What Makes It Popular

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What Makes It Popular? This essay is going to focus on what makes the artist Lady Gaga, birth-name of Stefani Germanotta, so popular within the music industry and the general public. It is first of vital importance to touch upon the worldwide disputes revolving around the meaning of popular music. Roy Shuker (1994) in his book Understanding Popular Music claims that “Popular is a contested term. For some it means simply appealing to the people, whereas for others it means something much more grounded in or ‘of’ the people.” This definition is applicable to different variations of music genres and is definitely applicable to Lady Gaga’s style. Lady Gaga as an artist Lady Gaga’s rush to commercial success and rapid rise in popularity since her first album release ironically titled ‘The Fame’ in 2008 proves to be an interesting and yet complex examination of the mainstream pop-artist. The reference to “fame” is purposely employed as a method of evoking clear ideologies towards the concept of fame in itself. As a Postmodern artist, aspects of Lady Gaga’s career successes can be seen in her vast demand for global tours, three number ones within the UK charts alone, as well as an estimated 23 million albums and 64 million singles worldwide. In order to understand what contributes into creating a popular, mainstream artist, we must first research into the methods in which the industry often applies into marketing their product. The music industry today covers the news globally. It is one of the largest entertainment industries in the world and constantly finds new ways to sell to the general public as a whole, as opposed to focusing on particular strict audience groups. Roy Shuker (2010) states, “The recorded music industry is the engine helping to drive a much broader music sector, which is worth more than $100 billion globally. This is over three times the value of

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