Lady Gaga performs at Stubb's in Austin, Texas, during the South by Southwest Music Festival. (Jay Janner/Austin American-Statesman / )
AUSTIN, Texas -- Lady Gaga wants to have her snack chips and eat them too.During her keynote address (actually a softball inteview) Friday, Gaga attacked naysayers who criticized her for performing at the South by Southwest Music Conference for a corporate snack-food sponsor who required fans to shill for its product in exchange for gaining admission to her concert Thursday night. At the same time, she touted rebellion and her refusal to play by the corporate rulebook as one of the keys to her career.It was a complex message, one that demanded to be untangled and could've made for a fascinating keynote, but her inquisitor, John Norris of Fuse, wasn't up to it. In addition, all audience questions were filtered ahead of time.'Whoever is writing or saying all these things (about the corporate sponsorship for her SXSW concert), you don't know (anything) about the music industry,' Gaga said. 'Without sponsorships we wouldn't have any more artists coming to Austin, we wouldn't have any more festivals, because record labels don't have any ... money.'Yet Gaga noted that corporate thinking has tried to hem in her creativity. 'What are we as an industry if we're not telling our artists to be creative?' she said. 'Why are we allowing it (the music industry) to be a prison?'The mixed message spoke to some of Gaga's difficulties in the last year. Her 2013 'ArtPop' album was not as commercially successful as her previous recordings, and she canceled a tour to have hip surgery. 'My hip was falling apart, there are three screws in it now,' she said.But she's gearing up for a major tour this year, which kicked off at South by Southwest with a highly theatrical and unconventional presentation that included a vomiting skit, with the star getting the worst of it.greg@gregkot.com
Posted by Unknown on Friday, March 14, 2014 - Rating: 4.5
0 comments "Lady Gaga delivers complex message at SXSW"
Post a Comment