Lady Gaga just released her brand new music video for "Perfect Illusion", the first single from her highly anticipated Joanne album, her first pop album in three years. While millions of fans have flocked to YouTube and Vevo to watch Gaga in action, the single is receiving mixed reaction from fans and isn't exactly tearing up the pop charts.
Gaga premiered the music video on the season premiere episode of the Fox television series "Scream Queens," and since then it has already been viewed on YouTube and Vevo more than 8 million times.
The new video features Gaga performing her new song in a field as well as an underground nightclub, surrounded by a group of enthusiastic dancers.
The quick cuts and flashing images that appear throughout the video and grow in number as the song progresses are intended to be jarring, as are some elements of the song itself.
That jarring quality seems to be turning off a large segment of Gaga's fan base, who aren't used to hearing her sing in the screaming rock style she features in "Perfect Illusion".
As a result, the single isn't performing as well as other previous releases by the pop diva, especially those that previewed an upcoming album release. The song will debut on Billboard's Hot 100 chart dated Oct.1 at number 15. "Applause," Gaga's first single from ARTPOP in 2013, debuted at number 6, while "Born This Way" from her 2011 album of the same name, debuted at number 1.
The song sits at a lowly number 22 on the iTunes sales chart, and hasn't made much of a splash on Spotify's U.S. and global streaming charts either, where it now sits at the lowly numbers 53 and 39, respectively. Is the tepid reaction to the track an indication of lack of interest in the star, or is it the song itself?
Anticipation for the track was high as the song topped Billboard's Twitter trending chart weeks before its actual release, but many fans seem put off by the shrillness of the track itself, especially Gaga's voice, which appears to be straining to hit some of the high notes in the raw sounding tune.
Vocal coach Justin Stoney, founder of New York Vocal Coaching, says that Gaga may be trying to emulate the ranges of some of her rival pop divas, like Jessie J, Tori Kelly and Ariana Grande.
"Lady Gaga historically has not had a belt that has gone as high as those other ladies," explains Stoney. "This particular song starts sort of in that higher range and then later in the song, it changes key and then it's definitely up there, a little bit higher than she's used to going."
Whether the rest of the album features similar vocals or a return to Gaga's lower range, in which she sang most of her biggest hits, will be clear in about a month's time, when Gaga's full album Joanne is released on Oct. 21.
