Lady Gaga
Chromatica

Talking about a pop star like Lady Gaga is an endeavor comparable to a double-edged sword: on one hand, there's the risk of falling into exaltation and idolatry, and on the other, of excessively diminishing her skills, reverting to the usual contrast between “underground” and “mainstream”. Staying objective, we could say that after her debut The Fame, propelled by the singles “Paparazzi” and “Poker Face” (not forgetting the excellent reissue The Fame Monster, enriched with unreleased tracks and some remixes), miss Germanotta's career proceeded without particular highlights, among not entirely successful albums and a parallel life as an actress, culminating in the success of “Shallow”, a song included in the soundtrack of A Star Is Born and even awarded with an Oscar.

This quick recap highlights one of Gaga's qualities, namely her ability to reinvent herself from an aesthetic and musical standpoint, a choice that, coincidentally, can cause new clashes between admirers (who appreciate her chameleonic tendencies) and detractors (who see it all as an attempt to mask the lack of a true artistic personality). As often happens, the truth lies in the middle: over these years, the New York singer, while continually renewing herself, seems to have lost the freshness of her debut, and the various musical releases have built a mask (yet another, as some would say) that has overshadowed her talent and distanced her from an image, if not true, at least more candid and genuine.

It is therefore time to rediscover oneself, and what better way than entrusting this healing process to music? Having recruited the usual troop of producers (among whom Skrillex and the trusted BloodPop stand out), Gaga's objective is to return to the origins, attempting to recover the sounds of The Fame and somehow update them to the present. Thus the early electro-pop merges with the dance and house of the 90s, while the singer dons the role of a cyberpunk heroine, aggressive and fragile at the same time, a cross between a post-atomic Madonna and a character straight out of a sci-fi B-movie. The result of this work is indeed Chromatica, an album that moves away from the country-pop of Joanne and the tear-jerking melodies of “Shallow” to emphasize, once again, the liberating power of music and dance. The elements that stand out (both visually and aurally) are essentially two: the contrast between sunny melodies and introspective lyrics and the desire to create, if not a concept album, at least a journey that develops over the sixteen tracks of the tracklist.

“Could you pull me out of this alive?/Where’s my body? I’m stuck in my mind”: this is how “Alice” starts, the first example of what's to come in the kaleidoscope of Chromatica. There’s hardly time to ask for help (“Take me on trip, DJ, free my mind”) before encountering the singles “Stupid Love” and “Rain on Me”, the first brimming with references to the Moroderian disco (and where “someone” wonders: “I gotta find that peace, is it too late?/Or could this love protect me from the pain?”), the second accompanied by Ariana Grande's voice and a visionary music video clearly inspired by the atmospheres of Matrix. “I'd rather be dry, but at least I'm alive”: this is the awareness reached and “Free Woman”, with its blatantly 90s piano, adds further elements of interest (“I’m still something if I don’t got a man” seems to allude to an unpleasant episode of sexual harassment). “Fun Tonight” concludes the first part, between dance, breakbeat and Gaga's voice performing daring flights, without hiding the human side of the singer (“You love the paparazzi, love the fame/Even though you know it causes me pain/I feel like I’m in a prison hell/Stick my hands through the steel bars