The MTV VMA's - "Try too hard" meets "forgettable" and a few good moments.

Well, well there were the MTV VMAs and I have to say the motto must have been: "Try too hard!", "Awkward and ashamed!" and "Some great performances." And well it was so awkward!

Okay guys the performance of Gaga was off the hook. It was amazing since it incorporated all her previous styles. And her stage was "amaza-bells". But one critique point would be her voice. It was a little off. But still the best performance of the night. How did her wigs stay on, and has she become some sort of magician that that last wig fitted so perfectly? WTF? I guess there were like 5 people behind that huge white prop to get that wig on in 5 seconds. And her figure in that slim down bod and seashell bikini. Wooop Woop! And the best is her defending One Direction after they get booed for winning the VMA for Best Summer Song. That is classy. I mean, she just stood up and left. Oh and that pink cup she drank from? WTF? That was a swine nose. Perez Hilton bash much? Oh yes Gurrl! And her look on the red carpet? Gorgeous, except for that bow, and you can see that the lace from her wig was glued on bad. Could have been better. But basically she was the show-stealer.

Well lets come to the worst of the night. I love my post-Disney Miley, and I have pre-ordered Bangerz yesterday, but that performance of her was just bad. All the teddy bears, the outfit, and her red carpet outfit as well, her dancing and her tongue sticking out. Oh my god. Miley, there is a difference between sexy-ugly/fashionable-ugly and ugly-ugly. And yes: It is appropriate to use the word skank here. And the twerking  she gave: Well we know she likes it but she is not the twerk queen. And that half lap dance with super awkward, and not very feminist, Robin Thicke during his performance of his, silly and women degrading, song Blurred Lines really threw me off. Miley, get some glasses if the lines are blurred for you. But this time you crossed the line!

What I really loved was the pro LGBT tone the show had. With Macklemore giving his performance of Same Love I was more then satisfied. Actually it gave me chills to see it and made me proud of being a member of the LGBT IQA community. But his gestures were so damn of. And I really loved that Jennifer Hudson joined them on stage, even though she looked like Alisha Keys. 

When it comes to Katy Perry I was so disappointed. Her leo print dress: ugly. Her grillz: ugly and a joke at her expense. Her hair: the only thing not totally ridiculous. Her performance of Roar: forgettable and boring. But she sang kinda good, so I will give it a mediocre, and send it along its way. And by the way: the Brooklyn bridge thing did not do it for me, even the people there seemed bored. #SorryBoutIt, we know Kathy can do better.

This years fashion was a mixture of "Oh my god, how ugly" and very stylish, classic dresses. Best dressed would be split between Rita Ora, Lady Gaga, Selena Gomez in that marvellous atelier Versace and Ciara. Ugly as fuck definitely goes to Miley's outfit and worst dressed also goes to the Smith kids, damn: get a stylist, and I was not a fan of the way Taylor Swift's hair missed a piece to cover a bit of her forehead. But whatever. The whole award show wont be legendary, and that is a shame since it was the shows 30th anniversary!  And the other performance there uhm.. Kanye: forgettable. Were there any others? Oh yes the Justin  and NSYNC. Too much. Also the video of the year thing for him: Not so much. But he kinda still deserves it. All I had eyes fro was Lance Bass. 

Oh and yes, there were people winning awards, so lets see if my predictions that I made earlier were right: For video of the year I said Macklemore, but it went to JT. I can live with that. That Macklemore won best hip hop is so okay with me, in fact I could not be happier, but i guessed ASAP or Kendrick to take it. Best male went to Bruno Mars, I did not see that coming, but I don't care since no one really cares. Best female went to Taylor Swift. Don't like that CeeUNextTuesday. (Even though her dress was great.) Expected P!nk to win. Best Pop video went to Selena, Im okay with that, especially after that Miley performance. Artist to watch was taken by Austin Mahone. Fuck that lil Bieber 2.0, his music is shitty cheap crap. Iggy Azealia should have taken this one home! Best collaboration went to P!nk , an well this one I guessed right. And best video with a social message went, as I predicted, to Macklemore. 

