Lady Gaga’s video for “Alejandro”—the third single released from her platinum-selling The Fame Monster—is here. And amidst all the sexually charged, homo-erotic, highly religious and arguably sacriligious imagery, one thing remains apparent: Gaga is hellbent on outdoing herself with each new visual epic. The Steven Klein-directed “Alejandro” clocks in at eight minutes and 44 seconds. Let’s head below and see what “Gaga Klein” came up with!
The first thing that becomes apparent—after, of course, the boys wearing leather hats and fishnet stockings—is that we’re at some sort of military-style funeral procession.
The clip then advances from Gaga as a widow to Gaga as a super sexed-up nun who swallows Rosary beads (well, that should give Fox News more food for venomous thought) and engages in simulated naughtiness with a bunch of gay dudes with bowl cuts. Alejandro, are you in there somewhere?
(Note: Gaga herself has said this video is a tribute to gay men and how she can never experience that type of love.)
By the time the guns are jutting out of Gaga’s bra (all we can think of here is Madonna’s classic “Vogue” cones), all the symbolism kind of gets muddled by the whole OTT-at-any-cost nature of the video.
What happened to the fun Gaga of “Telephone”? Where’s the coy, stylish Gaga from “Bad Romance” and “Paparazzi”? And, we know she’s a bit preoccupied with death (see her Larry King Live interview), but, geez—this video is just really depressing for such an upbeat summer jam.
We get it—artists need to evolve. And Lady Gaga has come a long way since the “Just Dance” house party days. But she should be careful not to fly too far over her little monsters’ heads in a bid to stay ahead of the pop pack.
So what do you think of the video? Blackbook recently noted that frequent Madonna collaborator Steven Klein had already done a shoot for W that featured models resembling the dancers in “Alejandro.”
Do you think Klein borrowed from himself here? And did “Alejandro” live up to your expectations after all the teases?
I totally agree with u with every words
esp “We get it—artists need to evolve. And Lady Gaga has come a long way since the “Just Dance” house party days. But she should be careful not to too over her little monsters’ heads in a bid to stay ahead of the pop pack.”
This is just too much for me, I honestly could not follow anything that was going on tons of screen changes lots crazy scenes with absolutely no relevance and nothing made sense Ive learned from the Telephone music video not to expect much but I actually like Alejandro its a shame she had to turn the video into another “look at all the crazy crap I’m doing” gimmick.
One of the better parts of the video was the very Madonna Vogue-ish black and white scene halfway threw the video should have just been like that the entire way threw but before you could really even get the chance to enjoy it was over and out come the ridiculous bazooka boobs.
I’m Over it.
no it isn’t wthat good
Kinda made me want to sit in a hot tub of water and cut my wrists. Artistic…..? Maybe. Fun to watch…..? Not for me anyway.
She really should try to be herself instead of Madonna.
First she portrayed herself as a psychopathic murderer in several videos which was not all that funny, and now she’s going for what – fascism? Blah. And on top of all that, she’s steeling profusely from Madonna (Vogue, Like a Prayer and other) and Sade’s Soldier of Love. She’s neither original nor progressive. I’m really starting to dislike her. Maybe she should be sent to a war zone for a year, and then allowed to come back and tell us a ‘story’. Blah.
I actually thought this was a massive step UP from Telephone which, to me, was basically unwatchable.
Listen, Gaga is playing to her Gays here. The dancing eye-candy, the monochromatic imagery, the inverted cross which looks like a hard-on and the fabulous shot of her swallowing Rosary Beads … her Gays will love it. As will a lot of people, I think. But, unlike Madonna who seems to have forgotten her Gays — can’t be an Icon without ‘em, honey; just look at Beyonce who has NO gays –, Gaga’s stepping up and snatching the crown. Gotta love her for that.
Bug Gaga doesn’t do subtle and quiet. She goes over-the-top and, as I said earlier, after the train wreck that was Telephone, this is a nice return to gorgeously shot, highly stylized, there’s-a-message-in-there-somewhere video making.
