This powerpoint looks into postmodern features

1. Postmodernism In Relation To
Lady Gaga
By Joe Chamberlain

2. The Postmodern sensibility that anything can be
considered cool in an ironic ‘I know it’s bad, but
it’s so bad it’s good’ way
Lady Gaga, is very obscure with her ideas to a point where she is like no other artist. Lady
Gaga is an entertainer, rather than just a singer. People go to see her for a show, not just to
hear her voice. She uses simple dance routines, which, on their own, would be really
boring, however, her huge sets and strange costumes make her style very interesting and
extremely popular:
Bad Romance

3. Work that is created based (entirely or in part) on
older material. This incorporates sampling and will
take you from the realms of hip hop culture
transporting you finally in today’s modern fragmented
musical landscape. You will have to listen to some of
the artists to fully appreciate them and their work
Lady Gaga uses parts of older material and has her own take on things. For example, I think that
Lady Gaga’s video ‘telephone’ uses a similar idea to Michael Jackson in the video ‘Bad’. Gwen
Stefani also uses this idea of a jail:

4. Audiences that are both niche and mainstream.
E.g.: Radio 1, 1xtra, BBC6, XFM
Due to Lady Gaga’s bizzarre sets, easy listening music and creative mind, she is immensely
popular with five grammy awards and thirteen MTV Video Music Awards. She has the most
watched video on youtube with Beyonce with an ever-increasing 135 million views.
Gaga is unable to be niche as she is so popular, however, she does dabble into other areas
of music which allow her to express her talent in other ways than pop. For example, she
sang with Tony Bennett in a ‘Swing’ type genre:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPAmDULCVrU
This still has 8 million views, but it is far more niche and specialised than the pop genre she
mainly features in.

5. The ways in which people engage and listen to
music e.g.: iPod, DAB, mobile phones, etc.
As Gaga is so popular, the ways in which you are able to engage and listen to her music is
endless. You can listen to her on the radio, on your iPod, on the TV, on your
mobile, iPad, youtube, soundcloud, iTunes, concert, in your car (Tom Parkin) and even on
your Hi-Fi.

6. The legal issues surrounding sampling. (Led Zeppelin
‘borrowed’ heavily from old bluesmen and it took
years for the songwriters to be credited and paid
royalties. The same group took a hard-line stance
initially to be sampled by hip-hop groups.)
Legal issues surrounding Gaga’s work is Copyright infringement. Copyright infringement is
the unauthorised or prohibited use of works under copyright, infringing the copyright
holder's "exclusive rights", such as the right to reproduce or perform the copyrighted
work, spread the information contained within copyrighted works, or to make derivative
works.
Other than that, people are able to remix her songs and people have live lounge covered her
songs too, such as Rolldeep:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ux2Y3jXpRH4

7. The state of the music industry incorporating any
recent developments that change how we
access/interact with music e.g.: Spotify, X
Factor, iTunes, illegal downloading, free CDs with
newspapers etc.
Although I have done nothing but talk about Lady Gaga’s popularity, it is the key issue with her
music. Her popularity is so vast that we will do anything to access her music and so companies
are ever increasing the ways to stop illegal downloading, such as newspapers giving free CDs so
that royalties can be paid to the artists. It is estimated that 95% of music downloads in today’s
society are illegally downloaded. So in order for the artists to make money, they need to make
the best of TV shows such as X Factor and to involve themselves in other activities such as
celebrity endorsement or, as Gaga did, have a private show to yourself with Paul O’Grady.