The NY Post‘s Page Six is reporting today that the nuns of the Convent of the Sacred Heart, a Catholic girls school on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, are none-too-pleased with the antics of their former student, Stefani Germanotta, a.k.a. Lady Gaga. Specifically, the Post found that the sisters were appalled at Gaga’s blood-soaked performance piece at the VMAs last week. (The nuns want their MTV, do they?)
It got me thinking — aside from ‘duh’ — about other pop provocateurs who started out life as Catholic schoolgirls (or boys). Could it be that a solid, strict Catholic upbringing is almost necessary for the kind of intense, life-long acting out that rock ‘n roll requires? Madonna, of course, went to Catholic school at one point. Help me out and prove my theory — who else?
Sinead O’Connor went to a reform school run by nuns.
Posted some of this on another blog but still stand by my original thoughts on this:
I know there are so many haters out there but I love Lady Gaga. I think she is a truly gifted artist. She knows what “performance art” truly is and gives it 100%. She has real vocal ability that doesn’t have to be fixed by autotune, protune, protools or a vocoder. She actually knows how to play an instrument. She also has her own signature style that isn’t a part of the cookie cutter, staus quo sheep of pop/dance music that overwhelms the scene today. We need more originality today not less. It’s sad that I can look back at the 80′s * say there were more risk takers with real vocals(since even with synthesizers, you still had to have some semblence of talent no matter how thin to sing back then). People bad mouth her fashion choices yet the designers she is wearing were all once used by Madonna, for example Thierry Mugler & Jean Paul Gaultier. I would rather be stranded on an island with Lady Gaga then the no talent bs of Paris, Avril, Heidi Montag, Ashlee Simpson, etc, just to name 4 pieces of s h i t !
Madonna did just as many bizarre outfits and crazy antics and so have many before and after Madonna; have we forgotten the cone bras, the video of Madonna making out with jesus or being on a cross multiple times???
I hate Lady Gaga. I don’t care where she came from as long as she goes away soon.
Well you can go fck yourself cause she’s not going anywhere.
I personally think that people are just JEALOUS of her immence talent. They decide that instead of admitting her awesome-ness, they try to hurt her feelings. It’s just pathetic. :/
thats just lazy thinking. there’s plenty of reasons for not liking someone other then jealousy.
I don’t always get Lady Gaga, and she’s not my favorite musician, but she’s certainly a breath of fresh air in the pop music world! Beyonce’s off singing about being wronged by men (wow, what a creative idea!) and Gaga’s singing about the corrosive nature of fame (with weird performance to match). I have a lot of respect for her for doing whatever she wants and for really embracing the artistic possibilities of pop stardom.
“Corrosive nature of fame”? Having listened to the album, I always imagined it more as an unironic embracing of fame and of the general celebrity culture. Which, in this particular time, is kinda a scary thing to do (and yet endearing).
That being said, I basically agree with you; the woman is at least articulating a focused message, which most of her peers really are not. Even if musically she isn’t that interesting (dance-pop synths are all the rage, and she never seems to do anything with them that would be out of place on, say, that last Gwen Stefani album), she should get credit for at least trying to say something in particular.
I don’t know anything about Lady Gaga, nor do I want to. But the headline did give me a good laugh. What the H-E-Double Hockey sticks are nuns doing watching MTV and then complaining about it? Sounds like a bad SNL sketch, or maybe a good one after all.
Good point. Why are the nuns watching award shows on MTV? Or MTV at all? Someone should talk to them. Maybe up their number of daily rosaries to keep their minds out of the gutter.
Nuns can watch what they want, in my humble Catholic opinion. Unless you’re in charge of their convent, don’t tell them what they can’t do. (Right, John Locke?) To be a nun is not necessarily to be a pop culture hermit.
Maybe they were watching since she’s a former student?
Kerry-I wasn’t telling them what they can or cannot do. I was merely posing a question.
Yeah, the Catholic thing really helps. All that repression and guilt makes you a rebel, whether you want it or not. From Michelangelo to Madonna, Catholic repression has been fueling the arts for centuries.
I enjoyed Lady Gaga. She makes me laugh. Even though her kind of music isn’t my taste, I can hear the talent. I wish her well.
And if the nuns don’t like it, tough. They don’t like anything.
Gerard and Mikey Way were both raised roman catholic in Jersey and I’m not sure but I think they went to a catholic school. at least for awhile.
I think it’s pretty common knowledge that Catholic repression has been many artists inspiration.
For the record, I like Lady Gaga’s music but I hated her performance at the VMAs creeped me the fuck out.
Why are the nuns watching TV?
Much less VMA’s.
The “unnamed” source and the fact that they’re not returning calls kinda tells me this was some made up sham/
Nuns have tv’s ??? – are you sure ? ? ? ? ? something is fishy here….
George Carlin! built his career off his childhood experiences of catholic school.
When I’m dying, and who knows when that will be, I want to be counselled by Nuns, not the sensationalism of pop music. That’s why this type of art comes in and out of style. It’s meaning and importance are shallow, interesting for a time but not nearly as satisfying as true selflessness.
People have weird ideas about nuns. Sure they have TVs. They listen to the radio. Many of them, especially younger women, like many of the same performers that laity do. And they don’t giggle when someone mentions sex. They may be celibate, but they’re still sexual, like everyone else on the planet.
She may be talented, but her talents are never the focal point, she just rather plays up her skank image. I don’t see how or why that’s innovative, she feels contrived to me. People are hyping her to death, like what she’s done has never been done before (Grace Jones and David Bowie anyone?). I look at her and my reaction is pretty much “meh”. And IMO, I don’t think a Lady Gaga fan should be criticizing Beyonce’s lyrics when all Gaga writes about is sex, fame and partying. She’s no more a modern-day Bob Dylan than Beyonce is.
Ehhh — Sissy Spacek did it better.