Gagapedia
Register
Advertisement
Gagapedia

On The Record with Fuse was a talk show about celebrities and their personal struggles, as well as a glimpse of what it takes to be a celebrity. Episodes include celebrities like Christina Aguilera, Rihanna, and others. The show was hosted by Toure.

November 3, 2009

Gaga talk about her writing process, her desire to be famous, her love for Andy Warhol and Madonna, humor in her music, her stance on bullying and homophobia, and more.

Lady Gaga wears an outfit by Jean Paul Gaultier, a necklace by Erickson Beamon, pumps by Saint Laurent, and sunglasses by Alpina.

Lady Gaga: On the Record with Fuse Transcription

On_The_Record_With_Fuse_2009_Full_interview

On The Record With Fuse 2009 Full interview

Lady Gaga: Society believes that when women are confident in their work that we are arrogant, or that we're bitches, and I've been perceived as maybe a bit pretentious sometimes or arrogant - but I'm not.
[Music]
Touré: Gaga
Gaga: Hi
Touré: Thanks so much for coming out
Gaga: It's nice to meet you
Touré: Nice to meet you
Gaga: How are you ?
Touré: You are On the Record with Fuse
Gaga: Yes
Touré: Tell me about your creative process. How do you come up with a song? And I love this idea that you said it's your job to have mind-blowing irresponsible condom-less sex with whatever idea you're writing about. I mean that's what an artist should strive to do
Gaga: It is but in real life you should always have sex with a condom.
Touré: Of course, of course, we're talking about hypothetical figurative
Gaga: it was a hypothetical metaphorical comment about how I like to roll around and wrestle with my music and it comes from a very deep place
Touré: but how do you come up with your songs is it pen to paper he's sitting at the piano
Gaga: it's whatever
Touré: whatever the views
Gaga: creativity for me it's like it's religious sometimes the piano and sometimes I just hear something and I write it out loud and doesn't just humming or I'm in the studio and I'm making a beat singing along it's always different when I wrote Monster I had this vision, I had this vision of the way that I have seen men for so long... monsters
Touré: Bad monsters or good monsters?
Gaga: Both, well I like monsters it monsters are bad for you I guess so that's what the record was about
Touré: why do you want to be famous?
Gaga: well Fame for me is it's not external, its internal so I've been famous for a long time and I certainly know that my destiny is to be a storyteller in the world and a liberator in the world so I guess you could say my external fame is a voice
Touré: Do you know what Strange means?
Gaga: Strange? yeah I'm talking about like
Touré: Like Grace Jones, okay yeah well Strange, yeah yeah I mean that's you that so much of who you are
Gaga: Grace Jones is a huge inspiration to me
[Music]
Gaga: the androgyny of the woman is this kind of fascinating thing that nobody
understands it wants to understand unless you're and the beautiful subculture that is my fans and also the gay community they they get it instantly, yeah and they love it
Touré: when Madonna says you have that it factor what does it do to you I mean it sounds like a heap of pressure? to be
Gaga: that's kind of like saying that Rivera can't handle the ninth inning
Touré: Yankee references from Gaga
Gaga: I love that you know what I mean but
your Mariano Rivera I'm a closer but I
guess what I'm trying to say is when Madonna says something like that I'm not the kind of woman that right that pisses out in the ninth inning I arise and I close

Touré: I mean you're a cultural phenomenon now I mean like there were tons of Gaga's for Halloween Cartman at South Park is singing Poker Face I mean, you know how does it feel when you're like you know you've exploded beyond the music business to just everybody talking about you and thinking about you well
Gaga: that's the idea I want to be a part of culture when I say I'm an artist of liberation that is where the work is, it's in culture it's in society it's with the people I don't care about what people think of me I care what they think of themselves when they come to my shows my fans aren't sitting there going oh my god I love Gaga they're going I feel so cool right now that I'm here

I love that you love Andy Warhol talk about what you love about him and how he influences you

well my favorite things he said is artists make things that people don't need and I was in Paris and I saw this painting it looked nothing like a Warhol and I started to cry I was just staring at this painting thinking why don't you look like a Warhol and he made it when he was you know like 23 and he's my age and I said I feel like that painting I feel like I have not yet defined my aesthetic so I'm just beginning now I'm in my my silkscreen period
you cry a lot lately
I cry quite, a bit yeah to be perfectly honest but I I cry a lot when I write
were you popular in high school
no no yeah were you tormented in high school

