Lady Gaga - Joanne

Lady Gaga
Joanne
2016
Spotify

Lady Gaga's impact as of late has been far less about the music and more about being a cultural icon. Fashion, TV and any other medium she can find and dabble in have been the center of her life. 2013's ARTPOP was an fine album but was missing any of the real inspiration that her previous albums did. It was overblown, full of itself and incredibly narcissistic exactly what the Gaga faithful were in to but a real miss for the casual listener. Three years on and we arrive at Joanne which might as well be called "An Homage to Bowie". On this album she tackles glam rock, soft rock, dance... I could go on and on and on because there is such little focus on this record it is maddening. Each new track seems like it's own little art piece and its own genre. "Dancin' In Circles" is half dancehall, half ballad, half sex romp and who knows what else. Joanne feels very much like an experiment, but one without a point, just grasping at straws and hoping you can snag one. The acoustic guitar ballads like "Million Reasons" "Joanne" are somewhat sweet, but they also have this slight twinge of anger that keep you from truly enjoying them. Even the "Little Monsters" might be confused at just how scattershot this record is missing almost any semblance of the dance heavy tracks that made her famous in the first place.

The writers list reads like a who's who of indie rock (Josh Homme, Tame Impala, Father John Misty, Beck) and while you can sense their presence in the music the lyrics and her style really muck everything up. "Sinner's Prayer" which let's be honest is a fucking Country song, is so incredibly lame that it will neither delight Gaga or Country fans. She sings with a ton of power on these tracks, but that makes it all the more odd when she is singing over really demure music. In case you thought doo wop wouldn't make an appearance never fear because "Come To Mama" is more than a little Leon Bridges rip off. Because she is so unfocused on this record you really get no sense of the point. Is she being true to herself? Is she trying to show us something new? It is anyone's guess, and I have a suspicion Gaga doesn't really know either. The one reprieve we get is Florence Welch's vocals on "Hey Girl", but the song co-written by Mark Ronson seems like an attempt to sound like Tame Impala that just falls flat. Clearly there was less care put into this album than her acting, performances at the Oscars or friendship with Tony Bennett and it really shows. You can't show up and just expect something great, and with Joanne there really is nothing great. At all.

2.0 out of 10