Lady Gaga

It's a deluxe album as only Gaga could do it: larger than life and, yes, even monstrous. The Fame Monster is stuffed to the gills with eight new tracks. Most don't radically depart from her debut's dance-pop vibe, but they do reinforce Gaga's talents: making somewhat familiar musical ideas a wee bit edgy and a whole lot addictive (see the "Fernando"/"La Isla Bonita"-biting "Alejandro" or the Beyonce-featuring "Telephone"). Things get really interesting when she takes off in different directions, as on the glammy (albeit more Elton than Freddie), strongly sung "Speechless" and the saucy "Teeth."

Gaga is including locks of hair from her wigs in the deluxe reissue of 2008's The Fame. It's
the Warhol-y thing to do. But she covers her conceptual bets by rolling out sturdy
club-thumpers, and this eight-song EP (included in the reissue and sold separately) is
largely on point. "Bad Romance" makes her name a Teutonic chant; "Alejandro" is a loving
Abba spoof. Half the disc is Madonna knock-offs, but that's part of the concept —... More >