Lady Gaga casts a spell with her newest single ‘Abracadabra’
By SHREYA KUMAR — arts@theaggie.org
During the Grammy Awards on Feb. 3, Lady Gaga debuted her new single, “Abracadabra.” The high-energy dance pop track was accompanied by a theatrical music video that quickly garnered widespread attention, racking up over 16 million views on YouTube just a few days after its release.
“Abracadabra” marks the second single from Gaga’s highly anticipated eighth studio album, “Mayhem,” set for release in March. For long-time fans, Gaga’s return to dance pop feels like a homecoming. Her career skyrocketed in 2008 with “The Fame Monster,” an album filled with infectious beats, campy visuals and a rebellious attitude that challenged mainstream norms.
She cemented herself as a queer icon and a voice for social change with subsequent albums “Born This Way” and “ARTPOP,” both of which leaned heavily into electronic dance music (EDM) and explored themes of sexuality, self-expression and cultural defiance. Gaga’s early work was provocative and boundary-pushing, drawing inspiration from burlesque and queer ballroom culture to craft a sound and image that shook the industry and ignited conversations about LGBTQ+ rights and sexual liberation.
However, in the late 2010s, she chose to take a break from releasing club bangers and instead explore genres like jazz and soft rock on her next two albums, “Cheek to Cheek” and “Joanne.” Soon after, she landed a lead role in the film remake “A Star is Born,” whose mellow, acoustic soundtrack was so popular in the mainstream that she became the first woman to ever win an Oscar, Grammy, British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) and a Golden Globe all in the same year.
By this point, despite still being wildly popular and successful, many of her original fans felt that she had let go of her counterculture roots in favor of a more universally palatable sound and look. She returned to her dance pop sound on the 2020 album “Chromatica,” but the album was overshadowed by its many collaborations with big names in pop like Ariana Grande, Elton John and Blackpink, as well as the COVID-19 pandemic in general.
With the release of “Abracadabra,” fans and critics alike are debating whether Gaga has fully reclaimed her dance pop throne. The song features pulsating beats and hypnotic synths, very reminiscent of her earlier hits from “The Fame Monster” era. The accompanying music video, co-directed by Gaga herself, showcases a vibrant dance battle between the light and dark facets of Gaga’s persona, featuring frenetic choreography, avant-garde costumes and striking visuals. Many longtime fans have praised the single as a return to form, celebrating its theatrical flair.
Additionally, the current resurgence of EDM-heavy dance pop — exemplified by Charli XCX’s 2024 album “Brat” — has shifted the genre’s landscape, in turn making Gaga’s return less unexpected than it might have been a decade ago.
Some cultural analysts have even linked the renewed popularity of high-energy, hedonistic dance pop to economic and political instability, coining the term “recession pop” to describe the high energy, raunchy club anthems that tend to thrive in times of societal uncertainty. When people lose trust in institutions, they often turn to extravagant escapism, embracing high-fashion aesthetics and maximalist music that encourages dancing, having fun and self-confidence.
Lady Gaga is no doubt one of the pioneers of “recession pop,” and her return to the sound has made people even more aware of how much skepticism and fear is in the air right now. Her re-emergence into this space suggests not just a return to her roots but an acknowledgment of the cultural climate that made her music resonate so deeply in the first place.
Whether “Mayhem” will solidify Gaga’s return to her dance pop roots or push her into new creative territory remains to be seen. Does her return herald a new age of economic insecurity or is she merely cashing in on a current trend that she helped create years ago? Regardless, “Abracadabra” has reignited discussions about her impact on pop music, proving once again that Lady Gaga remains one of the most compelling and unpredictable artists of her generation.
Written by Shreya Kumar — arts@theaggie.org
