Lady Gaga- Speech about Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Crowd Phone Call/Telephone
I already wrote a VERY lengthy review of Lady Gaga’s show at Lollapalooza so I will keep this brief, but I saw her in Philadelphia on Tuesday night, and left significantly more impressed with her show. Part of that is probably because I was in the front row (if you look at the video, you can see me on the far right doing some bad white boy head-bobbing and fist-pumping from 5:40-5:50 and at a few other points), but objectively some of the flaws in the Lollapalooza show were less prevalent last night.
The bass was turned waaaaay up, which made the remixes in the interludes much better. The opening Dance In The Dark remix, which samples the Vandalism remix of Finally by CeCe Peniston, was particularly impressive, to the point that I spent a decent amount of time yesterday trying to find the official version of it and that my sister forced me to hear her singing the only two lines from Finally that she knows all day. Overall the interludes were still sub-par, but that one’s a keeper. There were fewer inspirational speeches as well, replaced by Gaga talking about repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (even if her speech was awkward, it’s nice to have a pop star who stands for something again), the VMAs and her next album. The phone call bit was good at our show because of the girl actually being able to sing opera well, I’m not sure if it would annoy me at other shows but it worked Tuesday. There was one other moment in all her talks that made me laugh, whether Gaga meant it how I interpreted it or not, when she said “I hate the truth most of all, I’d rather have a giant dose of bullshit any day so…I love you too.” and then ended her speech.
Musically, the show was largely the same, with the addition of So Happy I Could Die being the only change, although it was a welcome one since that’s one of my favorite Fame Monster tracks. Unfortunately that was performed high on a platform with no dancing due to a ridiculous silver angel costume so it wasn’t as good as I had hoped, but the costume itself was pretty awesome. Gaga’s voice was rough at points, but in general the vocals were quite good and more relaxed than in Chicago. A few of the songs were improved with the addition of the catwalk and more choreography, especially Beautiful Dirty Rich, which was weak at Lolla but better here because of a jungle gym-esque structure that Gaga and the dancers climbed around and performed much of the song on. Money Honey was also better since she was able to move around to a few different platforms and jam with the band for part of the song instead of being stationary like before. The bigger spectacle kept their weakness musically hidden, and made both performances more interesting.
I felt last night’s show was stronger due to some small and subtle improvements, most of which are usually in the regular non-festival show. The flaws from the earlier performance are still there, but they’re covered up better and now I have more faith that Gaga knows what works and what doesn’t in her catalog/performance and will adjust her future shows accordingly.
P.S. The “Little Monster Zone” VIP package is pricey ($185) but worth it if you’re a big fan. You’re pretty much guaranteed front row, and the merchandise they give you, which includes an exclusive tote bag, towel, and necklace as well as Lady Gaga sunglasses, would sell for about $80-90 judging by the ridiculous prices of other merchandise at the show.
