When Stefani Germanotta strolls into a swank San Francisco café, two distinct reactions occur: Every male jaw in the place plummets straight to the floor, and the eyes of their female lunch dates narrow into vengeful “how-dare-she” slits. But oh yes, she dares. And then some. Because Germanotta has come in the outrageous guise of her alter dance-pop ego, Lady GaGa, and she’s all dolled up in platform heels, tan hot pants, a see-through diaphanous top revealing a black lace bra underneath, huge Italian sunglasses, and a gangster-moll fedora. The kind of outfit that can simultaneously get an average guy’s pulse racing and also chill the blood of the most confident, competitive gal. Which, ironically enough, is nothing compared to the skimpy, stripper-inspired costumes GaGa wears onstage. All this, of course, would just be so much sensationalist window dressing if the Lady didn’t deliver the musical goods. Which she does in sensuous spades on her Interscope debut The Fame and its chart-topping stomper of a hit single, “Just Dance.” With more potential smashes like “Poker Face” frothing right behind, she’s literally on the brink of becoming the next crowd-pleasing Madonna. So Stefani, out of necessity, is long gone. “My mother and father still call me that,” she tells ShockHound with a sigh. “But other than that, all my friends call me GaGa, and not because I say they have to. Everyone just…just enjoys it.” And despite her racy image, this New Yorker is no brainless bimbo. She’s one of the shrewdest pop stars on the scene, who has carefully planned every last stiletto-heeled step of her career.
SHOCKHOUND: What did music-biz moguls tell you?
LADY GAGA: “I don’t get it.” “I’m confused.” “I don’t understand.” But nothing made me feel bad. I was pretty angry with L.A. Reid for dropping me — he took no meetings with me during my stay there. I was signed for three months, and I used to wait outside the doors of his office for hours, just to have a meeting with him. And I’d tell my A&R guy “If he’s not getting it, I need to talk to him.” And he never took a meeting with me, not ever. And I remember I was auditioning for a guy at Virgin, and I was in his office, playing for him, and he said, “I’ve read so much about you — apparently you’re the talk of town.” And I sat down and played the piano, and by the time the song was finished, everybody in the room was looking at me like, “It’s all good! You nailed it!” Except this guy, who just stared at me and said, “What planet are you from?” And not in a funny-ha-ha way, either. And I took that as such a wonderful compliment, because it was so new to him and so different that he couldn’t even wrap his brain around it. I did theater for a while, too, and they’d tell me “This is a musical, but you’re too pop.” And I’d go into record labels, and they’d tell me “You’re too theatrical.” So I just thought, “Well, why don’t I do both? And why don’t I do it my way?” And without even realizing what I was doing, it became performance art – I thought I was just doing music, but people started going “What’s it like, being a performance artist?” So I really put all my eggs in one giant basket – I never wanted a backup career, because this is my life.
