Aural Analysis: "Bad Romance" by Lady GaGa

Another commute, another aural assault. This time it was the GaGa-thing’s “Bad Romance.” I had this song stuck in my head for something like five or six days, and only managed to finally expunge it by means of a liberal application of Viking metal and medieval Norwegian folk songs. But then, yesterday, as I surfed through the vaster wasteland yet that is SoCal radio, the GaGa-thing came crashing back at me. As will be evident from an examination of the lyrics, the Gaga-thing is fixated on revenge; I believe she is reaching through the radio to make a personal attack on me. Well, it’s time for me to fight back using the only weapon available to me: Swiftian wit.

It’s notable that I heard “Bad Romance” three times on my way to Orange County, rather than the subsequent single, “Alejandro.” Is this owing to the absolutely outrageous acts of homosexual gang rape and blasphemy and Nazi fetishism in the “Alejandro” video that represent GaGa’s crossing of three too many lines? I wonder.

Before I begin, I should say that I actually have some modicum of respect for the GaGa, if only a modicum. In the intellectual desert that is contemporary pop music, I must concede that she exhibits some shred of originality and talent. She is the best of the worst. She can sing, and isn’t all autotuned to Hell and beyond. She has talent. Her songs are undeniably well-crafted; they are all earworms waiting to happen. She and her collaborators have catchiness down to a science.

But oh, how she opts to expend such on weirdness and fetishism when she could probably use it to make much better music. There is a Tori Amos inside of Lady GaGa, trying to get out but constantly getting beaten back by means of bizarre displays of perversion. So my criticism of the GaGa-thing is a criticism of misused ability, rather than a criticism of an absolute lack of ability, which is the criticism I might level at, say, the current incarnation of the Black Eyed Peas.

You want my revenge, GaGa? Oh, I’ll give you my revenge. As before, my responses to your lyrics are in the brackets. As before, I offer the video up to those who, in their innocence, have been spared the seeing of it. It would be another essay entirely to describe the aesthetics of the video which…I actually really like, much as it tries to toe this weird line between sexiness and repulsiveness which…I actually really like. But whatever. The song still be dumb.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrO4YZeyl0I

Let’s go, GaGa. Me and you, toe-to-toe, no maybe.

Oh, and spoiler alert: if you have not already seen Vertigo, you suck.

Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh

Caught in a bad romance

[These are the lead lyrics from the lead single for The Fame Monster album, intended to describe the negative aspects of celebrity culture. I think the concept is breaking down here; bad romances are hardly exclusive to trashy celebrities. I, being about as unfamous as it is possible for a person to get, will attest to that.]

Ra Ra-ah-ah-ah
Roma Roma-ma
GaGa
Oh la-la
Want your bad romance

[Let me stop you right there, Dame GaGa. Now, I know your name implies that you have only a cursory apprehension of human language (and your video reveals that you have an outsider’s dim and unintuitive appreciation of what human clothing is supposed to be), but that doesn’t mean you have to actually employ strings of baby-talk in your lyrics. You’re an adult, as your video abundantly reveals. You can use adult words. Can’t you?

Okay. Let’s keep going.]

I want your ugly
I want your disease
I want your everything
As long as it’s free

[Wow. Apparently, being ugly and diseased and poor, I am the GaGa-thing’s ideal lover. Nobody tell my fiancée.]

I want your love
Love love love
I want your love

[It really takes something for somebody to make an expression of love sound like “blah, blah, blah.” Thank you, GaGa-thing, for cheapening affection and emotion.

Actually, no. I take that back. I’m not going to thank you for that, not even sarcastically.]

I want your drama

[You do? Okay. I’m going to see a performance of King Lear next Friday night in Garden Grove. Would you like me to get you a ticket? It’s only $14.50 on Goldstar, which I know isn’t free (freeness being apparently the threshold for your love, in spite of your otherwise overwhelming materialism), but it’s close enough to it.]

The touch of your hand

[Wow, Lady GaGa. That actually sounds…totally human and relatable. You’re slipping.]

I want your leather studded kiss in the sand

[Oh, good. You’re back to being a freaky weird person again. Don’t ever change, Lady.

