Gothic gargoyles appeared, lights dimmed, and the crowd chanted the prima donna’s name at the desert operahouse. It was Friday night at Coachella and Lady Gaga was about to tell the story of Mayhem — and give the performance of a lifetime.
Over two hours and four acts, Gaga brought to life the inner battle between two sides of herself: lightness (an angelic, innocent Gaga monster with blonde hair) and darkness (the shadowier “lady in red” she sings about in “Abracadabra”).
In the first act of her headlining Coachella set, she took the stage while wearing a massive, three-story dress and performed “Bloody Mary,” embracing the new life given to the Born This Way favorite on TikTok. Then came “Abracadabra,” where she channeled a Victorian-era opera singer in a dark parallel universe. Fittingly, next came “Judas,” which saw Gaga deliver the original choreography from the uproar-provoking video.
“How you feeling tonight… welcome to my house of mayhem,” Gaga said, addressing the crowd for the first time after a “Scheiße” interlude and “Garden of Eden.”
She ended the first act with a direct face-off between her evil and good sides to the beat of “Poker Face” from her mid-crowd B stage — seemingly killing off Gaga of Light. But fear not: By the second act, she had risen, literally crawling out of a pile of dirt in a corseted white dress, surrounded by dancers in skull masks, who moved to “Perfect Celebrity.” It seemed to be a poignant, yet clear acknowledgement that the only way stars reach perfection is once they’ve left us.
“I love you so much. I wanted to make a romantic gesture to you this year amid these times of mayhem. I decided to build you an opera house in the desert,” Gaga told the audience in a touching speech before “Alejandro.” “For all the love and all the joy and all the strength you’ve given me my whole life. Sometimes I feel like it went into a dream when I was like 20 years old and I’ve been in a dream ever since then. I didn’t know if I wanted to wake up… what if you weren’t there?”
For the third act, Gesaffelstein took the stage adding his futuristic allure to a performance set centuries before. He DJed during “Killah,” which Gaga performed in a silver and royal blue leotard reminiscent of her first “Just Dance” performances. (She told Rolling Stone she was most excited to play that song live.)
On “Zombieboy,” it felt like Gaga was channeling a Wednesday Addams-esque narrative, twirling alongside skeletons with her dancers. By the end, some of the provocative moves with the rattling bone piles will likely fuel criticism from the usual close-minded detractors.
Throughout the performance, Gaga gently sprinkled in the must-dos that might not have fit her concert storyline, like a shortened “Die with a Smile” and tear-jerking performance of “Shallow” that brought out human Gaga.
“You are who you choose to be. You always will be and thank you for teaching me something,” she said to the crowd before blowing a kiss to one special person in the audience: her fiancé Michael Polansky. “Babe I love you,” she said. “And thank you for bringing me my man,” she said to the crowd.
Most touching of all was Lady Gaga high-fiving and embracing her little monsters who just wanted to receive Mother’s blessing. She took her time celebrating her fans while singing “Vanish into You,” dedicating the track to those in the crowd who survived 100-degree desert hell to see her. Ask anyone: It was worth it.
For the grand finale, Gaga took the stage as a feathered angel, revived from the afterlife, all while “Bad Romance” began to play and colorful fireworks exploded in the background. “We are monsters, and monsters never die,” read a message onscreen. Gaga’s Mayhem didn’t end in tragedy: Both light and dark will always exist within Gaga. It’s up to her who she’ll embrace.
Gaga’s storytelling — creative-directed with Parris Goebel — was transformative, and a spectacle that cemented her status as a once-in-a-lifetime pop icon.
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