yeah oh oh you use the wrong word you know I had friends of course
yeah I think everyone it has at least
one friends but but I I was not really
understood I felt out of place I felt
like a misfit and but then when I left
school I loved that I was a misfit and I
met all kinds of people I realized I had
a whole group of new friends that I
could raise my freak flag way well yeah
tell me about the becoming well taking
the name Lady gaga
it started out kind of as a sweet loving
joke and then it became something my
friends all called me and then I used it
as a burlesque name and then I started
to incorporate my burlesque shows into
my pop performances so you know what I
just sort of became known as Gaga
that was the point in your mind and the
process in your mind you said okay Lady
Gaga is my name and I will respond to
nothing else from here so I was fun to
add to Stephanie but my mom calls me
Gaga now your Bob calls you go yeah but
it's because you know I it's like a
nickname like you know like if your dad
calls you skip but at what point do you
fully become Gaga I mean I know it's
always in you but at a certain point it
subsumes you and it becomes all of you
rather than being a part of you it
happened around five years ago but it's
it's sort of like a mantra it's kind of
you know you repeat it to yourself every
day music is my life music is my life
the famous inside of me I'm going to
make a number one record and with number
one hits
it's not yet the why you're saying a lie
over and over and over again and then
one day the lie is true do you find your
songs funny cuz just dance in particular
it's hysterical well I think that the on
the fame there was a lot of humor and
there's more humor even in the fame
monster but it's a bit more kind of
morbid right
I want your psycho your vertigo stick
want you in my rear window baby you're
sick I'm listening Hitchcock films and
giving them a sexual connotation but in
reality what I'm saying is I want I want
your horror you know I want I want your
fears whatever baggage you have I've got
it too baby give it all to me I want
your psycho
I want your ugly i want i want all the
most disgusting parts of you that you
think nobody will ever love i loved all
of those things
[Music]
I love bad romance thank you and it's
it's exciting because it's a sort of
different direction for you it's a
bigger song it's just a large you know I
want to hear it in like a gigantic Club
well I spent a lot of time in Eastern
Europe and Russia and in Germany and I
really fell in love with Industrial
gothic music it's very very niche
oriented so I thought what if I did sort
of a pop experimentation with the super
pop melodies and I wanted it to be
halfway in between my previous work and
the departure or something new and
bigger i want your ugly i want your
disease like i'm like well you know the
love is this all-encompassing whatever
you got i want it i want your ugly i
want your disease all of those things
that i'm saying it's like when when you
when you love someone so much and your
fear of losing someone is so so deep
that you i want your psycho i want your
ugly i want i want all the most
disgusting parts of you that you think
nobody will ever love i loved all of
those things each song represents a
different monster and that i feel like
i've encountered on the road so my fear
of love my fear of alcohol my fear of
sex well I want to talk about those
specifically because there's a lot of
fear of monsters within this but okay so
for you fear of sex what does that mean
um well alejandro which is one of the
songs on the album that's my fear of sex
monster and in that song I'm saying
goodbye to all my past lovers it's
symbolic of me moving on what about fear
of alcohol
um well fear of alcohol is sort of an a
mixture of two songs one and so happy I
could die and that song is happy in the
club with a bottle of red wine stars in
our eyes because we're having a good
time
yay ha so happy I could die
it's it's a fear of that happy place
that we that we get to and we're in an
addictive state I would expect you to
have a fear of fame monster in there
somewhere is there no fear of fame and
what it does to a person and how it
changes your life you know it's very
funny because I didn't intend on writing
a new album and that's really what this
is it's a rerelease that is my old
record attached to an entirely new album
and when I woke up and it was all done I
hadn't written about Fame and I didn't
write about money
I didn't write about celebrities or
paparazzi
I wrote about everything else we're
gonna talk about this but it's not
really a new album because you have the
old songs and ain't new ones right well
I guess for me it it it's just um in
conjunction with the first album it
makes it much more of a complete sense
when you come with eight songs why not
do four or five or six more and do a
proper album rather than giving us the
fame add it on with eight new songs well
it would only be maybe four more records
right you sort of meet the industry
standard of what most artists put out as
a record but the album in itself The
Fame Monster is is the yang to being of
the fame it's it's finished in the book
of Gaga which comes with the album right
you are selling locks of your hair how
much hair do you have to say well it's
not my wheel so it's parts of wigs that
you bought yeah well I you know I've
I've never really been very secretive
about wearing wigs so I guess I I didn't
know what to do with all of them so I
said I take them and tear them up and
give them to my fans cuz my fans would
love that yeah my little monsters they
love very specific things and I know
what they need why you call your fans
monsters I think it's because my show is
kind of like an exorcism we identify
with one another I see myself and my
fans and they see themselves in me
and I call them little monsters because
they're there my through my inspiration
I love poker face can't quite figure out
what are you saying when you say he
can't read my poker face well the song
was about fantasizing about women when I
was in bed with my ex-boyfriend so I
didn't really want him to know because
it bothered him and that was the
inspiration behind the song you talked
about that you you gonna have sex with
women but you won't love women no no
okay
testing my word tell me I have love all
