Off the Beat: Gaga - Lady of the Haus

It's been a good year for Lady Gaga.

Today, she wraps up her Monster Ball World Tour and, according to my Facebook events, this Friday marks the first National Lady Gaga Day. From the unremarkable Stefani Germanotta to Billboard's top new artist of 2009, the 23-year-old has charmed the charts and critics with her outrageous image and permanent poker face.

But for many, her allure is still a mystery. She's not tradtionally pretty. Her vocabulary-let's face it-leaves a lot to be desired. A year ago, upon hearing her synthesized vocals and cheap hooks blasting in L.A. clubs, I dismissed her as being as vapid and vulgar as Britney. I scoffed when my friend Steph, an avid Gaga-ite, called her work "high art."

I've converted. And so, it seems, has the rest of the world-pop fans, the gay community, even hipsters have come to worship the spectacle that is Lady Gaga. So why is it we can't seem to look away? How did this overblown burlesque singer become a pop phenomenon big enough to devote a holiday to?

In a brief appearance on the show "Launch My Line," a relatively toned-down Gaga offers words of advice to aspiring fashionistas: "Just because we're doing a heightened, avant-garde sense of what we are doesn't mean that we start shredding things and making giant hats," she says. "It still has to be you."

That is the Gaga guarantee-unwavering devotion to her artistic vision. No matter how good, bad, ugly or diseased, you know you what you're getting. The heightened, avant-garde self is her hallmark: a self that fills not only your vision but your imaginative appetite, dazzling you with its seamless integration of style, sound and performance (though giant hats help, too). We all have the fantasy of being more or greater than we are. Gaga is bold enough to indulge that fantasy-shamelessly.

Her visual appeal alone is enough to intrigue. Dramatic geometrical silhouettes, shoulder pads, neon wigs and space-age suits-and that's just the tip of the diamond-encrusted iceberg. She mesmerizes by sheer ostentation, a fashion chameleon who nevertheless shows remarkable consistency. Over the past year, Gaga has continued to outdo herself, building a larger-than-life persona without shredding her essential stylistic components.

But her flair for drama isn't limited to her wardrobe. By vicariously living in the glamorized, exaggerated world she creates with her shows and music videos, Gaga keeps us captivated. She strokes our egos by stroking her own, playing to our exhibitionist desires, our dreams of self-transformation, our jealousies, our pent-up fantasies of murder and revenge. We can't help ourselves. We want her horror, we want her design.

In the "Bad Romance" music video-arguably her most provocative yet-she addresses the struggle for self realization, forcing us to weigh the cost of maintaining integrity in a society that insists on selling out. We see in her disturbing body imagery the consequences of the media's unrealistic expectations of women, even while we drool over her undeniable hotness. We ooh, we aah. We are rendered speechless by her ability to walk in those absurd Alexander McQueen heels.

I like to think of Gaga as the Chuck Palahniuk of pop music. Another good comparison is Andy Warhol. Yes, she's flashy, gimmicky and over-dramatic, but she's also an artist who knows what she's doing. With what she calls "pop performance art," she immerses herself in the society of the spectacle in order to render it visible to her audience. In doing so, she both builds a monument and questions the artificialities, superficialities and materialism that color modern society.

Perhaps a lesser known fact is that Gaga is actually talented. She sings live and accompanies herself on piano, feats many pop artists (cough Ashlee Simpson, Britney) fail miserably at. She used to write lyrics for Britney. She is now a creative director at Polaroid. And she designs all the costumes and concepts for her videos, with the help of her stylist team, "Haus of Gaga."

So to answer my original question, Lady Gaga is a hypnotic play of contrasts. She is art and trash, smoke and mirrors, lace and diamonds. She has inspired Barbie dolls, met the Queen of England, and, according to the tabloids, might have a penis. But most of all, she's a free bitch, baby. And that is why we can't look away.

Ga-ga, ooh-la-la.

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