The thing about artists is that many of them are, by nature, self-centered. I'll even venture so far as to say that most of them are. Be it via self-aggrandizement or complete self-loathing and self-deprecation, the self is held as the most important thing to a given artist. Almost to the point of complete obsession.
With that, I'll say that I take everything thrown at me via any given artist is taken with a grain of salt. I'd like to be able to accept all music at its intended level without being forcefed other facets of the artists' personality, but that's not exactly easy.
With that said, I'll have to say that Lady Gaga herself is quite talented. She's not the be all end all of popular music or any music, but she's far above and beyond the norm as far as raw ability goes.
Before she was "Gaga", she was just a singer-songwriter. I'm sure that this has been posted in the thread previously, but it illustrates my point quite well, I think:
If I were at a University talent show and saw this girl playing, I'd be blown away. Vocally and musically, she is apparently quite talented. Lyrically, she's all right. All the same, I'd think, "Wow, this girl's going places." I've seen local acts and even national acts who don't possess that amount of raw power.
She could have potentially lucked into a record deal and gotten the distribution and success of, say, Ingrid Michaelson or Norah Jones. She wrote songs for other acts for a little while, then had the opportunity to "recreate herself" as it were, and she created Lady Gaga. A lot of others had input in the creation of this persona, but she has slipped on this new pair of skin rather successfully.
She is quite full of herself, but I'll have to say that the ability is there. If there was zero talent present, this success would never have worked as well. She's one of the best marketing vehicles in pop music in and of herself. Rather than detest her for her presumptions and such, I'll try to take the music at face value.
I'm not big on pop music, but I actually really enjoy her.
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It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken
Perhaps they're better left unsung
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