women I love so many women in my life
I've been physical only physically I've
never been in love with a woman so in a
romantic way okay so I mean that's what
I meant but I just wonder why you
haven't been in love with the female
heart in that romantic way I don't know
I but I certainly have beautiful
relationships with women that I've been
very close with I don't know if that
even I can say I've ever been in love
with a man
really yeah but you consider yourself by
right yeah I do
I mean and you said that you that's
letting that be known you regret because
you said you are it seems to some that
you're using the gay community to seem
edgy which doesn't that's not true okay
tell me I don't think that's true
I think the gay community knows where I
stand I mean it does make you seem edgy
but it's not a thing that you're using
it's who you are that's why I don't
really talk about it very much because
then it becomes a thing a thing yeah
that's why I'd say let's talk about the
music but I am honest about it so that
I'm clear when I hear one of the most
famous rappers in the world say
something homophobic on the radio I want
people to yell at him
[Music]
the gay rights rally in DC it's really
powerful moment for you it was a really
important moment for you why was it so
important because this country is not
fully equal the stigmas around the gay
community are so wrong so misinformed
and so incorrect and I choose really
felt honored to be asked to not only
perform but to speak the gay community
doesn't yet have full equality in
America but we're on our way you made a
big deal about it at the gay rights
rally that you wouldn't stand for the
behavior in the music business are you
talking about things that artists do
we're talking about things behind the
scenes as well I'm just talking about
everything I think that some saying you
know to feel about artists that are
politically involved or have very strong
you know religious beliefs just shut up
and sing but I'm not speaking about
something that I don't know about what
I'm speaking about something that I know
so much about and I I feel very strongly
about it and I took a stand and I mean
it do you even understand why some
people or see so many people think
homosexuality is immoral think that gay
rights are not civil rights and
everybody doesn't deserve equal rights
and these sort of things well of course
I'm I'm not ignorant to the way that
everyone has their own opinions about
politics and religion I feel even just
in the music industry that there's very
public misogynistic and homophobic
behavior when I hear one of the most
famous rappers in the world say
something homophobic on the radio I want
people to yell at him who are you
talking about I don't have to say him
because they know who they are but
there's a lot of homophobia in hip-hop
so are you like just disappointed in
that within hip-hop it's not just
hip-hop that's everywhere but hip-hop is
strong on its homophobia it's wrong it's
very wrong I'm not trying to create and
generate more hatred in the world for
example I don't want to
and then all of a sudden all these fans
get angry and I hate that person
I just want to generate awareness it's
always wrong to hate but it's never
wrong to love
I mean that's very Gandhi it's very dr.
King and that's powerful but you know
you also need the Malcolm X in the Black
Panthers I mean gay people are getting
beat up in the street and people just
watch So Min at some level there needs
to be that act up that sort of stronger
part of the movement that says you know
what you're wrong
maybe that's your opinion but I don't
believe in any hatred any warlike
behavior
I believe in commitment and love and
positivity so that might be at your
opinion but I I'll stay with Gandhi
I'll stay with Gandhi and Martin some of
the why some of the button-pushing
things you do I love the paparazzi video
and I can see where if some people are
like kind of throw it off because you're
you know in the wheelchair and you're
paralyzed through most of the video and
why did you decide to go that route well
I'm I'm excited I push your buttons
but the song to me at the beginning and
then the video and the live performances
and the appearances those are layers of
more expression in which I can grow and
change what the song is about endlessly
and that video I wanted to talk about
the death of the celebrity and do they
do we kill them or do they kill
themselves so it was meant to be a pop
cultural commentary
there's glamorous women dying all over
the house it was meant to be serious and
the bleeding at the VMAs what were you
were you saying there I had this vision
of monsters blood you know devil
monsters demons thought about Christ
I think I thought in a performance-art
commentary kind of way if I show the
media what my demise and my death looks
like as the artist Lady Gaga that
they'll stop looking for it so yeah an
incredible night for all around you're
about to go on tour at that point the
fame kills with Kanye and you're there
and he goes on stage with Taylor Swift
and embarrasses himself and you're about
to go on tour with this band what are
you thinking about what you learned
about what he did if it I sort of
thought oh oh geez honestly to be
totally honest I wasn't thinking about
the tour at all Connie's my friend right
so I was just thinking about him and
Taylor and you know Beyonce and that was
it and it's just one of those things
there's kind of this freak moment but it
happened tell me something that we're
gonna get from this Monster Ball tour
because I know you are cooking up ideas
things you've never seen before I know
when it's the Gaga show you're gonna go
there there's certainly something very
magical that happens when the whole
house of Gaga can be together there's a
theme of evolution and change so I begin
as a cell and I grow throughout the show
tremendously innovative choreography
insane fashion installations we're doing
things that I've never been done before
and I'm playing all music from the fame
and all the music from The Fame Monster
and I've been telling my fans it's a
giant post-apocalyptic house party
post-apocalyptic house party I like that
well like I say associate the apocalypse
with monsters so in 10 years were you
gonna be right here with you talking
about another record field so thank you
thank you

