Waiting for Gaga: A Culture Show Special The Culture Show

Hello and welcome to a record of a rather strange eight days. In which

Lady Gaga's fans wait for Lady Gaga. In which I wait for an interview

with Lady Gaga, and in which, when I eventually get that interview, I end

up waiting for Lady Gaga to speak. As the blood rushed out of my

body... How do I explain it? Friday, October 25th, a little more

than two weeks before the release of Lady Gaga's third album, ARTPOP. She

has been out of the public eye for getting on for two years, forced to

cancel part of her previous tour because she danced too much and

injured her hip. When she is in London, she always stays here, in

the Langham Hotel, very close to BBC broadcasting. Her fans were waiting.

I really am thankful that I am a fan and I am able to experience

everything that she is doing in real time, because I know that in years

to come, people are going to look back and realise how significant she

was. They are called the Little Monsters, and Gaga is Mother

Monster. It is a selfie with Mother Monster that they are really waiting

for. She was one of the first artists to realise what social media

could do for her. She has the third-largest following on Twitter

and the largest following on Facebook, of 60 million. In this new

world, everything depends on these, smartphones. You cannot really be a

fine without one. It is how you take your selfies with Gaga. With your

smartphone, it is as though, while you are waiting for Gaga, she is

just there, whispering to you. No one will ever understand her except

her fans. It is a new breed, it is a new kind, something that no other

celebrity has with their fans. We camp for days, weeks, to see Gaga.

We do not sleep, we spend all our money on her. Taxis. We put our life

on hold for Gaga. I have so many friends through her. This is me and

my best friend, and I met him through Gaga. That was over a year

ago. And we are best friends. I would not have met him if it was not

for Gaga. Hopefully he will be one of the friends that I keep for a

lifetime, and I am so happy that this is because of Gaga. How much

longer? It is going to be really worth it when she comes out. I would

imagine nine o'clock. Imagine ten o'clock don't! To the fans, she is

not just a start, she is a fellow sufferer. They do not simply add my

her, they identify with her. She was bullied at school, and so were they.

I do not even feel like she is a celebrity. I just feel like, this is

a person that has inspired me so much and has helped me through my

life. She has given me an amazing set of best friends, and without my

best friends now I would not be anywhere. Gaga has taken every

single underdog who was insecure away from all the kids at school,

and she has put them in the limelight and made them be proud of

themselves. She has made the weirdos at the party look cool. She has

become a defender of the bullied and oppressed, and none of that has

changed, neither has the music. The first track from the new album is a

trademark Gaga top club anthem, called Applause.

Same small woman, same massive voice. I like it, it is a great

song. She will be here very soon, very, very soon, within the next

hour, hopefully. If not sooner. Gaga finally arrives after nine o'clock

at the Langham, and she arrives the way she always does, strangely. Here

we go, here we go. Gaga, you look amazing. We love you so much! The

paparazzi of course go in snap happy overdrive, the flesh is weak havoc

on our cameras. But still, there she is. She is tiny. White face, black

contacts, bare feet. The dress is translucent, and there is nothing

underneath. She does not seem to speak, and when she does, it is

bizarre. Push your arms up. And she keeps it up all the way into the

hotel lobby. Are they going inside? She is a

human being, let her have her say! The paparazzi went in first and then

we went in with them. But she did that whole thing, straight into the

lift, and she kept, that is what I like about her the boast, she keeps

on the performance, and she carries on doing it, even if she looks

ridiculous, until she is out of sight. That is my favourite thing

about her, she is so theatrical. So, she is in the hotel. We have been

promised an interview. The only question is, when? So, what are we

doing? We are waiting for Gaga. But it is not just me. Because we

thought of Gaga as the world's most alternative mainstream artist, we

thought we would dress the set. It would look amazing. It would not

just be me interviewing Gaga, it would be a comment on the way she

talks to the fans. And so we have brought some people along. Do you

want to meet them? Here they are. They are waiting for Gaga, too. The

new album is called ARTPOP. For the last few months, Gaga has been using

her Twitter feed to keep more than 40 million followers, including me,

in the loop. Snippets of music and updates on the art ingredients she

has been throwing into the pot, the artists she has been working with.

