Lady Gaga made history at last year’s MTV Video Music Awards when she turned butcher’s cuts into high fashion.
On Thursday, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland unveiled the singer’s raw-meat dress to the public. The dress – made of layers of Argentinian beef – was kept in a meat locker, placed in a vat of chemicals and then dried out by taxidermists in California before being transported to the museum.
Hall of Fame spokeswoman Margaret Thresher says the dress took on a “dark, beef-jerky” look while dehydrating, so it was painted to look “fresh” afterward. The entire process took several months to complete.
The dress is being displayed as part of the “Women Who Rock: Vision, Passion, Power” exhibit, which runs until February 2012.
Flamboyant pop star Lady Gaga has sold more than one million copies of her new album to top the U.S. pop chart for the first time, according to sales data published on Tuesday by Billboard magazine.
Fans scooped up 1.11 million copies of her much-hyped release “Born This Way” during the week ended May 29, with a bit of help from a hugely popular 99-cent promotion by online retailer Amazon.com Inc.
It marks the biggest first-week sales total since rapper 50 Cent’s “The Massacre” debuted to 1.14 million copies in March 2005. The last album to break the million mark was country starlet Taylor Swift’s “Speak Now,” which started with 1.01 million copies last November. Boy band ‘N Sync holds the first-week record with 2.4 million copies for its 2000 album “No Strings Attached.”
Billboard estimated that Amazon downloads accounted for upward of 440,000 downloads of “Born This Way.” Overall digital downloads totaled a record-breaking 662,000 copies, Billboard said.
Lady Gaga records for Interscope Records, a unit of Vivendi SA’s Universal Music Group. Her 2008 debut album “The Fame” peaked at No. 2 and has sold 4.2 million copies to date in the United States. An eight-track follow-up EP titled “The Fame Monster” reached No. 5 and has sold 1.5 million copies.
Despite the ‘Hair’ hitmaker grossing an estimated $125 million from her huge 200-performance show at one point the production had cost her so much to stage – with its elaborate costumes and backing dancers – she had spent more money than had been earned.
She told the Financial Times newspaper: “I put everything in the show, and I actually went bankrupt after the first extension of the ‘Monster Ball’. And it was funny because I didn’t know! And I remember I called everybody and said, ‘Why is everyone saying I have no money? This is ridiculous, I have five number one singles’ – and they said, ‘Well, you’re $3 million in debt.’ ”
However, Gaga hasn’t curbed her spending since her tour and reportedly recently sent minders to buy memorabilia from London of the British royal family to decorate her home with and remind her of her fans in England.
A source told the Daily Mirror newspaper: “Gaga has sent her staff to London to spend £10,000 on Princess Diana and Prince William and Kate Middleton wedding memorabilia. She wants to set up a room in her New York apartment dedicated to London and all her precious Little Monsters over there.”
In addition to her extravagances, the ‘Judas’ singer has also been looking after her parents with her riches.
She said: “The only big things I’ve purchased are my dad’s heart valve and a Rolls-Royce for my parents, for their anniversary. And that was only because my dad had a Lady Gaga licence plate on our old car and it was making me crazy because he was getting followed everywhere, so I bought him a new car.”
The ‘Hair’ hitmaker is planning to eschew her usual electro pop sound to make a record of traditional jazz hits for the festive period.
She told the Financial Times newspaper: “I thought it would be really sweet to do a Christmas release of Gaga and the jazz standards. I really want to do it. I’ve spoken to my manager.”
Giving a possible preview, the ‘Born This Way’ star recently gave a rendition of jazz track ‘Orange Colored Sky’ when she performed in England.
The 25-year-old musician has also spoken of her admiration for British singer Adele, who she is set to knock from the top of the album charts with her ‘Born This Way’ album this week, ending a 16-week run by the ‘Someone Like You’ singer.
Gaga said: “I’m so excited for Adele. She’s doing so well all over the world and it’s wonderful to see the world embrace her. She’s beaten some of my chart records but I’m happy for her. I love seeing women succeed and she’s so talented.”
