Lady Gaga's 'Chromatica' may seem like a batch of bangers and blockbuster music videos that recall her greatest hits. But it's both a return to form and a full-circle moment back to the music she loves to perform — and hear. Here's how she got there.
Given her classical training and life-long appreciation for the great American songbook, teaming up with Tony Bennett was hardly a left-field move. The only surprising element of the collaboration was how drastic of a shift it was from the intense aesthetics ofdebuted at No.
1, and Gaga fully leaned into her and Bennett's lounge act. She dressed the part too, trading the bodysuits and fluorescent wigs for maribou and Marilyn Monroe waves — a makeover fit for a vintage Hollywood starlet. Stepping out of Mother Monster's shadow and back into the jazz of her pre-days offered a respite. She focused on honing her vocal chops alongside a legend, and the simple, slower pace gave her a sense of calm that her own music did not. "He's brought out a subtlety in me that I've missed for a while, because my life is very noisy," Gagain 2014."It's a lot harder to sing with auto-tune, in a way, you know? It's a lot harder to sing with rigid electronic music and lots of spectacle. It can be very difficult, because it's not always extremely natural." The"spectacle" stayed on the shelf as her work in film and TV kept her busy. Her first release of original music sincewas the award-winning"Til It Happens to You," a stirring, orchestral ballad she co-wrote with Diane Warren and performed at the 2016 Oscars. Penned for, a documentary about sexual abuse on college campuses,"Til It Happens to You" pulled from the experience of Gaga's own harrowing sexual assault. A group of fellow survivors joined her at the piano at the conclusion of the Oscars performance, and they were met with a tearful standing ovation: Without the distraction of costume or concept, Gaga's humanity shone through in a way her fans had never seen before.followed that September, she continued to speak candidly on her most personal experiences. She named the album after her aunt, who died from Lupus complications years before she was born, and wrote a plaintive lullaby for that namesake. This vulnerability extended to every aspect of her life, even when it involved confronting deep pain and physical trauma on camera. The Netflix documentary— produced by hitmakers Mark Ronson and BloodPop — as well as the end of her engagement to longtime love Taylor Kinney, her struggles with fibromyalgia and the impossible balancing act of a famous person's daily grind. The film ends with the beginning of her performance at Super Bowl LI, and we're reminded that Gaga has lived many lives over the course of her career: She can suit up in a platinum leotard and throw herself off the roof of Houston's NRG Stadium to belt out"Just Dance" and"Born This Way" as if it's just another work day, but at no point does she pretend it's easy. Eventually, the characteristically wacky productions and massive tours returned — Jonas Åkerlund, who directed her"Paparazzi" and"Telephone" videos, signed on for the dementedGaga: Unfiltered's honky tonk romp"A-Yo" on, she'd struck a balance between the stark concept of the album and the familiar flamboyance of her live set. In a sparkling crop top and fringed pair of booty shorts, she was the Southern-fried vision of her most fabulous self, a pop star who sneered as she picked up a guitar and didn't play it like a prop. She had reached a point where she could seamlessly flow between the genres she collected without the eye-popping set pieces and wardrobe.A Star Is Born in the spring of 2017, Gaga headlined Coachella and debuted a new single, soft-pop confection"The Cure," in the middle of her set. Shortly afterhit theaters in 2018, Lady Gaga's star power hit supernova status: Both she and Cooper received heaps of praise for"Shallow," the duet they recorded for the film, which delivered another No. 1 for Gaga and a handful of trophies, including an Oscar, come awards season.Mad Max: Fury Road and worked out their differences through a dance party at Burning Man, it would look, and sound, like"Stupid Love" — Gaga maximalism revived.s first single. A brief prologue hovers over an undulating life form as dramatic instrumentals swell."The world rots in conflict," it reads."Many tribes battle for dominance. While the Spiritual ones pray and sleep for peace, the Kindness punks fight for Chromatica ..." Enter Gaga, clad in bubblegum pink battlegear and sprinting towards a desert rager. She leads a pack of these rosy"Kindness punks" through a landscape of sparkling rock formations before they reach a group of feuding tribes and squash a fight in progress. Tension dissolves into celebration, and ecstatic synths cascade as she repeats her mantra —"All I ever wanted was love" — as the pre-chorus builds into a new wave explosion. She's the picture of bliss, twirling and leaping among the Kindness punks in this world of her own creation.'s debut, Gaga released a string of visuals and singles that ran with the futuristism of"Stupid Love," while hinting at a dark urgency underpinning the escapist vibe . On the album's cover, Gaga is trapped — or restrained — under the weight of a metallic sine wave. Everything she wears could double as a weapon: The heel of one boot is a bloody tusk, the other a butcher knife and spikes abound from her shoulders to her nails. In the video for her Ariana Grande collaboration"Rain On Me," storm clouds hurl raindrops and knives from the heavens. One pierces Gaga's thigh, and she pulls it out, screaming, before she crawls to safety and dances the pain away with Grande. The dance floor is her refuge, and she can heal here, even if the deluge won't quit:"I'd rather be dry but at least I'm alive." Order is restored when the violence abates and electro-pop saves the day. In interviews, Gaga has stuck to lofty, vague descriptions of the album's concept. After she declared that"earth is canceled,"— also helmed by BloodPop — is a"beautiful abstraction of my perception of the world." She clarified towas not a space rock, as her music videos hinted at, but a state of mind:"It's a perspective... I might sound silly, but I'm on it right now — I'm not on another planet. If you see and listen to, and you want to live there, too, you're invited. But I do want to be clear that it's not a fantasy."
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