When she burst onto the pop scene with a catchy song and a wacky wardrobe there was much muttering about her being a one-hit wonder. The recipe was there: she was over the top, she’d released only one single (the chart-topping Poker Face) and she seemed to crave attention by doing things such as buying fish and chips in what appeared to be her underwear.
But 15 months later critics are eating their words. Lady Gaga has taken outrageousness to a whole new realm and she’s a winning package.
The 23-year-old blonde has won two Grammy Awards and three Brit Awards and released two mega-hit albums, The Fame and The Fame Monster, which have sold more than eight million copies.
Her extravagant, multi-costume-change concerts are usually sold out and her songs are on every radio station. Rumours that she’ll be performing in South Africa later this year have caused huge excitement.
The first time her parents, Joseph and Cynthia Germanotta, saw her perform live they sat her down and said they were worried about her. Perhaps it was because on stage their daughter, whom they’d christened Stefani and raised as a devout Catholic, had worn nothing but a leopard-print bikini top and bloomers with a sequined belt. Or could it have been the fact she simulated sex on stage?
She’s the girl you always have to look at, who always ups the ante when it comes to fashion. And it all started when she was in preschool, acting in a stage version of The Three Billy Goats Gruff. “I was the big billy goat and I decided to make my own horns out of tinfoil and a hanger,” she recalls.
Lady Gaga refuses to be moulded by her record label ideals even though they told her before she hit the big time that she needed to be sexier to sell records. “A girl’s got to use what she’s given and I’m not going to make a guy drool the way a Britney Spears video does,” she insists.
She has always tried to be original and believes people shouldn’t become heroes just by selling a great album or doing something quirky. “People use the word icon so carelessly. I mean, don’t just freakin’ hand it to me on a plate because I dress cool. Make me earn it!”
Lady Gaga doesn’t beat about the bush when it comes to her biggest wish. “I want to be the next 25 years of pop music.”