May 9, 2011

The interview was recorded on Monday, May 9, 2011 and was premieried on Tuesday, May 17, 2011. On January 27, 2017 Fuse's official YouTube channel published lost tapes from "Lady Gaga: On The Record with Fuse" interview in two parts Lady Gaga: Born This Way (Part 1) and Lady Gaga: Born This Way (Part 2). In this never before seen footage Lady Gaga riffing with the host of On the Record with Fuse show Touré on everything from her parents, her sense of fashion, her political stance on the gay movement, and dance music in the United States.

Lady Gaga wears a catsuit and heels by Mugler, and sunglasses by Cartier.
  • Photos by Jason Miller

Lady Gaga: Born This Way (Part 1) Transcription

Lady_Gaga-_Born_This_Way_(Part_1)_-_On_The_Record_-_Fuse

Lady Gaga- Born This Way (Part 1) - On The Record - Fuse

Touré: Your bones are popping out today.
Lady Gaga: I'm very excited to see you...
Touré: [Laughing]
[Intro]
Lady Gaga: It is an evolution. No arrow can pierce me. I'm a pianist, a musician first and foremost. Worship yourself. Well I'm obsessed with pop culture. The show must go on.
[Intro ended]
Touré: You're on the record with Fuse.
Lady Gaga: It's so nice to be back. I love Fuse so much. Thanks for having me.
Touré: Thank you. We're happy to have you. If there's a mood board for Born This Way, for the whole album, what would be on the board?
Lady Gaga: Well musically it is a mixture of very, uh, dark and heavy sledgehammering beats. I really have becoming quite strong and very aggressive and fearless and brave and that is reflected in the music. I was so inspired by stadium rock. So these songs are very epic. Uh.. but the subject matters are quite joyful, like my previous work shares sort of this ying and yang of dark and light which is very much my personality in tandem with the album cover, half motorcycle half on the ride and half uh woman living halfway between reality and fantasy at all times. I'd like to almost describe the album as uh fantasy technorock.
Touré: Yeah it's very techno, very Eastern European, very dancy, club, high energy...
Lady Gaga: Thank you
Touré: That's what excites you right now.
Lady Gaga: Yes it's, it's what I'm inspired to make and I'm just very drawn towards really strong metaphors like "Judas" or "Hair", one of the songs on the album I write about how, when I was young, I used to get yelled at by my parents to go back upstairs and change and "You can't go out wearing that" and how my hair and my identity was all the glory that I had as a young person and going out with my friends was the only time I felt like I could truly express myself.
Touré: What about "Government Hooker?"
Lady Gaga: Oh I love that song. We started out with this very French, dark hip hop beat. So we made it really really fast and it took on this completely new energy. And I've been sonically really wanting to push from four on the floor. It's uh a little bit of a different approach than I've taken in the past. There's a voice in the background, uh, when I'm singing "As long as I'm your hooker" and then the government says "Back up and turn around." How much are you willing to be a puppet and a hooker? And how much more do you want to fight for what you believe in.
Touré: You're so much about liberation now and giving self esteem and giving people freedom and the comfort to do what you wanna do. Just let your freak flag fly and you're talking about that in "Born This Way." You know, "God makes no mistakes" I mean what a great line that is like "be whoever you wanna be!"
Lady Gaga: I think that's a really powerful lyric but what's nice about that statement is it sort of annihilates any judgment, annihilates any prejudice right off the bat and, and um ultimately puts hope in something that is much greater and I define, you define, beauty for yourself. The public does not define it for you. Uh society doesn't define your beauty. Your spirit and your faith defines your beauty.
Touré: The title "Born This Way" makes me immediately think about gay ideology. It's not a choice that you make but this is just who you are. So, you know, how are you judging me, right? That's what you're touching on?
Lady Gaga: That's certainly part of it. Social justice is one of the most paramount things I think about everyday on a daily basis. And thinking about now that I have this voice what is it that I want to say. "Born This Way", yes it addresses those issues. I do believe that the LGBT community was born this way.
Touré: Yeah.
Lady Gaga: I don't believe it is a choice. I don't believe that uh those in that community should be treated as less valuable by the government or by religion. These are absolute issues that I attack with "Born This Way" on that particular song and on some of the other songs on the record. But more importantly what I would like to sort of challenge everyone to think about with a song like "Born This Way" is it's not just about the gay community. It's about everyone.
Touré: Right of course.
Lady Gaga: And we don't have to create divisiveness when it comes to social justice. Let's all be together. Let's fight on equally. Equality cannot be reached if it's fought for in a divisive way. That is what "Born This Way" is all about.
Touré: When you go to the Monster's Ball and it's like a motivational sort of speech, I wonder are there things that happened to you as a kid that made you feel like "I wanna stand up for the person who I felt like?"
Lady Gaga: Well I certainly wasn't part of the in crowd and I had you know, my group of friends, but I got bullied and I got made fun of. I remember going to gym class one day and there was all kinds of profanity written all over my gym locker.
Touré: Mmm