"Music Minute" - Applause for the APPLAUSE VIDEO by Lady Gaga

Today has been the day that the reigning queen of pop, Lady Gaga, has released the music video for her first single off her third studio album ARTPOP. The single Applause was released early last week due to hackers and leaks, and has since been compared to Katy Perry's "Roar". But when Gaga entered Times Square in a black convertible with red leather seats to go onto Good Morning America it was clear that at this day Katy perry would play no role. 

When Gaga entered the studio she wore a stunning white dress, short brown or brunette hair and metallic high heel boots. In an interview before the music video premier she declared that the video will feature many images of her, all versions of herself. She also stated that the video was paying homage to her obsession with transforming herself. The video is a mixture of Tim Burton meets Alice in Wonderland meets Circus meets vampires and angels meets fashion and disco. Tons of outfits, flashing lights and a dance routine that seeks out for competition. An absolute complex, stunning and amazing pop music video that says one thing: art. It really is a video about obsession, rage, love, dance and art in combination with pop. A true iconographic piece that will go down in music history, at least it should! But don't believe just me, go an check out my arguments below!

*Copyright mention: I do not own any of the pictures on display here. Just used for entertainment purpose. All pictures are courtesy of Interscope Records.*

For those of you who haven't seen the video yet, and can not watch it on Youtube due to Vevo, just head over to Ampya and watch it there! So I think we should get right to it, and analyze it in every frame! Lets dive in:

I absolutely love the writing! Can not wait to see more of it. What we can see of the scenery just gives me the chills. Very central, very power oriented and absolutely Metropolis meets horror. The stage is like a circus arena curtain that opens. I love it to death!

Gaga mattress. And her body is banging! I mean seriously there hasn't been anything that hot since the last supernova! Her shoes are a high-heeled killer boot that makes my hear for fashion go pitter-patter. 

Gaga on a podium, with wings. Wait wings? Yes! Wings! And for me they look like the wings of death. She is flying over the podium and giving me further reasons to fangurrl!


Continue to read after the jump!

Academia - "Lady Gaga: The Mother Monster Identity - Deconstructing a Pop Star"

Right now I am working on an essay for the university titled: "Lady Gaga: The Mother Monster Identity - Deconstructing a Pop Star", and I have seen some amazing ARTPOP and APPLAUSE promotion done by some monsters. And I was really blown away by a video I found on twitter.

@BadKid_Earthfan and @Whisk3y_M0uth made a video where the talked to strangers about APPLAUSE and ARTPOP and also had the brilliant idea to relabel soup cans ins supermarket as APPLAUSE CAMPBELL. Check it out below! I will definitely use that as an example in my essay. So just wait for the 27th of august for my essay and follow them on twitter. And don't forget to watch their video! 

"Music Minute" - What unites "Tinker Bell" and Lady Gaga? - Lets have a look!

We all know the story of Disney's "Peter Pan". And we all know that Captain Hook is a pretty much a fucked up character, Peter Pan is crazy (Because I don't want to bee a teenager forever. I mean: you can't decide for yourself!) and that Tinker Bell is much more a symbol than such a sweet sweet little thing...

Picture from Lady Gaga's Twitter account.

Because Tinker Bell is a symbol for the power of believe and an innocent, or sometimes naive, nature. Thing is that his cute little fairy just can survive if she is believed in. When people stop believing in her, in magic and in possibilities she fades away. See the relation to an artist? An artist, might it be an art artist, a musician, a performer or whatever just exists when he or she is known. An artist thereby can be related to a stage character, and basically displays the question of wether something is there if we do not see it.

So where we can match Lady Gaga and Tinker Belle is that question: And we can answer it with her stellar performance in her tour DVD: "Lady Gaga presents: The Monster Ball Tour from Madison Square Garden". In there Gaga basically says: "You know, I am kind of like Tinker Bell, You know Tinker Bell? You know how she dies if you don't clap for her. Do you want me to die? Scream for me!"(By the way, check out the  video of Gaga saying that below!) I think we got our hint, don't we? An artist just can exist if her or she is believed in. And what better way to be believed in then by screaming, clapping and applauding fans? 