Telephone is unwatchable, this is a bit better, interesting, but the song is beautiful and the video is not. If sex a joyful pleasure, then get some help-anytime anything resembling s/m , or rough, or shades of violence – it just says something is wrong here. But the gal is brillant, and sweet and shy and I am a fan.
I love the song. Lady Gaga looks beautiful. The video is good to watch once ot twice because it is interesting, but then it is not fun like Lambert;s For Your Enterainment” which is always a pleasure to see.
First there was women in prison almost naked and violence;now we get the milirary, men in military and viloence. The pregression is downhill, from love to mere lust and pleasure is missing, and if you cant be happy, why live ? The video is interesting. I don’t like it anyway. The pleasure is missing for viewer too.
Ditto !
You obviously dont know a damn thing your talking about, The video is disturbing surely her “fans” aren’t into this tasteless classless display of exploitation & desperation? But then again…
Beyonce has no gay fans? Madonna forgotten her gays? Didnt she recently save some gay couple from going to jail for the rest of there lives cause of their “lifestyle” and didnt Beyonce’s Single Ladies explode on the charts thanks entirely to those infamous single ladie routines by her male fans? What the hell are you talking about?
“fabulous shot of her swallowing Rosary Beads” You really said that, your obviously just an ignorant buffoon
She has done an amazing work with Alejandro. It’s not supposed to be either pretty or shallow. There’s a much deeper message there, a serious one. She chose beautifully by using such a soft song for such a arguably chocking message. She is talking about how society simply forbid gays and transgenders to show their real side. They have to fight against it as religion and society dictates it as sin. The nazi inspired look to me seemed to resemble of how society dictates men in general to act against homosexuality. It shows how gay men are only supposed to show their true sides in their own private place, their own beds. She shows how wild is the sexuality they have to hide during the daylight and they’re wearing high heels to represent their “feminine” sexuality.
This video just shows the difference between artists like Gaga, that really has a meaningful message in their work, and other artists that only want to make money and look great in panties.
She’s turned into an idiot. Everyone is sick of her with the faux drama and faux bi story. She was cute in Eh Eh and Bad Romance was epic. She’s definitely on the downward spiral. BOOOORING too.
Seen it all before. War of words ensues with right-wing conservatives, call for boycotts blah blah blahhh…..Boring. It made no sense, it hade no storyline, it is just a bunch of images meant to shock and or drum up controversy, just like her last 3 or four videos. Its predictable and a waste of time. Whats Next? Graphic SODOMY ON A SWING SET ON A PLAYGROUND? IN A TURTLE COSTUME EATING LETTUCE WITH A BIBLE HAT ON? i’M OFFICIALLY UNIMPRESSED AND OVER THIS CHICK.
As if there were anything wrong with either making money or looking great in panties! C’mon, pal … it’s only Top 40 music. Looking great in panties trumps pseudo-intellectualism, and Gaga cain’t do it.
I agree with you. Once someone asks her to explain it she might say exactly that. :)
It’s a music video people. It’ll be on the radio and tv for two months and then it’ll disappear. Get over it.
Why do you guys take her so seriously? The video looks great and she looks amazingly beautiful. It’s a silly song so the video works OT to offset it.
It’s thrilling to look at. You guys are shallow to keep comparing her to Madonna b/c that’s all the women icon you know. Madonna Madonna Madonna. Oooh. Gaga is blond and bossy. She must be like Madonna! How deep!
She’s superior to Madonna in almost every way. At Madonna’s powerful height, she could not have made a better video (fun was all she could do). And here we have Gaga barely 2 years into her career and busting out epic after epic.
Since when music videos must have storyline? People hated “Bad Romance” when it came out calling it bombastic and whatever else, and it has now like 250 million hits on Youtube.
