Each time Lady Gaga puts out an album, it feels like an event. Each one preserved in it’s own ecosystem, allowing us a very brief window into her world at specific moments in her life. Mayhem, her latest is no different. We have had glimpses into the world of Mayhem, but were we ready to experience it?
I love how as an artist Gaga firstly never repeats herself, but also distances each album as far away from the previous one as possible. As different as Joanne was to Chromatica, so then is Mayhem stylistically, aesthetically and musically nothing like Chromatica. This feels the most like the Gaga we were first introduced to back in the late 00’s. It’s back to what brought her to dance, so to speak.
Mayhem is bookended by singles. With the opening two tracks being lead single Disease, followed closely by recent single Abracadabra hinting at what is to come, whereas the album closes with the Bruno Mars collab Die With A Smile. What lies in between is where the real magic of this album resides.
The buzzy electro of Garden of Eden, all disco twinkle and synth stabs. It’s an instant club banger. Perfect Celebrity is the brash sibling to Paparazzi as Gaga laments on the darker side of fame. Killah sounds like Nine Inch Nails reworked Sign O’ The Times by Prince. Razor sharp riffing and Bowie posturing, as it struts around your ears. It’s simply sublime and its begging to be a single.
Zombieboy is a fun glam stomper dripping in glitter and sass. LoveDrug serves up a huge dollop of 80s pop albeit with that Gaga touch sprinkled on top. How Bad Do U Want Me is one of my favourite songs on the album. Vulnerable with a vein of inner strength running through it. It does owe a debt of gratitude to the sample it borrows from Only You by Yazoo which underpins the whole thing along.
Don’t Call Tonight is the kind of song Gaga can write in her sleep. It’s one of the weaker moments on the album. It relies on a bit too many of her more.uninspired tropes. It features a strong vocal performance but is largely forgettable otherwise.
The Beast dabbles in the kind of seductive and sombre electronics and slow pacing that made The Weeknd a star. The tracks exploration of lust through lycanthropy is the kind of mad shit that Gaga pulls off with a sincerity that makes the whole thing work when it could have easily fallen into parody.
Mayhem’s penultimate track Blade of Grass is the kind of vulnerable number that Gaga pulls out every so often and makes you remember just how great she is a songwriter. Pure widescreen pop balladry that will get cellphones lit up and tears in people’s eyes when it hits the live arena.
Mayhem is an album that works on so many different levels. It’s more restrained and focused than Chromatica, feeling like a distant cousin to The Fame Monster. This is the sound of an artist rediscovering herself and once again reinventing her sound and artistry. By looking to her past Gaga has retraced her own musical steps creating something that not only sets up an exciting future ahead, but pays homage to the incredible legacy she already forged to get here. The Queen is back…long live Lady Gaga.
9/10
Mayhem is out now via Streamline and Interscope Records. For more information on Lady Gaga head here
