Lady Gaga's 'The Fame' takes pop to a whole new level

    On the surface, the debut album from self-proclaimed lover of Pop, Lady GaGa seems like it wouldn't be of much interest to a college-aged crowd, but surprisingly it's, for some reason, seeing heavy rotation in nearly all demographics. Moreover, it's been heralded as the future of pop music, or conversely, according to All Music Guide, "anti-pop," whatever that may be.
    From the first track and first single, "Just Dance," the theme of which is pretty self-explanatory, "The Fame" is unabashedly a pop album with nothing in mind other than serving up nasty hooks and even dirtier lyrics. While "Just Dance" relies more on the catchiness of its chorus than the lyrical content, the hook is so unstoppable that it's no surprise that this song is already tearing up the charts. Then again, the chorus is so blatant -- "Girl, I love this record/ but I can't see straight anymore" -- that it's hard to listen to the track without seeing throbbing subwoofers pounding out the steady bass line on a club sound system while throngs of sweaty, inebriated people wildly grind against each other.
    The second single from the album, which is already receiving heavy airplay on both radio and MTV, entitled "Poker Face," is nearly as melodically magnetic as "Just Dance," but it makes the unwise move of stepping from the realm of "kitsch" to "cheesy." As GaGa sings, "Can't read my/ Can't read my/ Can't read my poker face," the chorus is then followed by the word "poker" stuttered repeatedly. If the chorus had been thought through a bit more, this track could have been just as 'pop-tastic' as "Just Dance," but instead it stands in the shadow of the first single.
    Even though some of the songs seem rather serious, there are certainly a handful of others that were simply made to be blasted at ear-splitting volumes in New York's downtown clubs. The second cut off the album, "LoveGame," starts with the line, "Let's have some fun/ This beat is sick/ I want to take a ride/ on your disco stick." If these lyrics came from someone like Britney Spears or Christina Aguilera, it would be easy to write them off as clichéd dirty references. Yet, listeners are clearly cognizant of the fact that Lady GaGa knows how trite and humorously sexual her words are, and embrace them for that very reason.
    "The Fame," the title track from the album, is steeped in David Bowie and Prince influences, which somehow manage to mesh perfectly with the processed drums and digital bass that hold down nearly every track on the album. A simple guitar line takes the hook for the entirety of the tune, with synthesizers swooshing for the hard-panned left and right, attacking the listener with a flood of special stimuli. Amazingly the song still is about something as superficial as money, cars and women, with GaGa straight-facedly saying in her raspy voice, "All we care about is runway models, Cadillacs and liquor bottles."
    But it gets better. The ballad of the record, "Brown Eyes," has subtleties that bring to mind Lauryn Hill and even Billie Holiday. This one was definitely not made for the clubs, but it reminds the audience that even with her self-imposed superstar status, Lady GaGa, real name Stefani Germanotta, is still partially human beneath her skin-tight vinyl get-ups.
    Lady GaGa is unexpectedly attractive for the very same reason spandex tights or retro clothing styles have drawn in so many people over the last few years: She's turned what was once kitschy into the avant-garde and vice versa. Lady Gaga attempts, with some success, to do for music what Jasper Johns or Andy Warhol did for visual art in the 1950s. Though she is still far from being a real heavy hitter in the music world, this lady could see some serious staying power if she maintains her tongue-in-cheek pop mentalities.