Go Gaga!
its her stand for gay rights, its not depressing its inspiring!
here this blog explains it:
http://jukeboxheroines.wordpress.com/2010/06/08/alejandro-lady-gagas-epic-video-toward-salvation-social-justice/
Wow, I think it’s especially clever what this girl has done. Now, granted, I’m not under some false illusion that Lady Gaga herself has been the sole architect of her trajectory throughout the popular realm, but I will say that she has made some delicious choices along the way. Only now do I see the calculus of taking catchy pop songs and assigning them a powerfully charged message. Developing herself into a controversial, talked-about entity has been a process of deft decision making in itself. It’s not easy being odd enough to inspire curiosity but not so odd as to completely turn people off.
True as it may be, this video is esoteric and most simps who view it will casually wash it from their sensory memory as a meaningless hodgepodge of former pop-culture references. I, however, feel it to be genius to utilize fragments of former pop-culture iconography, and reinvent it by breathing it full of symbolism and meaning. Classic of the 90′s was sumptuous feel and envelope-pushing sexuality which was the next logical step in the music video art considering it debuted only a decade before.
It’s not enough to show your ass in a suggestive pose, or grind ‘gainst someone in an unrestrained manner, or invoke social minorities in an obvious in-your-face manner; it’s simply not enough to utilize the most lavish stage sets, the most exotic lighting techniques, or the most multifaceted camera effects. First, it was the visual aide that accompanied the song, then it was the aesthetic of that video. I think we’ve entered a new chapter: What the music video means and how that makes commentary on the world around us. Congratulations music video: You’ve now officially graduated to the next level of artistic hierarchy. This format may not be pretty to look at or easy to understand, but that’s not the point. Props to the Lady, her arsenal, and her pathway for managing, through catchy appealing pop tunes, to bring real art to the masses.
To the simps: Kick back and wait a minute. A sugary dose of easy to digest, pretty-to-look-at, nothing-to-understand, commentary-less stuffing is heading your way.
Video is lame as is she!
@Teras Wow, that was a great comment and very well put- I couldn’t agree more. You should post that on Gaga’s FB page. The fans would appreciate your insight!
that was horrible!!!!!! i will go listen to some ke$ha to make me feel better!!!!!!
Thanks for posting my article!
it sucked i like only 2 are 3 of her songs and this is one of the ones that sucked lady gaga try not to go over your head and mass your life up becouse that is one of the ways you can and thats when all your fans stop likeing you becouse of that. You cool and all but sometimes you not like this vidoe so try not to mass it up with you fans son my friend will stop likeing you becouse she said that she dosnt like what you be doing in most of you songs.
yeah you cant evein get what she is trying to say in her song theres nothing to pull from it its like shes talking like my lil cusin when he trys to sing you cant understand what she is trying to say.
I wasn’t even around when Madonna started but I can listen to her music and watch her videos from 25+ years ago and still be amazed by them and understand why she’s called the undisputed queen of pop. LG’s songs are fun & I can dance to them but her artistic vision is a big, befuddled mess, mainly because she’s just pulling Madonna & other artist’s references out of her ass w/ no context to go along with them. I will bet you any amount of money that fast-forward 25 years and she will not have come close to surpassing Madonna’s legacy, in fact, she’ll have fallen embarrassingly short of it. See ya in 1/4 century, people.
This video to me in three words: abstract, to say the least. artistic and certainly emotional.
Am I Catholic, yes. Was I offended by her eating the rosary and her dressing as a nun…no I actually found it fascinating, okk maybe not fascinating but my eyes were glued to my screen as I watched. Possibly in disbelief or possibly just in admiration of her courage to express her own ideas.
On the meaning of the video I read that it is suppose to express a women who longs for a love that is no longer existant. She is troubled by her current state of life, without this lover. Alejandro means defender so I can see a whole connection with this lover symbolizing the protector of her heart or something like that.
I wish Lady GaGa could give us, fans a bit more insite into this video’s meaning, I am deeply curious.