On a different note, can you imagine how awful a “leather-studded kiss” would be? It makes me think of studded leather armor. I do not want to kiss boiled leather onto which circular metal plates have been affixed. If my lover’s lips had that texture, I think I would need to get a better lover. Or some serious fucking chapstick.]

I want your love
Love love love
I want your love

[When you say that, Lady GaGa, somehow I don’t feel as though you’re being sincere. Something tells me that, in spite of your repeated requests, that if I were to try and give you my love I would very quickly be getting some hate from a bodyguard’s boot.]

You know that I want you

[I do? Well, okay, Lady GaGa. I guess you can have me. But I’m going to wear about seventeen condoms. I don’t know where in the universe you have been, and frankly, I don’t want to know.]

And you know that I need you

[That’s funny. You seem to have been doing pretty well without me up until now. Your vitamin-me deficiency hasn’t much affected your ability to wear spinal-cord extensions and twitch like vat-born abortion that you are.

I want it bad
A bad romance

[Alright, so let’s examine this wanting of the bad romance. What qualities does a bad romance have that you find desirable? Tragic failure? Does that mean you do want to see King Lear with me? Or are you drawn to the emotional or physical abusiveness? If so, I know a certain Katy Perry who, judging by her song lyrics, is desperately looking for a sub to dom over. You girls should hook up.]

I want your love and
I want your revenge

[Well, how convenient for you! ‘Cause that’s exactly what I want to give you!]

You and me could write a bad romance

[You know what? I bet we actually could. The bad romance that you and I would write, GaGa, being drawn together by a volatile mix of queasy lust and utter disdain, would be near-unlimited in its badness. I’ll take the first chapter; you get the second.]

I want your love and
All your lover’s revenge
You and me could write a bad romance

[Yes, I still think we could, too.]

Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh
Caught in a bad romance

[Hey, wait. When did you go from wanting a bad romance to being caught in one? In the space of like two lyrics? You move too fast for me, Lady GaGa! Usually it takes at least eight lyrics for me to commit.]

Ra ra-ah-ah-ah

[Sis-sis, boom bah-bah. Are we doing some role-playing now, Lady GaGa? Are we supposed to be late 19th century college cheerleaders? Are we supposed to be reciting some sort of prayer to the Ancient Aegyptian sun god? Or are we back to talking in proto-linguistic babble syllables again? So now you’re into submission and paraphilic infantilism. That makes some kind of sense, I guess.

Oh God. If Lady GaGa starts to make sense to you, fear for your sanity.]

Roma roma-ma
GaGa
Oh la-la
Want your bad romance

[Yes, I know. Your wanting of my bad romance is abundantly clear at this point.]

I want your horror

[Really? First you want to go to see King Lear with me, and now you want to go see Piranha 3D? Well, okay. But we’re going Dutch. International superstars in my company can pay for they own damn tickets. And, seriously, have you seen the prices for a 3D movie these days?]

I want your design

[Uh? Well, I’m not much of a designer, but okay. Besides, seeing your outfits, it’s not like I could possibly do any worse than the designers you already wear. An eyeless ape who has had half of his brains scooped out with a spoon could probably design more attractive clothes.]

‘Cuz you’re a criminal
As long as you’re mine
I want your love
Love love love
I want your love

[You know, Lady GaGa, you’re an adult human female (I think?), and I’m an adult human male, so for you to have my love would have would probably be legal in most areas. Then again, I am confident that if anyone could start at consensual heterosexual sex and end up at the point of criminal sexual perversion, it’s you.]

I want your psycho

[So you want me to dress up like a woman and stab you in the shower as you scream and bleed chocolate syrup? Eh…maybe.]

Your vertigo shtick

[So you want me to fall in love with you, whereupon you will fake your own death, whereupon I will fall into a deep depression until I find you again and fall in love with you again, whereupon we will recreate your fake death and end up actually killing you? That’s a pretty complex fantasy to have, Queen of the GaGas.

It takes a lot to get you off, doesn’t it?]

Want you in my rear window

[Oh, I get it now. All this discussion of classic Hitchcock movies is just a lead-in to you asking for anal sex. Thanks for ruining some of my favorite films for me, Lady GaGa. Never again will I be able to watch Jimmy Stewart and the incomparable Kim Novak climb those fateful stairs without thinking about you taking it in the butt.

