Celebrating Lady Gaga, born on this day in 1986. —Ed.
I’ll be the first to admit I sold Lady Gaga short when she detonated like a hyper-sexualized glitter bomb on the pop scene with her 2008 debut LP The Fame. Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta sounded like a brazen Madonna copycat to me, and if there’s one thing I can’t abide it’s a cheap Lower East Side Madonna knock-off. Ms. Ciccone and I go back too far.
Ah, but then her Gaganess sat down for an interview with Vanity Fair, and said an astounding and wonderful thing. Namely, “I have this weird thing that if I sleep with someone they’re going to take my creativity from me through my vagina.”
I mean, wow. Those words hit me like a diamond bullet smack in the third eye. Because NOBODY who says crazy shit like that can be written off as fake goods. No, I knew right then and there that Lady Gaga was a stone American original, and deserving of the kind of same degree of unwavering respect as the Dali Lama, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, and Kanye “This hat makes me feel like Superman!” West.
Why, I haven’t heard such naked honesty since Little Richard said, “The only thing I like better than a big penis is a bigger penis.” And with her refreshing candidness in mind I promptly sat down to listen to Lady Gaga with new ears.
My favorite and your favorite and the whole world’s favorite is “Poker Face,” Lady Gaga’s robotic anthem to both 7-card stud and studs in general. It’s both a great piece of stutter synth and a tribute to “The Song of the Vulga Boatmen,” and in muh muh muh opinion one of the most dance-floor friendly songs to come along since John Travolta invented the dance floor.
I mean, you just can’t go wrong with this baby. Lady Gaga rides its 120 beats per minute hard and puts ‘em away wet, boasting that nobody can read her poker face. She also boasts, “I’m bluffin’ with my muffin,” and in case you’re not sure what she means she spelled it out to Rolling Stone: “It’s my pussy’s poker face!” Coy the lady ain’t.
But this song gets by on more than pussy power alone. Lady Gaga hits her marks like the born to be a star pro she is, and turns stuttering into foreplay with a voice as hard as glass but capable of melting butter. That said, she really ain’t much of a p-p-p-poker player and she really doesn’t have a very good p-p-p-poker face; both you and I know damn well she holds all the cards in this game of strip poker, so be prepared to take ‘em off.
The very lubricious and utterly raunchtastic “Poker Face” went on to become one of the biggest selling singles of all time, and I don’t have to tell you why–the damn thing’s as infectious as an STD, and it’s one STD penicillin won’t cure.
Lady Gaga is a Gender Warrior and a feminist force for good, and has done more to further the cause of haute couture than anyone this side of Alexander McQueen. And I’m proud to call her my friend even if she does refuse to return my phone calls.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
A
