Entertainment For Lively Minds
Gaga: At the risk of repeating myself,
Posted by itfc1959 on 28 February 2010 - 1:24am.
I posted this elsewhere. But, proof if any were needed, that there is more to her than meets the eye. I'll say this, though: she makes our pop offerings look a little tame and I'm looking at you, Ms Allen. Talent will always out, in the end.
So, if you haven't seen this already, check it out.
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You see
I don't hear anything particularly interesting musically.
I don't get it. What are we supposed to get excited about? She can play her song on the piano? It is still not a particularly good song. I do a bit of DJ-ing for my mates as required and a did a wedding last year for a young cousin of mine (ably assisted in music choices by The Massive) so gathered some chart stuff and that was the first time I heard this and I thought...is that it?! I understand 'Bonkers' and Lily Allen but I don't get this at all. The melody is wafer thin..nothing going on at all.
Now, Joanna Newsome (who I don't get either) can write an interesting melody but its presented in a very austere and stripped down fashion and is supposed to be listened to in hushed reverence. If you mixed Gaga and Newsome together you'd be onto something. Kate Bush probably.
Poker Face is "74% not a song"
according to this scholarly appraisal
Laura Nyro
Sounds like bargain basement Laura Nyro to me. Good for you if you like it but I hear nothing new behind the silly outfits.
Where is the tune?
Just confirms to me that she has no songs. And her singing is horribly affected.
We've been through this before
If Gaga has no songs, or if Poker Face is not a good song, how come it was the best-selling single of last year? At the time of its release, she didn't have much of a fan base here, so it has to be all about the song. In my opinion, it is actually a very clever song, crammed with "ear-worms". As has been analysed on here before, Lady Gaga's songs (or at least her singles) are full of those catchy moments that lodge themselves in the brain. Most songs just have the one (usually the chorus), whereas Poker Face and Bad Romance have four or five. They may not have the traditional structure of verse/chorus/verse/chorus/middle eight/verse/chorus, but that doesn't disqualify them from being songs....and highly effective ones at that.
Big selling singles...
"if Poker Face is not a good song, how come it was the best-selling single of last year?"
Joe Dolce's Music Theatre
The Smurfs
Keith Harris & Orville
Assorted World Cup football teams
all had big-selling singles
And...
The Smurfs are sexier than Lady Gaaagghhhaargh.
What you describe
sounds like a collection of jingles - the average advert break during Ant'n'Dec's Saturday evening show would have the same 'catchy moments that lodge themselves in your brain.' But that won't make it a song.
It's a pop record
You either like it or you don't. No point in either side trying to persuade the other that it's good / bad.
Godstrewth...
forty year old men debating Gaga...she makes good POP records, the kids love her, and she brightens the place up--accept it!! In ten years time ( if we,re all still here) we,ll probably have a thread going about how underrated she was, as has happened recently with Collins, ELO,Straits etc!!
That's all wrong.
It's like Leona Lewis singing 'Barbie Girl' (not that dissimilar a song)or something. There's this annoying idea that a stripped down acoustic version of a song will make us take it more seriously. It sounds absurd without it's dance style accompaniment and production. It's fine as a daft, catchy, dance pop song to hear on the radio but it doesn't really stand up to analysis.
You're absolutely right, and that isn't what I meant.
I didn't expect anyone to take Poker Face more seriously because her Ladyship could belt it out at the piano. Of course it's a clever, if daft, pop song. Most pop songs, if they're any good, are.
But it's pretty clear to me that she has abilities that so far outweigh her material. She is a good pianist, she has a voice that can strip paint at 100 metres and a remarkably wide vocal range for a pop singer.
It seems as though she's come out from nowhere but Gaga has been performing and playing live for most of her very short life. I'm excited by her because I think she has the potential for greatness. She's not there yet, but out of all the competition I think she's going to be the one.
That voice may be impressive
but doesn't mean much without the material. Anyway, great pop records have been made by those with lesser technical abilities. Don't see where the potential for greatness is purely in vocal quality.
Everyone seems keen to stress
that she 'makes great pop records'.
Does she make great records, or just great pop records? Is there a difference? If not, why do you feel the need to modify the word records with the word pop?
It's not necessarily a diss
She's a great pop act. She makes great pop records. Just like John Lee Hooker makes great blues records. I can't speak for anyone else, but for me labelling something 'pop' isn't making excuses for anything, or trying to denigrate its worth.
It's my submission
that there's a general air of condescension when we discuss the likes of Lady Gaga and, latterly, Marina and the Diamonds, who was described over the weekend as being very good 'for her target audience'. Meanwhile on another Lady Gaga thread we plumbed new levels of fatherly approval with the fact that Lady Gaga 'certainly turns heads' and 'adds to the gaiety of nations', while here the same platitudes about her either being a great pop artist or making great pop records is trotted out.
I say again: if I was to make these kind of statements about, for example, a Word cover artist, you'd think I was taking the piss.
I'm sure you're right
I'm just saying it's not necessarily a diss. And that there's 'nowt wrong with being a pop artist. I'm sure others might think that 'pop' is somehow a more inferior artform, but I don't. And if Lady Gaga "turns heads" and "adds to the gaiety of nations", so what? Surely that's precisely what she does? I don't see why saying so should necessarily be perceived as condescending.
Agreed
Does anyone ever claim that they are out to write great metal, blues, jazz or techno songs? I don't think so. Other than the mainstream pop stuff I can't think of any artists who limit themselves in this way, but you hear it all the time in relation to this type of music, either from the artists themselves or from their apologists, almost as if the rules for writing pop are different from other genres, that the bar is lowered or something.
Is there a difference?
Of course there is.
Solid Air is a great record, but it isn't a great pop record.
So?
Biology is a great record, but it isn't a great Death Metal record.
So what?
What have you got against adjectives?
I won't go into it again, if you don't mind.
I'd rather not end up labouring the point.
Not sure if Albert means me at all but
personally I was referring to those with lesser technical abilities making great pop records - meaning pop as inclusive of all genres of popular music. I generally refer to pop in this sense. Sometimes to be clear I might say rock/pop just to indicate that I am including rock for the benefit of those who might see pop as separate from rock. All I am saying is that great pop records (as opposed to jazz, classical), due to their nature, do not require individuals who are technically highly proficient musicians to make them, in fact that can be a hindrance, so seeing how well Ga Ga belts it out does not indicate potential greatness of itself. For me I am not convinced her records are great, though I like a few of them. Not to say that chart pop of that kind cannot be, any more than other type of pop cannot.
Is it okay
to cut and paste Dr Volume's comment (at the top of here) into this space and call it my own?
Ive been trying to 'cohere' (ahem) something about her for a while and could not quite get there.
Oh, I'm new to 'Nyro' - the clip above is wonderful.