Sunday, February 13, 2011
Born This Way MEGAMIX
Lady Gaga's 'Born This Way': Vogue Yourself
Lady Gaga has said "Born This Way" is a new gay anthem. She's said she wrote it in "10 f------ minutes." We'll buy both of those statements: Her new single sounds like it was Frankensteined in a lab from harvested parts of other artists' gay anthems... in 10 minutes. It's overworked, overwrought, noisy, cheesy, and very, very derivative. That doesn't mean it isn't catchy -- or that it won't become Billboard's 1,000th Hot 100 Number One next week -- but it's literally a hot mess.
"Born This Way" follows the blueprint for an early '90s club hit remarkably carefully: keening strings on the first verse, a propulsive four-on-the-floor thump, layers of squelching synths, soulful vocals. We hear a bit of Kelly Rowland and David Guetta's "When Love Takes Over" in here and some melody from TLC's "Waterfalls," but mostly it's a hodge-podge of Madonna's greatest hits: the chorus from "Express Yourself," the glitter disco of "Ray of Light," the spoken-word bridge from "Vogue" -- there's even a hint of "Future Lovers" from her 2005 disc "Confessions on a Dance Floor" crammed in the last 10 seconds. Bits of the song are so reminiscent of "Express Yourself," the name of the 1989 track is currently trending on Twitter.
[Photos: See more of Gaga's wild fashions]
"Born This Way," produced by DJ White Shadow and Fernando Garibay, arrived at 6 a.m. this morning along with a pair of mysterious YouTube videos of Gaga discussing the track. " 'Born This Way' in so many ways is about the way we see the future. Right now, we're in a state of drifting. We're not so sure where we're supposed to go, or what we're supposed to replicate or imitate, so we're drifting in space towards the light. And 'Born This Way' tells us that the light is within us, and to follow yourself," Gaga says in the first YouTube clip. "Replicate"? "Imitate"? Perhaps a bad choice of words. Many of them.
Note: This "BTW" review isn't coming from a Gaga hater -- in fact, we're big fans of her past work (check out our 2009 and 2010 critics poll ballots for proof).
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Oh Gaga :-(
Friday, February 11, 2011
Monday, February 7, 2011
Friday, February 4, 2011
Rihanna Accused Of Ripping Off Famed Photographer In S&M Video -- See The Photos
Twitter has been abuzz with accusations that Rihanna has blatantly ripped-off famed photographer David LaChapelle in her much talked about music video, S&M.
The new music video, which was directed by Melina Matsoukas, premiered on February 1st, causing quite an uproar due to its highly provocative nature and has since been banned in 11 countries.
PHOTOS: Check Out A Side-By-Side Comparison And Decide For Yourselves - What Do You Think?
xtra copycat recipes....
A source within LaChapelle’s studio tells RadarOnline.com exclusively that the photographer has worked previously with the songstress, but he was definitely not involved in any way with this project.
The source says that they became aware of the similarities between the video and LaChapelle’s work when staffers who handle his fan page, Twitter, and Facebook account called them to tell them they were receiving a lot of messages regarding the video.
“Interns told us that fans were buzzing about the video and wanting to know if David had directed it,” the source told RadarOnline.com. “Then the phone in the office started ringing off the hook, everyone was like ‘wow it’s amazing – it’s the exact same.’”
The source said that they were completely unaware up to that point that the video was so heavily styled around what appears to be LaChapelle’s photography.
In a side-by-side comparison between LaChapelle's previous work and screen captures of the Matsoukas directed music video, the similarities are indisputable - with nearly identical sets, scenarios, and styling.
The source claims that Matsoukas had photographs from past Italian Vogue shoots by LaChapelle, ranging from 1995-2002 laying around the set of the music video shoot. And the evidence does appear overwhelming.
In one scene Rihanna is seen leading a man, who is crawling on his hands and knees, by a leash – a pretty much exact match to a previous LaChapelle Vogue photo.
In a bizarre twist, RadarOnline.com has learned that the man portraying a dog in Rihanna’s video is no less than celebrity blogger, Perez Hilton!
And, perhaps Perez wasn’t too pleased with the finished product, he later tweeted : “The next time you make a David LaChapelle music video you should probably hire David LaChapelle.” Ouch!
LaChapelle’s work is noted for it’s surreal, unique, sexualized, and often humorous style and has been described as grotesque, shocking and ironic.
He landed his first professional gig when Andy Warhol offered him a job as a photographer for Interview after meeting him at Studio 54 where he was working at the time.
Over the years LaChapelle has worked on all the great fashion magazines, as well as publishing four books of his works, featuring portraits of celebrities such as Courtney Love, Britney Spears, David Bowie, Whitney Houston, Pamela Anderson, Madonna and even Rihanna herself!
LaChapelle could not be reached for comment at the time this story went to print.
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