There is the New York-based performance artist Marina Abramovic,

creator of the "Abramovic method", a blend of performance and meditation.

You can watch this on Youtube, Gaga practising said method. We asked

Marina Abramovic to tell us what working with Gaga was like. Before I

met her, I knew about her, like everybody else, that this is this

young, outrageous girl, who wears strange clothes, she is into

extremes, she is experimental, she has 43 million people on Twitter

following her, whatever she does, Little Monsters, she wins so many

awards, and sells millions of records. That's about all. And

finally, when I met her, and she came really very humble to my house

and asked me if I can teach her, I started really changing my opinion

of her entirely. I found somebody who really is serious, who really

wants to learn and how much you can push your mental and physical

limits. She was such a good student. We went to the woods. She

never cheated, she went much further than I asked her. I started having

huge respect for her. She has also been working with Robert Millson,

high priest, perhaps the Pope of American experimental theatre. And

then there is Jeff Koons, the most commercially successful artist in

America. And very kindly, Jeff has sent us a selfie, too. When I think

about what it was like to work with Lady Gaga, it was a joy, pure joy,

because her character is always surprising, in her generosity, and

how connected her call being is to wanting to participate, to share in

the excitement, in the sensations of feeling, and being able from those

feelings to go into expanding on thoughts and ideas and to be engaged

in it. At her core, she is an honest human being. He has made a sculpture

of Gaga. If you listen carefully to the applause, Jeff Koons gets a bit

of product placement. # Suddenly the... She has released

two more singles, venous and Do What U Want, but she has not made a video

for either. Fortunately for us, the Little Monsters have been working on

one for venous, at least. # When you touch me I died just a

little inside. # I wonder if this could be love.

It is lovely, but it is unofficial. I want an interview, and Gaga, or

her management, keep suggesting different dates, and cancelling.

This is not normally how it happens. I have been a journalist writing

about music for 25 years, and this is how it goes. With a really famous

person, and I have done Paul McCartney, Madonna, Coldplay, Bono,

all of them, you get a phone call and they say, it is going to happen

in the next couple of days. They say choose Dale Wednesday. Clear those

days, and then they say definitely Wednesday, four o'clock. -- Tuesday

or Wednesday. You listen to the album, you take notes and then you

turn up for the interview. The star might be late, Madonna was one hour

late. I have had people being three hours late, four hours late, but it

eventually happens on that day. And that is kind of it. What is weird

about this interview is, I am never told when it is going to happen, or

I am told, and then it changes, and then the same again. After a while

you start feeling like you are slightly mad and you are not here to

do a job at all. You start feeling like you are a stalker, rather than

a journalist. You start feeling like you are a fan. I need to do

something to make myself feel professional. I need to practice.

Now, I am going to ask you about the difficult third album. Here we

go... So, you have done two albums so far, and this one, ARTPOP, is a

different direction for you, you have tried to bring art into the

album, in the way that Warhol brought pop into art. I wonder how

successful you have been with that? Is the art just a sprinkling on the

top, like on top of the cake, or is it actually within the cake? Would

you like to and pick that? Or not? She tries to get to everyone she

can. It is so different every time. It is mind blowing. It is like going

to see her live. It is such a performance. The end of day two

approaches. We've heard nothing. And Gaga doesn't stir from the hotel

until after 8pm. She looks completely different. She

is a space rock shrink-wrapped in a masterpiece. Guitar, fright wig, eye

test glasses, and a dress made from Botticelli's Birth of Venus. I do

hope it's not the original. Oh, my God! Oh, my God! I don't know. I

love her so much. Oh, my actual god! She took a photo

of me and chief smiled at me. I am going to cry. Delighted with his new

selfie, Gabriel goes home to bed. The other little monsters follow

Gaga across town, to GAY, where Gaga slips into a rather fetching

Victorian nightie, and sings her new song, Venus.

