Lady Gaga-Born This Way

Lady Gaga’s recent notoriety revolves more around her garish outfits than the merits of her music; this we take for granted. But on her monumentally successful debut and follow-up EP, The Fame and The Fame Monster, pop culture’s freak queen proved that her music itself was worth the attention. The records produced a whopping seven hit singles, all of which demonstrated a keen ear for infectious, irreverent pop. Unfortunately, her new release, Born This Way, fails to live up to its precursors.

Born This Way’s greatest flaw is a glaring lack of rhythmic variety. Each song melts into the next in a torrent of pounding drums and throbbing synths; it leaves the listener feeling abused and exhausted, the victim of an unrelenting, monotonous sonic assault. After more than an hour, the 4/4 bass hits, high-gloss production and rousing choruses have dissolved into little more than white noise. The Fame and The Fame Monster mercifully punctuated their dance floor obsessions with show tunes, changes in tempo and syncopation; Born This Way attempts solely to cash in on the Euro-dance stylings that have enveloped Top 40 radio, and all but abandons anything to the contrary.

Gaga has also streamlined her rhetoric—she has embraced her status as an LGBT icon and committed herself to championing self-love above all else. This would be fine in moderate doses, but its overuse becomes just as suffocating as the homogeneous production. She invokes the notion of individuality so often that when she sings, “Don’t be insecure/If your heart is pure” on “Bad Kids,” it sounds more like pandering than the admirable message it should be.

While not a total flop—“Heavy Metal Lover” and “Electric Chapel” are endearing, hypnotic fusions of rock and techno—Born This Way lacks its predecessor’s sincerity and ingenuity. Her efforts this time around are less innovative, blindly following pop trends rather than defining them. So perhaps it’s best, for now, that Gaga directs attention toward her wardrobe instead of this sub-par release.