Much like the caller in the Lady Gaga hit song “Telephone,” some visitors to Amazon’s site received a busy signal Monday when they tried to download the digital version of the artist’s latest album, “Born This Way,” which the online retailer was selling for 99 cents on its release date.
Spokeswoman Sally Fouts said Amazon experienced a high volume of traffic that caused delays for those downloading the album – echoing a posting on the album’s product page on Amazon.com. Customers who ordered the MP3 version of “Born This Way” on Monday will get it for 99 cents, she said.
An early evening attempt to buy the album on Amazon and use its new server-based storage system went seamlessly. The album appeared instantly on Amazon Cloud Drive and could be streamed online right away. The album downloaded in a few minutes to a computer. The user’s storage space also registered the promotional 20 gigabytes of cloud storage that came with the album.
Lady Gaga, whose real name is Stefani Germanotta, is known for her pop music and outre fashion sense.
Customer reviews gave the album an average three out of five stars.
The combination of Justin Timberlake and Lady Gaga on the season finale of “Saturday Night Live” was double the laughter.
First, they both starred in “Bring It on Down…,” a skit made famous by Timberlake during his past hosting gigs when he has dressed as an omelet and a breast implant and danced to promote local businesses.
This time, Timberlake, as a bottle of beer, invited people to “bring it on down to Liquorville” as he sparred with Kristen Wiig’s tea bag (she was promoting a tea salon). As the two battle it out on the sidewalk, Timberlake tells her to “stop whining” — and that’s when Gaga comes out dressed as a bottle of wine, complete with a giant cork on her head.
The two pop singers then launch into a medley of songs, with the lyrics changed to be alcohol-themed, including B.o.B’s “Airplanes,” Flo Rida’s “Low” and “Endless Love” by Lionel Richie and Diana Ross.
They later joined Andy Samberg for the digital short, “3-Way,” a sequel to Timberlake and Samberg’s previous hit, “Motherlover.”
In it, Timberlake and Samberg — in really bad facial hair and ’80s-era fashion — sing the praises of having a menage a trois.
Their lady? Gaga, of course.
“It’s not gay when it’s in a three-way,” Timberlake and Samberg sing, with Gaga on backing vocals. “With a honey in the middle and some lee-way. The area is gray in a three-way.”
Other highlights from Timberlake’s big night: the reprisal of “The Barry Gibb Show” with former “SNL” star Jimmy Fallon and the “What’s That Name” skit, in which Timberlake could not remember the name of his former ‘NSync group member, Chris Kirkpatrick.
The ‘Hair’ hitmaker emerged onstage in Carlisle, Northern England, from the velvet lined box, opening her hour-long set at the Radio 1 Big Weekend Festival with her recent single ‘Born This Way’.
The singer performed tracks from her new album – also called ‘Born This Way’ – as well as older favorites including ‘Poker Face’ and ‘Bad Romance’ during the show, which saw her make numerous costume changes, but clad in black throughout.
During her song ‘Judas’, Gaga wore an eye mask and a crucifix attached to her pants. She also played jazz standard ‘Orange Colored Sky’, changing the words in tribute to British royal couple The Prince and Princess of Cambridge, who married at the end of last month.
She told the crowd: “When I was in the United States I wished I was at the Royal Wedding. I want to be the girlfriend of a handsome prince.”
Gaga also gave a tearful rendition of her track ‘Edge of Glory’ after explaining to the crowd it was written about her grandfather.
Before her performance – which saw her take to the stage 40 minutes late – Gaga said she wanted it to be a little more “off the cuff” than her recently concluded The Monster Ball Tour shows.
She told BBC Radio 1 DJ Scott Mills: “I’m going to change it up a bit and maybe do a jazz tune. I’m going to see how I feel. It’s not the Monster Ball. I usually get a little more off the cuff when I do festival shows.
“I get really inspired by the audience depending on how I feel about the show. It’s not completely planned out.”
Other acts to appear at the free two-day event, attended by some 40,000 people, included Foo Fighters, Tinie Tempah, Nicole Scherzinger, Jessie J, My Chemical Romance and Bruno Mars.
