Oh, please…

Here it is, then. Among her many faults, she confirms one as amongst her worst: she takes herself waaay to seriously:

Lady Gaga refuses Weird Al permission

Essentially, the link takes you to Weird Al Yankovic’s account of his being refused permission by Lady Gaga to do a parody of “Born this way” on his new album. As he points out, he’s actually pretty respectful of the artists he parodies and is a very well known, long standing satirist, so the vast majority have no problem granting him permission. Not so Lady Gaga, who didn’t even have the decency to give him reasons for her decision. This surely reeks of someone so completely enamoured with their own image that they can’t stand to have anyone laughing at them for any reason; bad enough at the best of times, but I see nothing in this artist’s reportoire, apart from an ability to read the public well, that would justify such an exalted opinion.

It’s a pet peeve of mine actually, people and companies that take their image so seriously. Whether it be Vodacom whining about Cell C’s adverts targeting their new campaign or SAB trying to crush Laugh It Off for satirical t-shirts, the demonstrated inability to laugh at one’s self shows something fundamentally amiss. Do you really think you’re supifyingly perfect and above the rest of us, or is there a secret fear that your image hides imperfections that will be fully brought to light by a little laughter? Really, having your sense of humour removed at birth is not a good thing…

UPDATE:

According to new reports, Lady Gaga has given permission: it was her myopic managers that refused it. So the artist is exonerated (though not from any other faults) and we chalk this one up to a failure on the part of the pencil pushers, not her. Wouldn’t like to be in that manager’s shoes right now!