# rocket number nine take off to the planet.

Her performance concludes. She um... 17 hours waiting today. We went to

the studio and then she said she is coming here. We walked all the way

across London, all the way to Charing Cross, and then she did not

stop. It is currently 3am. 2:56am. It is exhausted. The day before X

Factor. Two days down and a million more to go. We waited for gaga but

she went round the back. We saw Laci. That is Gaga 's choreographer.

Goodbye. On Sunday, day three, Gaga performs

two songs on X Factor. She plays Venus again. She keeps her pants on,

and there are Botticellis all over the place.

Then she plays her new single, Do What You Want.

And, at the same time as I'm enjoying it, I'm worrying. As far as

we know, she's only here for another two days. And I'm starting to think

I might have to do something instead of the interview. It gets worse on

day four. We hear that some time today she's going to do an interview

but not for me. For the Graham Norton Show. It's the final straw. I

join the fans outside the hotel. I have resisted this for the past four

days but I am now here. I have joined the fans, waiting for Gaga.

We are standing outside the Langholm and checking out passing grade

cars, in which she made travel to another destination. It seems the

only way I can get anything to do with Gaga. The fans are all really

nice. You are nice, aren't you? She is nice. Everyone is really nice. I

have started to hang out here because it is more fun. I think I

might get a programme out of this. I turned up because I thought it

looks like there is some action. I have been here for three quarters of

an hour and we have seen a whole load of silver cars drive off. Is

that good or bad? That is bad because she has probably gone

through the back entrance. How will you know if she has left? We will

see her cars drive past. Some of the fans are going to ITV but I am going

home. She will be doing Graham Norton. I feel slightly sad because

she is not doing me. Is it because I am not as pretty? I have no idea.

Why do you like Lady Gaga as opposed to anyone hours? She has helped me

so much with who I am. I used to be insecure. She said being gay was

such a beautiful thing in front of millions of people and that helped

me with who I am and I love her so much. That is a good thing to do. I

am sure I will be meeting you again because I will be here tomorrow. I

will carry on interviewing year. Do you think I should come and six in

the morning? You are dedicated. At this point I was unable to keep the

lid on my inner mum any longer. Have you got warm clothes on? I have five

layers on. I have the models and I have blankets and pillows and stuff.

I am happy about that. They are in their bras and stuff and they must

be freezing. Shall be carry on waiting? I will wait till she comes

out. I will do that. I do not actually leave until she has come

out. Some people get tired and bored. It is a long day. 11 hours. I

want to see my kids. All right. That's great. I love him. I ask some

other little monsters what the etiquette is for greeting Gaga. And

I receive some surprising news. For some fans at least, the classic Gaga

fan gesture, known as paws up has fallen out of favour. We do not do

that any more. It is bad. You look kind of demented. So the hard-core

fans do not do pause up. In a delusional state, it might be

awkward. I am not doing it but I am. Most of the time... We used to when

we were younger. Are you saying, what? Up to 16, pause up and then

down. It was big two or three years ago. It is still there but it has

kind of died. We are not little monsters any more. We are monsters.

I can be a big monster because I am quite old. I have not been doing it

very long. I am a trainee monster. You are all established monsters.

OK. We have a spare T-shirt if you want one. That is fine. I will wear

it. Here I am. A fully paid up monster. Got the T-shirt. But I give

it back. It's precious. And I go and talk to one of the paparazzi. How is

it they know in advance when she's coming out? Everyone is working on a

weird kind of 6 cents. The indication is security. They show

their faces. They tell us, 15 minutes to go and we get in

position. So, now I know what I'm waiting for. And there's no sign of

security. And then we have a couple of false alarms. We get Bill Oddie.

And the dog off Britain 's got talent. This is hilarious! I may

come here every day. I am having a good time. And then I make a fatal

error. I made the mistake of an amateur. I went for a copy. I came

back and, as you can see, everybody has gone, including Gaga. She must

have gone while I was having a coffee and I am pretty gutted

because I'd did feel like, we cannot get an interview with her, I will

maybe feel her and throw a feud questions over the barriers but

nothing, I have failed. I am no good at this. I am leaving. Of course,

more experienced little monsters than myself have got what they came

for. She just wrote, she, on my hand. She came out and said, I

cannot take any pictures. I am late. I got her hand and I said, I am so

proud of what you did on the X Factor yesterday. It was amazing.

