very much for the whole era, since there were already other things that happened before even ARTPOP was a thing, that have contributed to the mess that this era was, but definitely in this scenario that happened it won't look too good for the general public 

Overall ARTPOP era is such an interesting case with everything that went wrong during it

[JohnPokerface 1,810]

when it comes to ARTPOP era, no mistake is greater than another 

[vmpiregrn 1,275]

3 hours ago, ladyabramovic said:

SXSW performance is legendary in the pop and performance art worlds. Not a mistake.

Biggest mistakes:

- the wig during the ARTPOP vevo artRave in Brooklyn. It was an otherwise impeccable release party.

- missed opportunity: she should have done some pop-ups in galleries or notable art global art events. She didn't tap into the art world side much besides the collabs with Marina and Jeff, and of course Robert Wilson and the Louvre. Wouldv'e loved more. Understandably, her team was a mess so I give her grace.

- releasing the app before it was ever finalized or ever even possible to be what it was marketed to be. 

off topic but i went to a reading with marina abramović the other day and got to ask her a question. she was fab