Lady Gaga: Just mine. And it just said the most horrendous awful things. Ranging from, uh, sexual orientation to race, to religion to, uh, social status. And it sticks with you. And it hurt. And I went home and I cried and I didn't want to go to school and I felt like, in some way, I was less valuable. And those stories and those memories that haunt me are what propel me into my relationship with my fans now. But the album is also really fun. You know..
Touré: It is, it is.. it is.
Lady Gaga: I don't want to harp on the seriousness of the record too much. Because I do want people to know that liberation through fun and through togetherness and through celebration of life is also part of what the record is about.
Touré: The fun part of the record. The upbeat, glorious part of the record, like, they played me "Edge of Glory" and they said, Gaga watched her grandfather and her grandmother together, right? And your grandfather's last moments. And they're holding hands and then he passed away. And it's this very upbeat,--
Lady Gaga: Yeah.
Tiure: --joyous song.
Lady Gaga: Celebration!
Touré: Yeah! And I expected a ballad to come out of that.
Lady Gaga: I actually wrote part of the song before we got there knowing he was going to pass and then I finished the lyrics and finished the melodies after experiencing that moment. And--
Touré: But why did you create a happy, upbeat song?
Lady Gaga: Because his life was glorious!
Touré: Yeah.
Lady Gaga: And because life is glorious and when I saw my grandpa pass with my grandmother what I saw was him looking into her eyes and saying "I won. I'm a champion at life. You and I kicked life's ass." the second verse is "Another shot before we kiss the other side tonight, I'm on the edge of something final we call life tonight." I believe that right before you kiss the other side your life, not necessarily flashes before you, but rather honors you. And tips its hat and says "You did a good job." So "The Edge of Glory" is about rejoicing and living every moment as if it's your last.
Touré: I see this sonic arch in what you've done in terms of The Fame was sort of American Pop records. And then you did "Bad Romance" and it seems the like road that you're on now with these Eastern European, big, techno-y records, sounds like it's coming out of what you started with "Bad Romance." Was that a sort of Seminole or breakthrough record for you?
Lady Gaga: There was a lot of um sort of eyebrow raising when we put that record out because it was so different from what I had done on The Fame. But what was wonderful was once the fight was over and once we pushed forth, "Bad Romance" became the biggest song of my career. The album did grow out of The Fame Monster and ultimately I wanted to create an album that I knew, when it was played live, it would be something that would contribute and enhance the religious pop cultural experience of the Monster Ball which is my home.
Touré: [Laughing] Well you definitely create a sense of people wanting to worship you in terms of giving them a complete pop star...
Lady Gaga: But I want them to worship themselves. What I hope everyone sees as different about me. Is I would rather that you are inspired by my ability to transform and liberate myself through pop culture and through music and then in turn liberate yourself.
Touré: I see that. I've been to the Monsters ball and I do see you saying "Don't worship me, but worship you. You can do it. You can be the person you wanna be." And at the same time, half the crowd is looking exactly like you in one of your videos. So they are worshipping you at the same time you're telling them "Be you. Do whatever you wanna do."
Lady Gaga: Well that's also part of the fun of the show.
Touré: Yeah, yeah.
Lady Gaga: And the whimsical nature of the Monster Ball is it's not really a concert. It's much more of a cultural experience and a party and it's a conversation back and forth and that is where my music grows from. Having this intense beautiful relationship with them and then saying "I have to take it a step further." I have to be a warrior for pop music. I have to be willing to take arrows, willing to take a beating, willing to take bullets and know, please know as my fans that my heart will always keep beating. No arrow can pierce me.
Touré: Old saying that uh, you have your whole life to make your first record. Nobody's waiting for The Fame. You're making Born This Way, the whole world is waiting to see what you're gonna do so talk about the difference between making sort of an album when you're under a microscope and the world's waiting for the record as opposed to, you know, when you're kind of making it in peace.
Lady Gaga: In peace?? Listen...
Touré: [Laughs]
Lady Gaga: I was never making anything in peace and first of all, there's no difference. I'm still an artist. I'm still making music. And I don't create based on reaction.
Touré: Mmhmm
Lady Gaga: My relationship with my fans is not reactionary. That is something that is symbiotic at the same time it's completely organic and uh we move like a amoeba across the pastures of culture. In peace...
Touré: [Laughs]
Lady Gaga: If you think I wrote The Fame in peace you have a strong misconception about what I have been through to get to where I am today. The fight, being dropped by record labels, being told I was too strange, being told that the music was too dance. The fight that I have been though is not in peace and I wrote record after record after record until finally "Just Dance" occurred. And then, it wasn't in peace. I had to fight for a year tooth and nail blood sweat and leather every night. No sleep. Bus. Club. 'nother club. 'nother club. Plane. Next place. No sleep. No fear. Nobody believed in me. That album was not made in peace. That album was made with the eye of the tiger and so was this one. There's not gonna be some transformation in me that will assimilate to Hollywood and I will suddenly push my tits up in a bra...
