The “TikTokification” of music: writing a single hook to catch virality while simultaneously filling the rest of a song with melodic mush, has become more and more visible in recent years. As artists continue to chase a paycheck, creativity is being sucked out of the music industry. However, there is one artist who continues to fight against this new trend in music: Lady Gaga.
Lady Gaga debuted almost twenty years ago and has since been considered one of the most successful artists. She continues to push boundaries in music, releasing her seventh album, Mayhem, this March and launching her accompanying tour, The Mayhem Ball, in July.
The Mayhem Ball is staged as a gothic opera. It opened with the songs Bloody Mary and Abracadabra, which introduced the character The Lady in Red, who is hunting Gaga throughout the show. While the concert follows fictional characters, it is based on real problems that Lady Gaga has faced throughout her career; publicly dealing with PTSD, Fibromyalgia, and substance abuse. In an interview with The New York Times, Gaga said how “[she] was not deeply in touch with reality for a while,” but during the process of creating her last album, Mayhem, with her partner Michael Polansky, she found herself again.
Throughout the concert, the journey that Lady Gaga took to find herself again is represented on stage as a fight between her and The Lady In Red. That battle was wonderfully performed. Whether it was through the Joan of Arc-esque performance of Paparazzi, or the nostalgic dancing of Bad Romance, Poker Face, and Just Dance. Even though it was in a high-production pop number, Gaga still portrayed her message in an entertaining and meaningful way. However, the most beautiful moment of the concert was not with a grand set piece or elaborate costume. Instead, it was during Million Reasons and Shallow, when Gaga embraced The Lady in Red. By embracing The Lady In Red, Gaga was also embracing all of the fears and anxieties she had been suppressing; instead of running from them, Gaga learned to live with them as a part of her.
At the end of her concert, Gaga performed her acoustic section. That is when Gaga, the person, not the celebrity, shined. Through the piano, she connected to each fan in the audience and retold the stories she has with all the Monsters (the nickname of the Lady Gaga fanbase) and how they consistently support her through highs and lows. In her closing encore, How Bad Do You Want Me, an upbeat love song that asks her partner how bad they want her without her celebrity persona, Gaga, instead, addresses the song to her fans, returning to the stage with no costume or makeup, asking, “How bad do you want me for real?”
There is a presumption that many people have about pop music; it’s bland, repetitive, and void of much emotional depth. Lady Gaga challenges that stereotype. Her albums are filled with not just meaningful lyrics but also a synth beat, and on stage in The Mayhem Ball, her music shines even more. The creative freedoms of a live performance allow her to act out the complex emotions of her music, allowing each individual fan to connect to her performance. In a room filled with 20,000 people, Gaga makes each fan feel like she is performing just for them.
