Pop singer Lady Gaga has been left extreme distraught after it emerged that one of her gay fans had comitted suicide last Sunday after enduring years of torment about his sexuality from classmates.
Lady Gaga has set up a meeting with Barack Obama with the aim of petitioning the US leader to create a legislation which makes bullying at any age a crime.
In a series of tweets, she wrote: “The past days I’ve spent reflecting, crying, and yelling. I have so much anger. It is hard to feel love when cruelty takes someones life.
Jamey Rodemeyer was found dead outside his home in Williamsville, New York. The 14 year old was a victim of constant bullying. Lady Gaga said she would not rest until bullying was made a crime in America.
The 25-year-old rallied tirelessly against the American military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy – which banned members of the US armed forces from being openly gay – before it was finally repealed this week.
Distressed, Gaga tweeted: ‘I am meeting with our President. I will not stop fighting. This must end. Our generation has the power to end it. Trend it #MakeALawForJamey,’ adding: ‘The past days I’ve spent reflecting, crying, and yelling. I have so much anger. It is hard to feel love when cruelty takes someone’s life. Bullying must become be illegal. It is a hate crime.’
Jamey, who is the latest of a number of gay teenagers in the US to commit suicide, recently recorded a video revealing the abuse he’d been subjected to but said he had found help.
‘People would just keep sending me hate, telling me that gay people go to hell,’ he said in May in a YouTube message for the It Gets Better campaign.
Classmates at his high school taunted Rodemeyer with homophobic and nasty comments in the months before his suicide.
Jamey said his parents, Tracy and Tim, had supported him and that he had received counselling following the abuse.
The scale of the taunts was revealed when cowards anonymously posted messages on his postings on the Formspring networking website.
One bully wrote: ‘I wouldn’t care if you died. No one would. So just do it 
It would make everyone WAY more happier!’
In the weeks leading up his death, Jamey wrote: ‘I always say how bullied I am, but no one listens. What do I have to do so people will listen to me?’
In a string of final posts at the weekend, he paid tribute to his hero Lady Gaga and said he was looking forward to seeing his late great-grandmother.
After he was found dead, his father said: ‘He fooled everybody. He put on a brave face and I wish he wouldn’t have.’
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YouTube has blocked Lady Gaga’s official channel and is currently suspended by the video sharing website.
Any users that try to click on the link to her video are greeted with a simple message.
“This account has been suspended due to multiple or severe violations of YouTube’s Copyright Policy,” it reads.
Several online blogs suggest that it’s because of a disagreement between the star and a Japanese media company.
Copyright violation
Lady Gaga recently appeared on SMAP X SMAP, a weekly TV show in Japan, to promote her new album.
On the Japanese TV show the worldwide singers performed a medley of songs featuring Born This Way, You & I and The Edge of Glory.
Footage of that performance has since been removed from other websites as well as YouTube.
On one it says the copyright violation claim is from Media Interactive Inc.
Google, which owns YouTube, said it does not comment on individual videos or accounts.
Lady Gaga is one of the most popular artists on the internet.
Her Bad Romance video has been watched nearly 400 million times on YouTube.
She also has more than 11 million followers on Twitter.
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Last night at the MTV Video Music Awards there was one artist that caused a stir, Lady Gaga. She raised eyebrows at last night’s MTV Video Music Awards by appearing on stage in a controversial ‘meat’ dress as she scooped eight gongs – half of the total awards available.
Lady Gaga accepted the video of the year award wearing a dress, boots and hat that appeared to be made of cuts of meat.
Gaga recently posed in a ‘beef bikini’ on the cover of Japan’s Men’s Vogue magazine and her latest outfit is sure to anger animal rights activists.
Cher presented Gaga with the award for Bad Romance at the bash in LA’s Nokia Theatre.
“I never thought I’d be asking Cher to hold my meat purse,” Gaga joked.
The singer led the field with a record 13 nominations and ended up winning eight prizes including female video, pop video, dance video, choreography, direction and editing.
Gaga arrived at the ceremony in a full-length Alexander McQueen dress with a renaissance-style art print on the front, which she teamed up with a gold-feathered headdress.
She also changed into another black McQueen number during the show with a spikey head-dress.
Eminem, who received eight nominations, walked away with two awards for male video and hip hop video for Not Afraid.
The rapper opened the ceremony with a medley of hits with his Love The Way You Lie collaborator Rihanna, but made a quick exit before accepting his awards.
Justin Bieber was voted best new artist and 30 Seconds to Mars scooped best rock video.
Her video for Telephone, featuring Beyonce, won best collaboration.
Gaga also took the opportunity to announce the name of her next album – Born This Way.
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Westboro Baptist Church led demonstrators as they gathered outside the venue where Lady Gaga was performing in St Louis holding signs reading “God hates Lady GaGa” to protest against her “promotion” of homosexuality.
The Westboro Baptist Church group also demanded that the show on Saturday night be cancelled, according to the news reports.
Gaga, a strong supporter of gay rights, took to Twitter to encourage fans to turn the other cheek.
“At the risk of drawing attention to a hateful organization, I would like to make my fans aware of a protest being held outside the St. Louis tonight.”