She took a group photo of us. I am next to her. It was so cool. It was

at this rather low point that someone on Planet Gaga finally took

pity on me. We were told that Gaga would be staying until Friday first

November, and that our interview would happen on that morning. We

were offered this attractive function room at the Langham to do

it in. So, it had to be disguised completely. We draped it. We draped

the mannequins. I thought about draping myself. We started setting

up at 7am. Gaga arrived at about 11am. She hadn't had any sleep. For

the last two days, she'd been working with Robert Wilson on a

series of installations - recreations of great masterpieces in

which Gaga replaces the central figure. Masterpieces like the Death

of Marat, or the head of John the Baptist. It turns out that Wilson

already has the video portraits up and running and they will be shown

at the Louvre fret until February next year. Can you imagine another

mainstream artist doing something like that? Answers on a tweet.

Welcome back. Thank you for having me. You had an enforced absence, due

to illness. How were you as a patient? I guess I was a good

patient in some ways. I was so excited to be able to rejuvenate my

body. It was exciting in a way. You feel like an infant. In another

way, I've felt dead all the time because I could not be on stage. I

just really took to enjoying and appreciating the parts of what I

do. Life is art all the time as a way to make it through that sort of

torture I was feeling. It was good for me. This stage is a place that I

started to rely on very much with the fans and the interconnection.