You know, Lady GaGa, the other pop stars—they’re just ignorant fuckwits. They know not what they do. But you, you have just enough talent and culture and intelligence to cause actual harm to the things I hold dear. With moderate ability comes moderate responsibility, and it’s unfortunate that you have opted to use your powers for evil.]

Baby you’re sick

[*I’m* sick? Hey, I’m not the one who just turned one of the best movies of all time into a request for butt sex.]

I want your love
Love love love
I want your love

[I don’t know. I was having considerable doubts about our love you even before you asked me for all the Hitchock murder roleplay. I don’t know if me repeatedly pretending to kill is a good foundation for a relationship.]

You know that I want you (’Cuz I’m a free bitch baby)

[I doubt that. I’m gonna go with the supposition that you’re actually a ludicrously expensive bitch.]

And you know that I need you
I want it bad romance
Your bad romance

[Yeah, I think we both know at this point that any relationship between us would prove to be pretty fucking terrible. And yet you want it anyway? This song really is a cry for help, isn’t it?]

I want your love and
I want your revenge
You and me could write a bad romance
I want your love and
All your lover’s revenge

[More revenge? I haven’t given you enough yet? Okay, well, we have a bridge and a last verse and one more instance of the chorus to go. I hope to have satisfied your revenge quota by the time we’re done.]

You and me could write a bad romance

Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh
Oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh

Caught in a bad romance

Ra ra-ah-ah-ah
Roma roma-ma

[Roma—like the Roma people of Cenral and Eastern Europe? So we can just flat-out use the names of ethnic groups as non-lexical vocables now? Let me try, using my own ethnicity. “Ger-Ger-German American.” Eh. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.]

GaGa, Ooh la-la
Want your bad romance

Walk walk fashion baby

[How is it that we’re discussing fashion now? This is the second time you’ve brought it around to fashion for no apparent reason, O atrocity that goes by the name of GaGa. I feel like you’re just trying to draw attention to your outfits, which probably don’t need any help in that department.]

Work it, move that bitch c-razy
Walk walk fashion baby

[In _those_ heels? I don’t think so, girlfriend.]

Work it, move that bitch c-razy
Walk walk passion baby
Work it
I’m a free bitch baby

[If that were true, how would you be paying for all those ridiculous clothes? Shit that ugly has got to be super-expensive.]

I want your love
And I want your revenge
I want your love
I don’t wanna be friends

[You don’t? But isn’t being bad friends a good way to lead up to being bad romantic partners?]

Je veux ton amour
Et je veux ta revenge
Je veux ton amour

[Look, you’re just saying the exact same thing in French. You don’t fool me. That’s not really very sophisticated. And yet there’s definitely something about the way your tongue curls around those vowels…ah! No! Must…resist…!]

I don’t wanna be friends
(Want your bad romance
I want your bad romance)
Want your bad romance!

I want your love and
I want your revenge
You and me could write a bad romance
I want your love and
All your lover’s revenge
You and me could write a bad romance

[We’ve been over all this already.]

Caught in a bad romance

Ra ra-ah-ah-ah
Roma roma-ma
GaGa

[You know, just because you took your name from the Queen song “Radio Ga Ga,” which criticized the kind of infantile pop music that was “becom[ing] some background noise / A backdrop for the girls and boys / Who just don't know or just don't care” doesn’t mean that you have to continue you to speak baby talk. If anything, Lady GaGa, you are becoming the very thing that Queen set out to criticize. And, in the end, that’s my real criticism of you—that, in your addressing of the topics of materialistic excess, our culture’s obsession with celebrity, and the pop music that is devoid of artistry and serves only to provide an accompaniment for sex, by means of your hyperbole, you seem to be critiquing all of these things by means of hyperbolic excess, but I really don’t think you’re critiquing these things so much as I think you’re reveling in them with an absolute abandonment of self-discipline. You are not satire so much as you are self-parody. I don’t think you’re pop culture’s greatest critic as you are its worst perpetrator.]

Oh la-la
Want your bad romance

[You know what? No. Sorry, but no.]