Antichrist like
i love the video gaga keep doin yo thang
Yes, this video is far superior to “Telephone”—no killings this time! Yay! I can definitely appreciate anyone who explores the boundaries of gender expression and tries to break down the sociopolitical ties chafing them. I hate to invoke La Madge again, but the echoing of/response to “Like A Prayer” in her mixing of Catholic iconography with LGBT erotica really does seem to work here. Plus, it’s very tastefully shot as opposed to the aforementioned “Telephone” which was occasionally nauseating in its whole bang-zoom circus-whirl aesthetic.
When I first saw the video, it hit me like a brick in all senses. However the classical sounding of the song allows the shots to be more extreme. And there is definitely something Madonna-ish but in a Gaga way which is good. Some older ideas are nicely interpreted. In general it’s smart and I like it. Not to mention that thanks to this video I can finally come to terms with her orange-blond hair in Telephone… Oh, and I really like the color scheme.
this is video is booooooooooooooring madonna ripp off zero original
WTF? WHAT A MASTER-CRAP.
it seems that you’re “creativity” is fading away faster than your success, lame
The song and the video total ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwhhhhh
I’M SICK AND TIRED OF THIS BITCH.
it’s not worth it ,it sucked,it’s a blatant copy. copycat!
Nope. Well I should say not for me. The video is pretty damn amazing but I understand that to some she is going overboard to get her many points across.
@Teras–
Delightfully well said.
love you katy perry for what you said about the clown.
I think this video is very deep in its meaning. On the surface it just seems so offensive in many many ways. And I will admit that I was a little offended by the nazi’s but then I looked at it for the second time and I came out of it feeling different.
What I got from the music video is that the female character gaga potrays in the video continually struggles with the fact she lost her loved one. As in the beginning funeral scene she holds her heart in her hands, symbolizing her loss. Then after words she is sitting above the soldiers, her eyes covered ( I think symbolizing her hiding her pain.) As the words say “she hides through love, She’s got a halo ’round her finger. Around you.” I think means that shes lost her will to love another, everyone she has a relationship means nothing. its just all empty lust (I guess). And the nazi’s I think Represent the coldness she feels from every man, the emptyness. It all just seems dead. And she doesn’t want anymore emotional attatchments (“Don’t wanna kiss don’t wanna touch just smoke one cigarette and run”)
And thats what I got out of it……
have you guys seen the behind the scenes? that’s better than this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4Gsrvu7Qfc
kesha is gay. along with her music videos.
lady gaga is a 1,000 times better than that KESHA crap. at least gaga puts some effort into her videos unlike KESHA’S “your love is my drug” video which looks like a 5 year old made it. GO GAGA!!!!!
I would’ve liked it…..
if Madonna’t done hadn’t done it already. No, seriously.
And Gaga wants this song to be gay anthem when the song nor the video are gay at all (Gaga humping men isn’t gay)….
Just another way to make Gaga fans delusional and think she’s a deity of sorts. Doesn’t matter if she blatantly copies someone, but if XTina does it, everyone calls her out on it. Please. I was a big Gaga fan and loved her originality shown in Bad Romance and other works, but not anymore. She and the fans have lost it.
Are you kidding me, TrggerTrigger? Go watch Madonna’s videos. Like a Prayer, La Isla Bonita, Justify My Love, Frozen, Vogue, Express Yourself, etc. Alejandro is an EXACT ripoff of those videos. Heck, watch this video. I DARE you to prove she’s not copying Madonna. All Gaga is is a Madonna ripoff with autotune. Who are you and her trying to fool?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVhcpxT37BU
I didn’t like it and I think she is so phony about what her motives are. She is the new Vanilla Ice.
Lady Gaga has come and taken the music world by storm with her SONGS and her video clips, that are so out there — they ARE talked about and so is ~SHE. By the way, as one of her “little monsters” I thought that her collaborating (twice!!) with Beyonce was a mistake albeit an effective one, especially since Lady Gaga did outshine her.
Men You are so absolutly right!