When it went away, I had to find a more spiritual connection with music

and art. I am on the dirty path now. The interview has been going for a

couple of minutes and I noticed something. Sometimes, before

questions, Gaga shut her eyes for a couple of minutes. I wonder if she

is falling asleep or I am boring. I notice that before you speak to me,

you drop your eyes and you centre yourself. Is that something you

learned from Marina Abramovic? Yes, I did learn a lot of that from

Marina, and also from Bob Wilson. I have been working with him for

48... Phil Morley -- for more than 48 hours what were you doing

together? We were doing a series of portraits. We were using his clay to

mould into pieces that he was essentially recreating, re-inspiring

into these beautiful, moving pieces. So, I like to make sure that I give

you my full attention. There is a lot of noise around me, and I have

learned, working with... Did you hear the creaking door? Yes. Who is

coming in? It is like a ghost. I have learned from working with

Marina that you need to be aware of these sounds. Because otherwise, I

cannot react to real life. But I like to make sure that I am

breathing properly and censoring myself, to get through these... You

see, I did it wrong there. To get through these long duration works. I

do not necessarily consider myself to be a performance artist really,

just yet. Just yet?! She did Graham Norton the other week, and he got

this normal popstar... Please be careful! You are just going to see

his high-flying away. And what are you doing at the end of... ? Oh,

well, let's just try talking about pop and sex. If you think about how

you present yourself onstage, if you think about a lot of pop artists,

particularly female, they are often presented in a straightforward

sexual way, they have to be good-looking, they have to be

presented as though the first thing you are going to react to is, do you

fancy them? And you do not do that. Sometimes you do, and sometimes you

don't. How do you regard your body, then, within that context? You just

asked me like 1000 questions. In one. Yes, or maybe I just have 1000

opinions about it. So let me just begin with something. Well, I would

say in pop music, in that particular sphere, that there is a

one-dimensional quality to sexuality. So, I think the

difference between what I do and that, if I could maybe start there,

is that there is any intention always behind the sexuality, if the

sexuality is there. Most of the time, I do not particularly find

myself to be very sexy, actually. And then, in the beginning of my

career, I think that some of this exploration of covering myself up

and transforming into other icons and other states of life force, was

a sense of sexual freedom for me, because I felt quite numbed by my

experience, and I wanted to escape things. You use sex on this album in

quite an interesting way. There are lots of different aspects to it, but

often it is used as a way into love, it seems, the sex is going to

hopefully leading to something which will touch you a little more, would

you say that is white? Yes, I would say that is white, but I actually

don't create with the intention of the finality, if that makes any

sense. I do not always know exactly what is going to come out of it. So,

it is beautiful for me to hear your reading of my experience with sex

and love at this time, because my earlier experiences of sex were

quite perverted and scary, terrifying... Fear... It reminds me

of these things we are sitting around. Yes, they are quite spooky,

and they? It was sort of terrifying for me. But now I have really great

sex. Which is good, I am glad to hear it. It is just sort of a

natural change. I guess we are dealing with two different

conversations in a way. When I am working with Bob, for example, I was

a vehicle for an expression of him having a conversation. For example

we did The Head of John the Baptist, 1507. I find myself talking

to a million selling pop star with a new album coming out who would

rather discuss her experimentation with another artist. I have been

recreating this image, The Head of John the Baptist, by Andrea Solari.

Hopefully John the Baptist will come to me and say, it is OK, you are

allowed. And the same thing, we did The Death of Marat, and this was the

same. I have an experience where I have two really breathe, and I have

to have a tremendous understanding of the artist that created the work.

And for me, like I said, it is really, I have always heard things,

my entire life, since I was young, and it has come out first in the

form of music. When you say you have heard things, what do you mean,

something speaking to you in your head? I mean, I do not even know,

just things. I always noticed that I would say or notice things, or

accuse things happening which people around me did not were happening.

And as I got older, it started to make me feel sick, and it still

makes me feel sick sometimes. Marina has really helped me with that. She

calls me a diseased artist, she says it is OK. So then, my own work, this

is a duration of my own life, it is completely separate from what I am

doing with Bob and Marina. But with ARTPOP, I wanted to show that being

a student is OK. I feel that the education of your teachers, every

dancer that you have danced with, every paintbrush that you have

touched, every book that you have read, every bit of music that you

have heard, if you channel that entire history into the thing that

you are creating, whereas in intention in the work which runs to

the centre of the Earth. That is quite interesting, because what

people might say or worry about your work is that you have so many

artistic references within it... OK, pause again. One of the good things

about Applause is its video, which contains a lot of cultural

references, so many that websites have started counting them. This one

says it has got 48 cultural references. We can see Botticelli,

Andy Warhol, Fritz Lang, and of course, KJ Choi... Anyway, carry on.

