Taylor Swift VS Lady Gaga

Having been a Lady Gaga fan, I was somewhat stunned that someone I viewed as immature and less sophisticated would win the best album Grammy. So, I grabbed my wife's copy of Taylor Swift's Grammy winning Fearless album and began to listen. Here's what I figured out.


The Vitals

Swift: 20 years old Gaga: 23 years old. Both women are young, precocious songwriters and performers, and grew up in financially stable - if not affluent - home environments. Both play instruments with skill (Gaga - piano, Swift - guitar).





Voice

Taylor Swift has a powerful, rich voice. She demonstrates is on a range of songs in her music and it is prominently featured in the mix.

Lady Gaga has a powerful, rich voice (see "Speechless"), but she doesn't flex that power as much on her dance tracks.

Winner: Taylor Swift. Their voices may be equally amazing, but Swift shows hers off more on her album.

Persona

Taylor Swift has a wholesome appeal. She has a good deal of innocence and although she is 20 years old, she comes off as very young and for me it's not hard to imagine her as a high school student. Her attire is typical of someone her age. In interviews, she seems to be an ordinary person who appears very grounded.

Lady Gaga falls on the other side of the continuum - her lyrics can be jaded, emotionally inert, and somewhat aggressive. Although she is 23 years old, it's not hard to imagine her lyrics coming from a 30-something bitter divorcee. She doesn't need men - they need her. As an artist, she projects a very progressive image with her attire being exceptionally creative. It also contributes to the idea that she is inaccessible emotionally. She appears to be very devoted to her wardrobe creativity. She can show more of her body than is commonly accepted in US culture. In interviews, she appears to be fairly down to earth and opens up much more than you'd expect based on her music, giving much affection to her fans, and downplaying her fame and demonstrating modesty in her talent. She occasionally uses her fame to discuss social issues such as gay rights.

Winner: Lady Gaga. As an artist I find her much more interesting. However, this would not factor in a Best Album vote.

Songwriting

Both artists are the primary songwriters on their albums.

Taylor's songs nearly always relate to romantic relationships, and often specifically relate to cheating, breakups, or some other love triangle. The lyrics often reveal a story. Her musical arrangements are fairly simple. Instrumentation involves a fairly routine cast of sounds - strumming guitars, some electric guitar, piano, organ, and violin. Swift's music can be upbeat, touching, or plaintive. Lyrically, Swift wears her heart on her sleeve. Her songs have a lot of variety across songs (fast/slow, happy/sad, upbeat/slower) but not a lot happening within each song.

Consistent with her persona, Lady Gaga's music represents a large difference from Swift on many dimensions. Lady Gaga's songs often relate to aggressive pursuit of relationships with men, whereas Swift is more pleading and hoping. While shallower than Swift's lyrical content, I often find it more enjoyable because it is simple and catchy. Unlike Swift, her lyrics rarely tell a story or take you on any kind of journey. Occasionally she touches on personal topics such as relationships. Her arrangements are a bit more complex than Swift's and she uses a wider array of sounds in her music. However, across her songs, Gaga's sound is more consistent, where Swift shows a good bit of variety from song to song. Gaga's music tends to be more upbeat and energizing - like most good dance music. Unlike Swift's heartfelt lyrical sentiment, with Gaga, you're probably just seeing a protective outer coating - not the real Gaga.

Winner: Swift wins on lyrics, song structure, and song variety. Lady Gaga's music is more interesting sonically, the songwriting is very strong, and I would actually prefer to listen to Gaga's music because it's more fun and interesting, but critically I understand that Swift's album may be a greater collection of songs.

Lyrical Sample

Taylor Swift: "You be the prince and I'll be the princess" "She wears high heels I wear sneakers, she's cheer captain and I'm on the bleachers"

Lady Gaga: "Cherry cherry cherry boom boom" "Loving me is like chewing on pearls"

Conclusion

The fact is that right now I would prefer to listen to Lady Gaga because of the upbeat energy, sonic variety within each song, and the depth of her persona. But, I really do appreciate Taylor's talent, personality, and the results of her effort, which are usually very enjoyable.

This leads me to the question - why does a given person prefer one type of music to another? What accounts for musical taste?