Like a Can Opener in a Worm Factory

I just hae considerably more respect for pop as an art form when it's an authentic expression of an individual vision raher than a staged process where those responsible for the creationof a particular track or melody or lyrics aren't the ones who perform, usually because they have the wrong image,or whatever. Performane is interpretation, but a cover of a song already in the public eye, sometimes with the creator's consent, is different from he manufactured pop of a fw overtanned young celebrity wannabes being fed someoe else's creations because they look the part. And there's something that comes from life and professional experience even in covering a song - take the contrast between, say, ld lang's hallelujah and alexandra x-factor's. (I mean, what the hell was that about? she had a good voicem but no creative or interpretive spark at all, and it was just a pointless exercise.) Manufactured pop is just a travesty of something that can be real and meaingful and true, and for all that LG uses the tropes of manufactured pop, she uses her own ability to manifest contemporary expectations, celebrity archetypes, to undermine heir usual anodyne meanings. Which is why I thinkshe manages to do something that Peaches, however awesome, doesn't - because she's outside the contemporary body ideals,behaviour types, etc, she stands in opposition to the culture that imposes them, whereas Gaa can bring them down rom he inside, so to speak. Gaga ewmbodies them, and uses her abilty to do so to subvert them. And it's true that she worked her way up on pure talent and determination, she didn't just look good and get somebody else's songs handed to her on a plate, and i *respect* that. More than i would if she was a model that fell into singing by accident. She's clever and she's got her own ideas...