Wearing it like a hat, yes. Which is putting it on and taking it off, so

to put it within an album, to make sure it is embedded, that is quite a

hard thing to do, given that you have got so many references in your

work. You do not want to think you are Michael Jackson going through a

home furnishing shop, you need to make sure that it is in the works,

don't you? You do and you don't. We are getting back to this idea of

defining art in jongleurs and sticking it in particular places. I

want to really free myself of all of that. -- in genres. It is really

exhausting to have the projection of the world onto you, what you should

be. I do not know what I am. I do not even know if that is any good,

and I do not know if that matters. What matters is that it is, and it

is there, free to feel and to be and to experience. It is a life force on

its own. And I am still very young in the duration of my work. If you

look at the work of many artists over many mediums, you can see them

channelling and imitating and bringing along the artists that they

have admired and learned from, their teachers. And then later on in their

careers, that is when the real amazing work starts to happen. So I

do not know if anything I have done is very good, but that is not really

the point. I am not really the point, if that makes any sense. It

does. You are saying that you are on a journey to try to discover the art

that you can make and you do not know if you have made it yet. Sure,

it is really about the potential. What I am saying is that it is worth

it to be a student. To not be a student would be to suggest that I

was creating in a vacuum, just floating in space, with no

knowledge, no gravity, no error, no oxygen, no nothing. And perhaps that

is something that I will learn how to do. I do not know that anyone

does that. I have yet to meet any great artist, and I am very lucky to

have worked with Jeff Koons, Bob Wilson, Marina Abramovic I have yet

to have any moments with them where we have not been talking about art

works which have happened before. You just have to trust in your

teachers that they will guide you. And how did you pick those three

teachers? To me, they all seem very different to each other. They seem

like they have come from different backgrounds, although they are all

artists. I think they are my holy Trinity. In a way. You have theatre,

you have this discipline, this meditative, performance discipline,

and then you have a commercial art which is viable as fine art. And

these are all the sorts of things that I am very interested in. So, it

is the combination of what they represent for me, and how it has

guided me in my views of where we are now, in terms of pop art and how

it has travelled into our pop, like an inferno. So, without

disrespecting you, I am just trying to explain it to young kids, we are

taking the soup can art and putting it back in the soup can. The soup

can art is already on the soup can, it says Andy Warhol on the bottle. I

have been doing this since the beginning of my career, and I have

just discovered its meaning now. In the album, I have found artists that

I feel very connected to their vibrations and their work. We speak

a language that I understand, if that makes any sense. When I am

working with Bob, for example, I think it was maybe 7-8 hours

yesterday, not moving, as he directed me. We did a bondage

piece, and I am hanging in Verte it, I told him I wanted to do something

-- inverted -- which was, I should not say tribute... Inspired by one

coach -- inspired by? The tortured soul of the artist, related to

suicide. We have yet to really acknowledge the living legends when

they are living, and they only really become legends when they die.

So I wanted to hang for as long as possible in order to have an

experience with my body feeling numb and being out of control, the thing

which you mentioned. And also, facing the challenge of my own

mortality. And I went out and they tied me up, they inverted me. It was

quite intense. And he just pressed record. That to me sounds remarkably

intense and a very difficult thing to do. When you came out of that,

obviously, you had to be in a certain state in order to create

that piece, so how do you feel? I went through so many different

emotions from the beginning to the end of the piece. I am usually quite

speechless after I do something like that, and for example with that

piece, I did not really feel human at all. My humanity really left me,

and my mortality didn't matter. But this numbing sensation from the

feet, as it travels up into the neck and then your heart starts to go

numb, and your arms, and then your head, it is somewhat of what I would

imagine that feels like. And yet there were moments I was quite

liberated by the feeling, because I have had addiction problems as well,

so the numbing is quite freeing for me. And as the blood rushed out of

my body, how do I explain it... ? I had to decide for myself in this

moment what the intention was. I had to decided in a moment when my

humanity was sort of being drained from me. How do such experiences

feed into your pop performances? It is. It is quite mastered the Tory. A

lot of theatres this way, it is like entertainment. When you watch Bob 's

work with the lighting, it is overwhelming how beautiful it is.

You cannot take your eye off it. What I am saying is, I think that a

lot of people like, for example, you, you are seeing me for the first

time. A lot of people in my life have known me in this way for some

time and see me grow in this. I have gone through stages of being centred

and then being addicted to drugs and alcohol, having a difficulty

handling the chaos in my mind. When I go on stage, you cannot imagine

the energy of all those fans. When you are talking about your reaction

to your fans, we have been talking to some fans who have been making

video diaries. They love you. I am interested in your relationship with

the fans. Every artist has a lot of fans. They have a certain

relationship. Your relationship seems to be particularly intense. It

is. What do you get from them when you see them outside the hotel, when

they talk to you? Well, I'd choose to receive their love. And, because

of that, it has become very intimate over the years. I think that maybe,

in your suggestion that my relationship with my fans is

different than some other pop artists, I think some of it is

because there is a separation between them and the work for some

people. That's what I am doing here and what is happening here are two

different things. Because I have studied Stanislavski since I was 11

years old, I have a sense. So, because of that, I am aware of their

energy all the time and I received it. I need it for my work. I cannot

survive without them. They have injected this love into me that

carries through every single moment of my life. For me to separate and

compartmentalised my work from them is dishonest. That is what I am

learning. Working with Jeff is very intense because you see is pure joy

and creating like a child. -- his pure joy. This is what I am so

inspired by. You make it accessible for everyone to know that if you

love something and then you apply the discipline and then the eye for

the theatricality of it, whatever it may be. And then the integrity of

the message, from me, which is what Jeff is all about. That is something

when the moment happens. That in explainable moment. I did not mean

to interrupt. I did not mean to talk for so long. These things happen.

When you go out of the hotel, and you see the fans, you present

yourself in various ways. Those are the different looks from perhaps

what you would get on ARTPOP or when you are performing on the X Factor.