“My request to (fans) and public authorities (sic) is to pay these hate criminals no mind. Do not interact with them, or try to fight,” she wrote.
“Do not respond to any of their provocation. Don’t waste your words, or feelings, no matter what you hear or see you are more fortunate and blessed than they are, and in your heart just pray for them.”
Earlier this year, church spokeswoman Shirley Phelps-Roper told Radar Online: “We will be going to her concert with placards reading ‘God Hates Lady Gaga’ – to inform people that they will be going to hell too if they listen to her messages.”
“According to the Bible homosexuality is an abomination and she has to shut her filthy mouth and stop promoting it.”
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The 23-year-old pop phenomenon played the first night of her self-styled “electro opera” in Manchester on Thursday.
The tour, which travels around the UK and Ireland for the next couple of weeks, is dubbed The Monster Ball. But there’s nothing to be frightened of – except tinnitus.
It was a hugely ambitious, terrifyingly loud show, spread over four acts and held together by a flimsy “narrative” about Gaga and her dancer friends trying to get to a party.
Impressively, the entire spectacle was put together in just four weeks. The singer told fans at the MEN arena: “We were doing another show in the United States… but I got very bored, so I threw it away.”
In fact, the production was so last-minute that the star was still on stage adding the finishing touches just half an hour before the doors opened.
Inevitably, then, the first night didn’t run entirely smoothly.
Lighting cues were missed, the sound mix wasn’t properly balanced and the show over-ran by 30 minutes, leaving some of the audience stranded in a cold and snowy Manchester.
But nearly all 23,000 of them stayed on to the bitter end – because, make no mistake, this was a sight to behold.
SET LIST
ACT 1: City
Intro
Dance in the Dark
Glitter and Grease
Just Dance
Beautiful, Dirty, Rich
Vanity
The Fame
ACT 2: Subway
LoveGame
Boys Boys Boys
Money Honey
Telephone
Brown Eyes
Speechless
So Happy I Could Die
ACT 3: Forest
Monster
Teeth
Alejandro
Pokerface
ACT 4: Monster Ball
Paparazzi
Bad Romance
When Lady G demands her food back, the waitress returns with the food covered in rubbish.
Unfortunately, Lady Gaga can’t able to maintain her Poker Face, and after 12 minutes she can contain her expletives no longer.
“Who would put that in their mouth?” she can be heard to say. “Would you put that in your mouth?”
“It has sh*t all over it! Clearly you would because you’re just, like, f*cked up!”
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She’s known for her crazy shades, platinum locks and outlandish and barely-there outfits, but this picture of Lady Gaga – taken when she was merely Stefani Germanotta – shows what the glam bombshell really looks like.
Back in 2005, a brunette Lady G appeared on the MTV programme called Boiling Points, which was a bit like You’ve Been Framed. Contestants were secretly filmed while being subjected to rude or irritating behaviour.
Lady Gaga, then 23, and two other contestants would win $100 if they could survive for 14 minutes in a New York restaurant without swearing.
In the clip, the singer is lured away from her table for a moment, while a waitress comes and takes away her food.
She’s known for her crazy shades, platinum locks and outlandish and barely-there outfits, but this picture of Lady Gaga – taken when she was merely Stefani Germanotta – shows what the glam bombshell really looks like.
Back in 2005, a brunette Lady G appeared on the MTV programme called Boiling Points, which was a bit like You’ve Been Framed. Contestants were secretly filmed while being subjected to rude or irritating behaviour.
Lady Gaga, then 23, and two other contestants would win $100 if they could survive for 14 minutes in a New York restaurant without swearing.
In the clip, the singer is lured away from her table for a moment, while a waitress comes and takes away her food.
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When lady gaga was a little girl, she would sing along on her mini plastic tape recorder to Michael Jackson and Cyndi Lauper hits and get twirled in the air in daddy’s arms to the sounds of the rolling stones and the Beatles. The precocious child would dance around the table at fancy upper west side restaurants using the breadsticks as a baton. And, she would innocently greet a new babysitter in nothing but her birthday suit.
It’s no wonder that little girl from a good Italian New York family, turned into the exhibitionist, multi-talented singer-songwriter with a flair for theatrics that she is today: lady gaga.
“i was always an entertainer. I was a ham as a little girl and I’m a ham today,” says lady gaga, 23, who made a name for herself on the lower east side club scene with the infectious dance-pop party song “beautiful dirty rich,” and wild, theatrical, and often tongue-in-cheek “shock art” performances where gaga – who designs and makes many of her stage outfits — would strip down to her hand-crafted hot pants and bikini top, light cans of hairspray on fire, and strike a pose as a disco ball lowered from the ceiling to the orchestral sounds of a clockwork orange.
“I always loved rock and pop and theatre. When I discovered queen and David Bowie is when it really came together for me and I realized I could do all three,” says gaga, who nicked her name from queen’s song “radio gaga” and who cites rock star girlfriends, Peggy Bundy, and Donatella Versace as her fashion icons. “I look at those artists as icons in art. It’s not just about the music. It’s about the performance, the attitude, the look; it’s everything. And, that is where I live as an artist and that is what I want to accomplish.”
