Bad Romance

Analysis of the Video The video is dense with symbols and odd images. Some are significant while others seem to be random. It is obvious that the whole concept is a huge allegory for the reality of fame. She plays the role of a mind-controlled and drugged sex slave who is prepared to get auctioned to members of the Russian mafia. Here’s the video.

Main Story Line The video starts with Gaga emerging from what looks like a high-tech coffin or maybe a sensory deprivation tank.

At the beginning of the video, she is deprived of her senses. Either her eyes, her ears or her nose are covered. Sensory deprivation is a torture technique used on prisoners or mind controlled slaves in order to “break” them and to facilitate their re-education. She is a beginner, an amateur and she doesn’t really know what she’s doing.

Gaga can’t see or hear anything In one scene, she is wearing thick sunglasses and talking to herself through a mirror.

This is reminiscent of The Who’s Tommy movie, where a deaf, dumb and blind boy only becomes responsive when staring at the mirror.

The Who’s Tommy is a movie about a boy who becomes deaf, dumb and blind after a traumatic event.

Gaga then bathes herself to “wash off her sins” as Gaga said in an interview about the video. She is “wide-eyed” and innocent but we’ll see that she’ll gradually turn into a “Fame Monster”.

Innocent Gaga taking an innocent bath with her big innocent eyes She is then roughly handled by two women. She fights them but she finally accepts her fate and even raises her hands in praise.

Throughout the video, there is a back and forth between her being forced to go through with her duties as a slave and her willingness to go through with them. She is then forced to drink some vodka, which is in fact an MTV-friendly substitute for drugs. Mind controlled sex slaves are heavily drugged to numb their thoughts and make them easy to manipulate.

Gaga is then undressed and forced to perform in front of a bunch of men. Those mafioso can represent the Illuminati, the dark force ruling the music industry. The masks represent their hidden nature. Each individual represents a record company, and they are bidding to see who will sign her.

Gaga seems to be well aware of what is happening and she chooses to charm a particular guy, who seems to have what she wants. The masked man seems to enjoy what is happening to him and bids to obtain her.

One second left to the auction for the services of Lady Gaga Gaga is then required to fulfill her duties as a sex slave by…you’ve guessed it… having sex with the winning bidder. So she proceeds into a very symbolic room.

Her hands are strategically placed under the horned heads. Immediately after, a fire ignites the room.

On each side of the bed are gazelle heads, who symbolically refer to Baphomet, the horned idol of Western occultism.

If you’ve read my other articles on the music industry, you already know of the frequent use of the likeness of Baphomet in music videos and pictures. My past articles on Gaga have shown her posing in the same way as the image above. Strategically placed horned heads have appeared in her past videos and photo shoots. Having said that, the presence of those horned heads in that room is not merely decorative, it is very symbolic.

Gaga is “offering herself” at the altar of Baphomet in order to become initiated and accepted into the Order. She does not want “to be friends” with the music industry, she wants to be an insider (she’s not a “Fame Monster” for nothing). So this offering gets consumed by fire, and not sex, because it is about Baphomet and not the Russian guy. He was just a means for her to obtain what she wanted..fame.

When the fire starts, another scene plays simultaneously showing Gaga and masked dancers dressed in red, the color of sacrifice and initiation. The virginal white garments she wore during most of the video are replaced by bloody red, a visual confirmation of the fact that she is now initiated and accepted as an insider. In my article on the 2009 VMA awards (article here), we see that Lady Gaga and Taylor Swift start out the show wearing white garments and, after a symbolic performance, they appear completely dressed in red. The codes of the music industry seem to be used over and over again, in videos, award shows and photo shoots.

Gaga then makes her trademark “Eye in the triangle” hand gesture after her initiation to make it clear who owns her now…the Illuminati.

The final scene shows Gaga lying in bed with the burned skeleton of the Russian mafiosi.

Notice how everything is burnt except the two gazelle heads. The real “intercourse” happened between Gaga and Baphomet. The guy was a tool, a middle-man who was sacrificed in the process of Gaga’s initiation.

So Gaga basically went through the steps a mega-pop star has to go through in order to “make it big” in the music industry. She ultimately got what she wanted and apparently played the game on her own terms. Let’s see how that works out for her.

Other Symbols Aside from the main storyline, the video is riddled with numerous symbols and images which are occult in nature. Here are some of them:

Sun Symbolism There are many symbols referring to the sun in the video. As said above, Ra is an Egyptian sun god who is mentioned many times in the magic incantation-like “Rah-rah” chant. Sun worship has always been at the center of occult mysteries as it is considered to be the ultimate representation of God.

Image of the sun in the razorblade shades. She is wearing a golden dress. Gold is representative of the sun in occultism.

Golden sunlight bringing her back to life

Gaga at the center of planetary orbits Anti-Christian Symbolism Christianity has always been at odds with occult secret societies. Persecutions and accusations come from both sides and one often defines itself by the negating the other. This is also represented in the video.

The word “Monster” with a Christian cross underneath it creates a not-so-subliminal unconscious association The cross associated with the word “Monster” is also seen on her promotional pictures:

Notice the position of her hands
A cross placed right on her “privates”. No matter what religion you are, you know this is not a sign of respect
In this choreography, Gaga does what looks like the sign of the cross but her hand gesture describes a triangle instead (classic phallic symbol). Enjoy my brilliantly drawn triangle to help you visualize it.

Reptilian Monster Symbolism In some scenes, Gaga gradually starts to look like reptilian monster, with a focus on the spine.

Emphasis on the spine
Why is her spine glowing?
Angry looking bat on her head
Bulging spine… I’m not sure of what she is doing with her fingers either. There is a great resemblance with the devil in this painting by Michael Pacher. Notice the spine.

In Conclusion Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance is by far the densest and most symbolic video I’ve ever analyzed. It is a metaphorical yet accurate description of the steps which must be taken in order to become part of the “mega-pop-star machine”. Submission, control, business negotiations, initiation, secrecy and the embrace of dark forces are all represented in the video. Once decoded, the song describes indeed the Bad Romance of the music industry. The machine uses artists, it pimps them, it cheats on them with new, hotter artists and it finally dumps them when the initial appeal is lost.

Gaga, the “Fame Monster” wants to be treated that way, knowing that there is not any other way to obtain world-wide fame. One might be extremely creative and talented, however fame can only be achieved through the exposure provided by the media corporations. They are owned by a secretive elite, represented by the masks on the faces of the bidders in the video. Bad Romance, more than simply serving the required dose of subversive symbolism to the MTV generation, offers a chilling description of a music industry ruled by the elite. And now comes the hardest part: getting this damn song out of my head.