Lady Gaga's brand new single "Perfect Illusion" has topped Billboard's Twitter trending chart as buzz about her upcoming new, potentially secret, album continues to heat up. The chart-topping feat is unexpectedly impressive in that the single itself is weeks away from being released.
A new single from one of pop music's A-list artists often finds itself at the top of Billboard's Twitter chart, as buzz about the track grows in mentions on the social media giant. But Lady Gaga's accomplishment is especially noteworthy because it not only hasn't been released yet, it apparently won't be available for weeks.
The singer must feel vindicated that fan interest is so high after relatively tepid reaction to Gaga's previous album "Artpop," released in November 2013. The collection received mixed reviews critically, and only produced one bona fide hit single, "Applause." "Do What U Want," the album's catchy second single had limited success, partly because of its association with collaborator R. Kelly, and third and final single "G.U.Y." outright bombed, a rare occurrence for any Lady Gaga release.
After being raked through the coals in the media for what many called "Artflop" (the album still performed well but was considered a failure in relative sales terms), Gaga made a surprise comeback with her 2014 "Cheek To Cheek" jazz duet album with legendary singer Tony Bennett, whom she credited for inspiring her to enjoy making music again.
Recently, Lady Gaga has been seen in the studio with various top pop producers. One of them, Mark Ronson, is reportedly the producer of first single "Perfect Illusion," the name of which Gaga revealed last week in a series of cryptic Instagram posts that turned out to comprise a mosaic of the single's name. The buzz grew rapidly and has resulted in her topping the Billboard Twitter chart dated Sept. 3.
Ronson was coy about revealing much about the new music in a recent interview but stated, "It's some of my favourite music I've really ever worked on. It's incredible - I love it," adding, "I can't wait until you can hear it because the music speaks for itself - some of my favourite musicians of all time are working on it."
The announcement has in turn led to much speculation about the release date of Lady Gaga's new album. While some reports claim that Gaga may follow in the footsteps of Beyoncé by secretly releasing her album this fall with no prior fanfare, other sources insist this is not true. In addition to Ronson, Gaga has reportedly been working with the producer of many of her biggest early hits, RedOne, as well as top EDM producer Zedd.