Touré: Right, right..
Lady Gaga: And put on mascara..
Touré: Okay.
Lady Gaga: And put out my second record. The good news is I am very hard on myself. [Laughs] And I'm always pushing myself to move forward and I'm very excited and happy and feel blessed that everyone's waiting to hear "Born This Way" and I want to make people rejoice and celebrate who they are as much as I can. The album is identity as religion. Pop culture as religion. Worship yourself.
Touré: How do you write a song?
Lady Gaga: I have a memory bank in my Gaga robot and they open up my back and then they press "Write Song."
Touré: [Laughs]
Lady Gaga: I write music all the time. Uh sometimes when I'm falling asleep I hear melodies or I think of an idea or I'll see an image or something very graphic for a performance and I get inspired. And other times I just sit at the piano and play. I have these sort of 15 minute, uh, moments where I'll just vomit all these ideas and melodies and beats and then after that 15 minutes is over I have to honor that regurgitation for the next 6 months.
Touré: Yeah what is that 'honor your vomit mean?
Lady Gaga: When you regurgitate all that creativity and you regurgitate all of those ideas and you vomit all of the most personal and vulnerable things about yourself, when it's over, uh, don't be afraid. Honor what you've done. And just fine tune it and make it better. So you have to honor your creativity.Because the minute you don't honor your creativity it will tell you to fuck off.
Touré: [Laughing]
Lady Gaga: And it won't come to dinner anymore.
Touré: [Laughing] What is the percentage of songs that you write that you use versus songs that you end up not using?
Lady Gaga: Most of the songs that I wrote are on the album or on the the special edition of the record.
Touré: But that's 20 songs, right? On the special edition?
Lady Gaga: Yes but it has about 5 remixes.
Touré: But you write everyday. So...
Lady Gaga: There were maybe a few songs that didn't make it. If I don't feel like it's moving in the way that I want it to move I just abort mission.
Touré: [Laughing] In two years of touring and your life changing so much from being this person that has to fight to get heard to a person who the whole world is coming to you and saying they we want to hear everything you have to say. And--
Lady Gaga: But I still have to fight to be heard, just because people are listening, doesn't mean they understand...
Touré: Of course.
Lady Gaga: What it is that you're saying. My dad always says to me his favorite thing about my work is that, I say something. And if you don't understand what I've said, I say it again. And if the second time you didn't quite get it I do it again. And I do it in a different way. And I say it over, and over, and over until suddenly everyone gets it. And I remember the first couple of nights of the Monster Ball there was a whole lotta... This going on.
Touré: [Laughing]
Lady Gaga: In the audience! But it's about perseverance. And it's about surging forward and then here we are two years later, over 210 sold out shows.
Touré: Wow.
Lady Gaga: That's why I always tell my fans "Don't give up on who you are. Don't ever stop" because I feel that way everyday.
Touré: You are being yourself here. Right? But at the same time Gaga is a creation. It's something that you...
Lady Gaga: I am self created.
Touré: Yes absolutely. It's just an interesting contrast to me to, when you say "Born This Way", right? You were not born this way. You self-created Gaga and then you come out with "Born This Way" and I'm kinda like, ok, but you're not actually, right?
Lady Gaga: In the literal interpretation of "Born This Way", any artistic expression would sort of not stand a chance when it comes to your identity. Something as simple as makeup on a lady. You could say "you weren't born this way." In the "Born This Way" video uh an in my expressions with fashion and technology uh the vessel on the Grammys rebirth. I am challenging, in my own way, your idea of what it means to be born this way. Your idea of what it means to be born is birth...finite? Or is it infinite?
Touré: Mmmhmm.
Lady Gaga: Does it happen once or does it happen over and over again throughout your life and do you have control over it? Can you be reborn? I believe that you can be reborn over and over again.
Touré: Cause some of your other videos through multiple viewings seem to unlock themselves much more. And that one I'm sort of like "What is she saying?"
Lady Gaga: [Laughing] I-- Yes, I do think that video went over some people's heads. It is about birth being something that is continuous. It is about creating a fantasy, a surrealist painting. The video was inspired by Salvador Dolly and Francis Bacon and metal. [Laughing]
Touré: Mmhmm. And Fritz Lang?
Lady Gaga: Uh, there was a bit of Fritz Lang. And in the video I give birth to my fans. The new race. All different colors, all different beliefs, all different backgrounds. But the race bears no prejudice and only boundless freedom. But then I say that on this same day that goodness was created. Evil also came into the world. And how do you protect good without evil?
Touré: If you fans are the good, who is the evil?
Lady Gaga: Well it's not necessarily just about the fans. It's about everyone. The fans are my symbol of the potential of secular thinking and the future. Because my fans are so secular in the way that they think and are so open and are so free and so accepting. The evil is those that close doors. And the good is those that open them. With this album I would like to help open the doors.
Touré: Mmhmm.
Lady Gaga: And not close them.
Lady Gaga: Thank you sweetheart,--
Lady Gaga: Thank you.
Touré: --it's lovely to see you again.
Lady Gaga: Thank you so much.


