The Best of Both Worlds: Lady Gaga & R. Kelly - "Do What U Want" (ARTPOP)

Lady Gaga recently teamed up with Hip-Hop Soul/R&B crooner and Phoenix cohort R. Kelly for her latest teaser single, "Do What U Want." The first in a series of a planned weekly singles series leading up to her third studio album, ARTPOP (November 11th); Highsnobiety further described it as "a distinct step away from some of the styles of many of Gaga's previous songs, less Bowie-derived and more Tina Turner." But I personally hear lurching rhythmic effects that're reminiscent of "Thriller"'s eerie-sounding central rhythm and seasoned vocal inflections akin to Christina Aguilera. It's kinda more or less along the lines of a socially-conscious "panty-dropper," inter-spliced with semi-prolific lines like, "Do what you want with my body... Write what you want. Say what you want about me."


Just mere hours before uploading "Do What U Want" at 12:01am, Lady Gaga ended up posting a number of shit-slinging and self-loathing Tweets, coincidentally hashtagged #DoWhatUWantWithMyBody, #WriteWhatUWant, etc: "MADONNA HATES GAGA, SHE'S OVER... I don't need anybody's permission to be remembered. I will be. Whether they like it or not." While R. Kelly may seem like a pretty unlikely collaborator, lest we forget Gaga's previously worked with Kanye, Kendrick Lamar, Marilyn Manson, and Tony Bennett. Chicago producer Paul "DJ White Shadow" Blair helped conjure up the majority of ARTPOP's 15 tracks, including singles "Applause," "Venus," and "Do What U Want," in addition to "Jewels n' "Drugs" with T.I. Too $hort, and Twista. R. Kelly's own forthcoming album, Black Panties, on the other hand, has been pushed back to December 10th for additional mastering. Even though Kelly stated back in August that new Trapped In The Closet chapters were supposedly just "a few months" away, episodes onward of recently unveiled Chapters 22-33 have yet to fully materialize.