That goal might seem lofty, but consider the artist: gaga is the girl who at age 4 learned piano by ear. By age 13, she had written her first piano ballad. At 14, she played open mike nights at clubs such as New York’s the bitter end by night and was teased for her quirky, eccentric style by her convent of the sacred heart school (the Manhattan private school Nicky and Paris Hilton attended) classmates by day. At age 17, she became was one of 20 kids in the world to get early admission to Tisch school of the arts at NYU. Signed by her 20th birthday and writing songs for other artists (such as the pussycat dolls, and has been asked to write for a series of interscope artists) before her debut album was even released, lady gaga has earned the right to reach for the sky.
“My goal as an artist is to funnel a pop record to a world in a very interesting way,” says gaga, who wrote all of her lyrics, all of her melodies, and played most of the synth work on her album, the fame(streamline/konlive/cherrytree/interscope). “I almost want to trick people into hanging with something that is really cool with a pop song. It’s almost like the spoonful of sugar and I’m the medicine.”
On the fame, it’s as if gaga took two parts dance-pop, one part electro-pop, and one part rock with a splash of disco and burlesque and generously poured it into the figurative martini glasses of the world in an effort to get everyone drunk with her fame. “the fame is about how anyone can feel famous,” she explains. “pop culture is art. It doesn’t make you cool to hate pop culture, so i embraced it and you hear it all over the fame. But, it’s a sharable fame. I want to invite you all to the party. I want people to feel a part of this lifestyle.”
The cd’s opener and first single, “just dance,” gets the dance floor rocking with it’s “fun, L.A., celebratory vibe.” As for the equally catchy, “boys boys boys,” gaga doesn’t mind wearing her influences on her sleeve. “I wanted to write the female version of motley crue’s ‘girls girls girls,’ but with my own twist. I wanted to write a pop song that rockers would like.”
“Beautiful dirty rich” sums up her time of self-discovery, living in the lower east side and dabbling in drugs and the party scene. “That time, and that song, was just me trying to figure things out,” says gaga. “Once I grabbed the reigns of my artistry, I fell in love with that more than I did with the party life.” On first listen, “paparazzi” might come off as a love song to cameras, and in all honestly, gaga jokes “on one level it is about wooing the paparazzi and wanting fame. But, it’s not to be taken completely seriously. It’s about everyone’s obsession with that idea. But, it’s also about wanting a guy to love you and the struggle of whether you can have success or love or both.”
Gaga shows her passion for love songs on such softer tracks as the queen-influenced “brown eyes” and the sweet kiss-off break-up song “nothing i can say (eh eh).” “‘Brown eyes’ is the most vulnerable song on the album,” she explains. “‘eh eh’ is my simple pop song about finding someone new and breaking up with the old boyfriend.”
For the new tour for this album, fans will be treated to a more polished version of what they saw (and loved) at her critically acclaimed lollapalooza show in august 2007 and winter music conference performance in march 2008. “This new show is the couture version of my handmade downtown performance of the past few years. It’s more fine-tuned, but some of my favourite elements to my past shows – the disco balls, hot pants, sequin, and stilettos – will still be there. Just more fierce and more of a conceptual show with a vision for pop performance art.”
It’s been a while since a new pop artist has made her way in the music industry the old-fashioned/grass roots way by paying her dues with seedy club gigs and self-promotion. This is one rising pop star that hasn’t been plucked from a model casting call, born into a famous family, won a reality TV singing contest, or emerged from a teen cable TV sitcom. “I did this the way you are supposed to. I played every club in New York City and I bombed in every club and then killed it in every club and I found myself as an artist. I learned how to survive as an artist, get real, and how to fail and then figure out who I was as singer and performer. And, I worked hard.”
Gaga adds with a wink in her eye, “and, now, I’m just trying to change the world one sequin at a time.”
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Singer Lady Gaga has apologised to fans after being forced to cancel a concert in Indiana due to ill health.
“Can’t apologise enough for how sorry I am,” she said, via micro-blogging site Twitter, revealing she had collapsed due to exhaustion and dehydration.
“An hour before the show I was feeling dizzy and having trouble breathing,” posted the 23-year-old, renowned for her flamboyant stage performances.
The show at Purdue University will now take place on 26 January.
Lady Gaga – real name Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta – is scheduled to return to the stage on Saturday in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
Last year she failed to appear as a support act at two Take That concerts in Manchester, citing ill health.
The singer tweeted that she had been “crying for hours” as a result of Thursday’s cancellation.
“My stage has complicated mechanical elements,” she said. “Everyone was concerned I’d be in danger during the 2hr show, since I had passed out earlier.
“I have performed with the flu, a cold [and] strep throat,” she went on. “I would never cancel a show just based on discomfort.
“I hope you can forgive me. I love my little monsters more than anything, you are everything to me.”
Lady Gaga – who recently topped the UK singles chart with Bad Romance – had the best-selling UK single of 2009 with Poker Face.
Her tour is due to hit the UK in Manchester on 18 February.
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