It is like another world that you are creating. Walking out the hotel

is not the same as performing on X Factor. You have two consider all

the variables. One I am leaving their hotel, it is so different and

it feels so natural. It is a canvas that I understand. The fans, the

love, the stairway. The paparazzi in London are very nice to me. I think

they appreciate the joy I have for transforming for them and allowing

myself to be OK with them. My fans like that. Also, I always stay in

this hotel now. It has become a stage for me to leave. They probably

love it as well because they are able to see me truly in my element.

There are a lot of things we do not see. The corporate musical world is

terrifying and I hate it. Why do you hate it? They try to tell me what to

do, the entire time. ARTPOP is about two worlds. One from the sphere of

art and one from the fear of pop. I became a pop star because of my

incessant drive my love for creating. Then you are faced with

the sort of choice. Am I going to go left or right and allow these

corporate projections to drive what I do? It is tormenting for me. It

physically painful. I had to decide if I was going to allow that. Allow

people to project things onto me and do that. I have decided the only

people I will allow to project things onto me are Marina

Abramowitz, prints and Jeff Wilson. Corporations are poison. It is the

death of art and it is killing young people. It is just like fast food.

It might taste good at first but after you eat it for many years, you

might get fat, sick or die. I just want to feed my family. You are not

like I thought at all. I will give you a hug. Thank you very much for

that. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was my interview with

Lady Gaga. Were she worth waiting for? Yes, definitely. She did three

more interviews then flew to New York to prepare for her album

release. Leaving her little British Monsters to do the same. Today is

first to November. I have lost a ball in my nose ring so it looks

really weird. But, before we go to the launch party, a little footnote.

A couple of days after our interview, it was announced that

Gaga's relationship with her original manager, Troy Carter, had

come to an end. So the launch party for ARTPOP, ARTRAVE, actually became

our first opportunity to see how Gaga might indeed move away from

that corporate music world into something more - art.

ARTRAVE took place on November 10th. And it was an enjoyably odd affair.

It came across as a collaboration between Gaga and Jeff Koons. Koons

sculptures were to be seen everywhere.

And Gaga introduced us to what is quite possibly her most eccentric

dress to date - Volantis. The flying dress. We cannot wait for you to see

her. Stand back! Jeff Koons and Marina Abramovic were

on hand to offer their support. And so was Tony Bennett.

And then she spoke - a little oddly, but we're used to that. I hope today

is a change in pop culture, not for me but for everyone. I hope that we

remember we are in this together as a world. If we belong together, so

many great things can happen. ARTPOP. And ARTPOP was at last

released to the hungry little monsters. It has just gone midnight

on the 11th and ARTPOP has officially been released in the UK.

I will hear it for the first time. Oh, my gosh! It is downloading.

You can really hear how much hard work she has put into this album and

how much it means to her. I cannot wait for her to come back to London.

I miss her so much. I cannot wait for her to give me the biggest hug.

I want to tell her how proud of her we all are. We could not be more

proud at this moment in time. I cannot cope.

I love it. ARTPOP is about finding your talent. If you are going to be

good at art, pursue their talent. Do something creative. Creative things

are so important. This album is so creative and so beautiful. I want to

say a massive thank you. Just having to pause for a second. ARTPOP is

actually number one on iTunes within 30 minutes. That was quick.

It is amazing. The Little Monsters. Loving it, of course. Some

unanswered questions. The main one being, is there any art in ARTPOP?

Well, art is referenced a couple of times in the lyrics, but to be

honest the music - there are at least six fantastic songs by the way

- is what we expect from Gaga. Big, hooky pop, designed for the dance

floor at 3am, as much as it is for the charts. If you think about her

as a kind of multimedia mistress, though, perhaps you can say that the

art is in her videos. It is certainly in her encounters with her

fans as she moves from car to lobby. And, of course, it was in that

incredibly strange performance that she gave us on camera. Record

breakingly long pauses, strange confessions, a brief seance with

Andy Warhol. And only one answer that really had anything to do with

her music at all. I liked her. In fact, I was slightly blown away by

her and I hope you were too.