Love her or hate her, you have to admit that Lady Gaga has done something special.
In a relatively short space of time she’s gone from a nobody to become one of the most exciting, inventive and inspiring pop stars of the Noughties. While her peers veer wildly from one extreme (bemoaning problems like music piracy) to the other (having very public breakdowns), 2009 has seen the emergence of an artist who has rewritten the rulebook when it comes to making headlines, all in the name of art.
Her live performances never fail to be spectacular (exploding firework bra anyone?), and even the most mundane events like boarding an aeroplane gain significant column inches. She even provides forums the blogs with plenty to feast on.
But ‘poon or peener’ aside, for me the success of Lady Gaga is primarily down to one thing; some damn good PR. The team around her has managed to create a water-tight persona (or should we say brand) with which to stir up controversy and interest, the likes of which hasn’t been seen in a long time. In a music market dominated by X Factor-style competitions, where new acts are created in front of the camera, warts and all, it’s refreshing to see a marketing approach that’s based on the creation of an enigmatic ‘superstar’, where not a shaft of light from backstage is ever glimpsed.
We’re never privy to the ‘real’ Lady Gaga, the person behind the make-up. There are no stories, or photos, of her falling out of a nightclub drunk, upset at being jilted by an ex-lover, overjoyed that she’s reached number one in the charts. There constantly remains an air of mystique, carefully controlled and refined, where art and performance become the overarching messages, and the usual ‘girl next door does good’ angle fails to materialise.
As PR machines go, Lady Gaga and her record company are on to a winner. She might have a lifelong career or be the proverbial one-hit wonder, but someone who’s taken less than a year to build up the admiration and reputation as someone as established as Queen of Innovation Madonna deserves to be watched with close attention.
Then again, perhaps it really is all about the art.