Lady Gaga: Born This Way (Part 2) Transcription

Lady_Gaga-_Born_This_Way_(Part_2)_-_On_The_Record_-_Fuse

Lady Gaga- Born This Way (Part 2) - On The Record - Fuse

Lady Gaga: There was no mistake, there was no accident, it was just destiny.
[Intro]
Lady Gaga: I am self created. Don't give up on who you are. Your spirit and your faith defines your beauty. Everyone has to come together. We can change the world.
[Intro ended]
Touré: Gaga, you're still on the record with Fuse you ready for part two?
Lady Gaga: I just need another cup of tea. Yes, I'm ready.
Touré: [Laughing] Gaga, when you get up in the morning do you feel insecure and not fully superstar Gaga? And you sort of have to kick yourself in the butt and say "you're a superstar, get out there and be the star that you know you can be, you have to turn the swag on..."
Lady Gaga: No, most mornings I feel wonderful, I feel great I'm so happy. I feel so blessed, I feel more confident and fearless than I've ever felt before. And some mornings, just like everybody I wake up to get on my boxing gloves and sock myself in the face and say "bitch let's get to work it's time to go...
Touré: [Laughing]
Lady Gaga: They're waiting for you, the show must go on."
Touré: Cause sometimes you feel like the loser you said you felt like in high school, right?
Lady Gaga: You know, those wounds never go away, they're buried deep you don't see those scars anymore maybe they're just really small and you put...use certain cream on them to make them fade. But sometimes they resurface just like with anything in your life that haunts you. That's really what "Judas" is about, releasing the things that haunt you, releasing the things that you regret. "Judas" is about saying "If I never went through that, I wouldn't be where I am now.." The idea that Judas was the ultimate betrayer. But in fact if that would never have occurred...
Touré: You wouldn't have Jesus.
Lady Gaga: The ultimate prophecy of life would not have been fulfilled.
Touré: Right.
Lady Gaga: So it's a metaphor for struggle and perseverance.
Touré: Tell me about the "Judas" video.
Lady Gaga: Uh, I directed it with Laurie Ann Gibson, a long time collaborator and very close friend of mine. She's a choreographer as well, amazing. And what I wanted to say with this video, similarly to how I've pushed my music in the past, layering an additional metaphor on top of any metaphors maybe already existing within the music. We talked about the statement "If they were not who they are taught to be, would you still believe?" So in the video it is inspired by this sort of hybrid of motorcycle Fellini. I am Mary Magdalene riding and searching down the highway with the apostles on motorcycles and their leather jackets read Thomas, John, Bartholomew, Thaddeus, Peter, Judas. And as we're searching down the highway we go to meet Jesus and we go to a bar and we preach to the town people and we walk through a street and we hold hands with all of the unique followers in the village. But it's modern day Jerusalem. So everything about the video feels like it could be today. I wanted to create the feeling that if they were here now, which you watch the video, you want them to be here. I really want the apostles to be real. I want it all to be real.
Touré: Why?
Lady Gaga: It's so powerful and inspirational and they're revolutionaries and they're badass and they're preaching about love. And it's not about Christianity and it's not about Catholicism and it's not about religion it's just about identity. It's about saying "We can change the world" all you gotta do is speak your mind, all you gotta do is be together and fight forward. And in the video there is a moment between myself and Jesus and Judas and it is the moment of the infamous Judas kiss and the reenactment of this kiss is almost as if we were all in on it the whole time. There was no mistake, there was no accident it was just destiny. You have to walk through all the fire in order to reach the clearance.
Touré: Right, surely Jesus knew what would happen. I gotta say that I've never met anybody your age who seems as knowledgeable about high art as you are. You talk about Fellini and Bacon and Warhol and Dali and these are just normal things that are part of, ya know, the Gaga robot and I mean it's pretty extraordinary that you have educated yourself about the people who came before you and decades and decades before you in this short of time.
Lady Gaga: Well, I'm obsessed with pop culture...
Touré: But, we're not talking about pop culture. We're talking about Fellini and Francis Bacon and Andy Warhol...
Lady Gaga: Well they're not modern pop culture but there was a time when they were the most heralded artists. And Warhol, although appreciated more after his time, was the king of pop art.
Touré: Yeah.
Lady Gaga: He is, pop art. And it's interesting to me, as I'm attempting to push the boundaries of mainstream pop music and commercial pop music, that "Warholian" concepts like the ones that I've used in the "Telephone" video...
Touré: Your whole life is Warholian...
Lady Gaga: Well the Haus of Gaga is in essence my "Factory".
Touré: [Simultaneously with Lady Gaga] "Factory".
Lady Gaga: But, with the "Judas" video it's very Warholian to us iconography to make a statement about pop culture.
Touré: Sure.
Lady Gaga: But what's interesting is that he did it so long ago and for some reason everyone still gets so pissed off. [Laughing] And you'd think that 30 years later everyone would have settled down and realized that it's whimsical and fun and important and that it changes lives.
Touré: Can you describe your fashion aesthetic? Like what is Gaga's style?
Lady Gaga: It changes all the time. But right now, it's avant garde, high street fashion.
Touré: I mean I see you with, you know, big shoulders, big shoes. It's very graphic. It' seems to become more sheer as time has gone on. Versus, I think, two years ago. More likely to be in nude colors.
Lady Gaga: I guess I've changed. I've been wearing a lot of black. I really like wearing black. I dunno I think of it very differently. I, I, I view it as sort of expression in my music. So the album is avant garde, pop music with a sort of high art street sensibility and so that's what my fashion sense is now.
Touré: I think that one thing that people didn't understand, when you were emerging as a super mega icon, is that you understand that fashion is not just below the chin. It's also the hat and sometimes they'd obscure your face and sometimes they wouldn't. And the super high fashion people understood like "She understands fashion goes head to toe."
Lady Gaga: It's part of who I am. It's part of my blood and my bones.
Touré: But the hats, ya know, and even when they cover your face you're like "that's part of the whole thing."
Lady Gaga: Well, part of what "Born This Way" is all about and the cover, the "moto-centar".
Touré: [Laughing]
Lady Gaga: And that cover represents so much to me...
Touré: Is it a Harley that you are?
Lady Gaga: Yes, it's an easy rider. I am half fantasy and half reality.
Touré: Mmmhmm.
Lady Gaga: And I am endless in my ability to transform.
Touré: Mmmhmm.
Lady Gaga: And I am also always in a constant state of journey and I am married to the process. I'm not riding anywhere. You don't see the bike going...
Touré: It's not in motion...
Lady Gaga: Away from or towards anything.
Touré: It's not on a road.
Lady Gaga: It's not on a road it's in space, it's in blackness, emptiness. For me the motorcycle represents the ride. Me as the bike represents me as a woman on the run, a woman on a ride. And-- and-- A never ending rid in space, in time. That ultimately propels me further and further towards my artistry and in that way when you take a step back and you look at it it's sort of, I am the sculpture, I am the art piece I am an expression of my artistic ideas.
Touré: Mmhmm. Why is you name not on the cover?