Get the second clue? Applauding fans? Lady Gaga releasing Applause?  I mean her latest single basically is the prove that Gaga knows about the rendering of all that. Smart one, isn't she? She sings: "I live for the Applause! Live for the way that you cheer and scream for me." Yes, she does live for the applause. But the applause needs her as well. She needs the applause to be cherished and exist, and the applause needs her, or better said the fans need her to cheer on someone. Uhlala!

And you know what? Tinker Bell does not only serve as a symbol, but also for a reminder for us. A reminder that the concept of pulp, of low brow culture as high art culture, of pop art as important and valuable. And we are ensured as well through the lyrics of "Applause": "One second I am a Koons fan, suddenly the Koons is me. Pop culture was in art, now art is in  pop culture, is in me." What is described by that? Well that pop culture is art art is pop culture and the exchange of both in Lady Gaga is ARTPOP. What a great reminder that popular culture is more then what meets the eye. And well.. isn't that a reminder of camp? Basically Gaga ironizes, and parodies the innocent notion of Disney and reminds us of the nature of the artist: constructed by attention. 

And Gurrl! Gaga is feeding the pop machinery! We got the video coming up on monday, the V-Magazine September issue with 4 covers and different photo stories, the album coming up, a short video "Lady Gaga is  over!" (Which I will talk about, when I give you the full range on Marina Abramovic.) and a VMA performance. I guess the "Applause" singer probably will be pretty much existent with all this cheering, screaming and applause. Tinker Bell will live on, for sure!

APPLAUSE OUT TODAY

Picture from Gaga's twitter!

Today has marked a sad and genius day for little monsters and music lovers from all over the world. There have been extremely many leaks of snippets of "Applause" by Lady Gaga on the web, and today is the day Katy Perry's "Roar" has been released. And to stop all that leaking madness Gaga has taken her twitter and released "Applause" today!

Sorry Katy that Gaga stole all your thunder! Your song also is a good pop song, which I wanted to review today but now I will have to give Gaga the first and give "Roar" a shout out some other day!

Gaga announced the early release "Applause" on Twitter to be faster then these damn hackers! And man, was I mad at first! We could have also waited 7 more days, but apparently not. Good thing we still have the video coming out on the 19th! Lets get straight to the song now: It is a new Gaga, it is a new sound. The song basically is very clear, it is very disco, it is very 90's and very electronic but still radio friendly. It is very much how I expected it to be. It is less of a "rock-electro-pop" thing but rather an "electronic-disco-pop" sound.

Topic wise it is about the artist, that would be Lady Gaga in this case, lives for the applause, the appreciation of the fans. When she starts the song she sings that she waits for the fans to crash the critics. Very much Warhol! This song definitely befits the message of ARTPOP!  Then the song brilliantly goes on to say: "I overheared your theory, nostalgia's for geeks. I guess Sir, if you say so, some of us just like to read." What a great smash into the direction of research in art and referencing basically this could be Gaga's version o saying: "Go and pick up a book!" Directly afterwards she adds: "One second I'm a Koons fan (Jeff Koons, the pop artist), suddenly the Koons is me." Well that is actually true. Jeff Koons reproduces everyday products in glamorous ways and makes them icons. See the connection to Gaga?

I could go on, and fangurrl till you all fall dead, but that is basically the best pieces of the song. So just go and buy it and listen! Oh and the picture Gaga released along the release is amazing! Check it out above! 

"I Love Art" - Lady Gaga, the beauty that deconstructs beauty, using camp.

Monsters, it is only eight days until APPLAUSE from ARTPOP is released. Meanwhile I will continue to sweeten the wait with drawings of Gaga. And isn't she just a beauty? But...

... did you know that Gaga, as our generations pop diva, makes extensive use of the performative class of camp? What you don't know what camp is? Well basically camp is the celebration of passionate failures, it is aesthetics over content which makes camp the perfect thing to criticize the dominant discourse by appearing as a form of it. But basically camp is a masqueraded way of criticizing through the use of irony, parody, aesthetics and theatricality. If you still don't have a glimpse at what camp is, you should really read about it. Probably the best would be to start with Susan Sonntag's essay "Notes on Camp". But listen up: she leaves out camp as a political thing... Alright, that brings me to the following: I have to fucking write about camp.. but in another post! Just enjoy the picture! XOXO