Lady Gaga: For no particular reason. It is on the Special Edition cover. When I put my first album out The Fame we put the title really small on my glasses and put my name really big because we wanted everyone to know who I was.
Touré: Now, you don't have to put your name.
Lady Gaga: No, it's just that now I would like the message to precede the icon, the ego. It's not about Lady Gaga anymore. It's about my fans. I wanted "Born This Way" to be the thing that was highlighted and I would like my name to be synonymous with those words.
Touré: Take me to you drinking with your parents in a bar that you guys have been going to for years and your sister is there. You know, when the old family unit comes together you kinda snap back into those old family roles that you had when you were teenager. Are you still Gaga or do you go back to Stefani?
Lady Gaga: Well, I'm both. You know there's no separation between Lady Gaga and Stefani. It's just that I changed my name.
Touré: But you are different than...
Lady Gaga: Oh I'm so different now. But, if you were to ask my parents or ask my sister they would tell you that I am more myself now and happier than I've ever been in my life. It took me a long time to figure out who it was that I wanted to be and what I wanted to say and what I wanted to do. But I've committed so strongly to it and ultimately it was that very thing that made all my dreams come true. So I'm the same way with my family that I am with you now and they love me for who I am.
Touré: Well that's clear. I met your mom she's so proud of you and she's clearly so supportive...
Lady Gaga: We look exactly alike it's so funny. I try to hide her because ya know, I wanna keep my family so sacred. But, she looks just like me so once she's in the room the jig is up.
Touré: As soon as she walked in, she's got blonde hair, she's got your...you have her face...
Lady Gaga: The nose! It's all about the nose. We share the nose...
Touré: You fought so hard as part of the Don't Ask Don't Tell repeal movement. And it has quote unquote been
"repealed" although,--
Lady Gaga: Hasn't--
Touré: --slowly.
Lady Gaga: Yeah, it hasn't been signed off on yet.
Touré: Right, so the fight is not over although a certain battle has been won. Are you happy with where we are as a government, as a nation in that or is there more to be fought on that issue?
Lady Gaga: I am hopeful that it's moving forward. I'm hopeful that we won that innitial sort of fight. I'm gonna continue to fight with the world and with my generation, the battle for full equality.
Touré: I thought it was so powerful of you to show up to a major awards show with a slew of gay soldiers who have been wrongly dismissed. And is-- so much of what you're saying, it's not an ego gesture it's about promoting the cause that means so much to you.
Lady Gaga: The meat dress was a cultural shit storm, right? And everybody was "What's wrong with her, it's weird" or whatever they felt about it. But those who paid attention to what I was doing from a political side, the political activism, the cultural activism, the social activism, the name of my speech when I spoke in Maine was "The Prime Rib of America". And what I said in that speech is that "equality is the prime rib of the Constitution. Equality is the greatest cut of meat that our country has to offer." And I wore the meat dress with the soldiers as a statement about our cry for wanting them to have the greatest cut of meat that the world has to offer. For wanting all soldiers and all people to be valued as equal and to open the door not to shut the door.
Touré: I don't think people got that. Those of you who saw you with the soldiers found that powerful. I think most missed the meat dress. Does it dismay you when you make a statement like the meat dress and so many people seem to miss the point?
Lady Gaga: No, at some point it will all come together.
Touré: 'Cause the meat dress is one of your big moments where people were like "Oh My God".
Lady Gaga: [Chuckles]
Touré: Zone in, love it, don't understand it.
Lady Gaga: All of my favorite artists were not appreciated until they were dead. So, maybe some of my greatest artistic statements won't be acknowledged until I'm... ...Dead.
[Lady Gaga and Touré laugh]
Touré: So is the next fight for you Gay marriage?
Lady Gaga: That is one of the fights that I will be, uh, certainly doing everything I can to mobilize my fan base and the generation that I am a part of. But just full equality in general and social justice. Fighting the battle against bullying, fighting the battle against schools and, and education not valuing every student and every kind of young person. These are all sorts of the things that I'm interested in but, I do also feel that the album addresses these issues in an over arching celebratory way.
Touré: There's very few people who've ever gotten to the level of fame that you're already at and you're only going up higher and higher as you go along. And some of the other people have talked about that it becomes very difficult to trust people when you're that super famous. Are you getting to that point of like "I can't trust people anymore it's changed"?
Lady Gaga: You know you can't live your life that way. You can't live in fear but it's important to be protective of the things that are important to you no matter what. I don't think trust is any different for me than it is for anybody else.
Touré: But people who are around you, who come to you can get from you or might wanna get from you, be it financial or the ability to say "I was with Gaga, I met Gaga, I know Gaga" is far greater than any normal person.
Lady Gaga: You know what, I'm from New York City and I fought from the bottom all the way to the top and I'm a pretty "no shit bitch" when it comes to that stuff. And it's really hard to pull the wool over my eyes. So no, I'm not worried about that.
Touré: What're you listening to that's not Gaga music?
Lady Gaga: I listen to a lot of Edith Piaf a lot lately and Iron Maiden.
Touré: And that is that is the dichotomy of you right?
Lady Gaga: Well you'll hear both those influences in the album in different ways.
Touré: Yeah.
Lady Gaga: Edith Piaf has always been a vocal inspiration for me. And Maiden I think it's the theatrics of the show, their commitment to their sound, their commitment to their fans. The epic nature of what they create. I went to an Iron Maiden show last week and it changed my life... changed my life!
Touré: How?
Lady Gaga: Because their fans were just so rad and they were just fist pumping in the air and singing every word to every song and you know...Iron Maiden isn't number one on the charts right now and it doesn't matter. They're...
Touré: They love it.
Lady Gaga: They're a culture, it's, it's so much bigger than the industry. Iron Maiden is... is a religion.
Touré: As, Lady Gaga is...
Lady Gaga: Well...you said that not me.
Touré: [Laughing] So you finished "Born This Way" you working on the next one yet?
Lady Gaga: I've already started thinking about it. I fear my brain may explode onto the floor if we start talking about it [Laughing]
Touré: You have anything going? Any songs or any...
Lady Gaga: Not that I would ever tell you about!
Touré: [Laughing] It's just me, it's just us talking here...
Lady Gaga: Yeah, right and 50 fucking cameras
Touré: Tell us a little bit about the "Born This Way" tour. Which I know you've already conceived...
Lady Gaga: Um, it's not entirely conceived. But I do know that I want it to be a ball like what we have done before but I wanna continue the extension of the Monster Ball. So I think it's going to be something called along the lines of "The Born This Way Ball: The Third Monster Ball" So the evolution of the Monster Ball will continue on forever and it will be more like a endless running musical and then a tour.
Touré: Mmhmm, mmhmm, mmhmm. Wow. Anything else you want to talk about?
Lady Gaga: No, I just am very grateful to Fuse for having me and thank you for believing in me so much.

Advertisement