Evan Sawdey of "PopMatters" said that the song is the most embarrassing moment of the album and as a result makes the album come to an intermediate halt thus ruining the "bad-girl party atmosphere".
(meta data) TITLE: Lady GaGa: The Fame | PopMatters 60 captures 27 Oct 2013 - 13 Sep 2022 About this capture COLLECTED BY Organization: Internet Archive These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved. Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors. The goal is to fix all broken links on the web. Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. Collection: Wikipedia Near Real Time (from IRC) This is a collection of web page captures from links added to, or changed on, Wikipedia pages. The idea is to bring a reliability to Wikipedia outlinks so that if the pages referenced by Wikipedia articles are changed, or go away, a reader can permanently find what was originally referred to. This is part of the Internet Archive's attempt to rid the web of broken links. The Wayback Machine - https://web.archive.org/web/20131027182426/http://www.popmatters.com/review/68939-lady-gaga-the-fame/ Call for Feature Essays About Any Aspect of Popular Culture, Present or Past Home>Music>Reviews>Lady Gaga # Lady GaGa ## The Fame ### (Interscope; US: 28 Oct 2008; UK: 12 Jan 2009) Amazon iTunes Text:AAA # Lady GaGa: The Fame By Evan Sawdey 19 January 2009 PopMatters Interviews Editor The most embarrassing moment on Lady Gaga's debut album The Fame is not, shockingly, the part where she sings "Let's have some fun / This beat is sick / I wanna take a ride on your disco stick". No, the most embarrassing moment is a song called "Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)". As a defiantly modern club album, awash in dirty synths and whispered promises of promiscuity, The Fame comes to a full-halt when "Eh, Eh" comes on, as—unlike the sinuous strobe singles that came before it—this vapid, superficial piece of gooey '80s synth-pop ruins the bad-girl party atmosphere that was being so carefully constructed during the first four tracks. When Gaga (real name Joanne Germanotta) sings "there's nothing else I can say" ad nauseum over the irritating keyboard melody lines, you can't help but think that, in fact, she couldn't think of anything to say at all when it came down to writing actual lyrics. It's a shame that we have endure tracks like "Eh Eh", "Paper Gangster", and the forgettable piano ballad "Brown Eyes", because the rest of The Fame is remarkably enjoyable. When Gaga focuses on crafting hedonistic four-on-the-floor bangers and nothing else, she succeeds more often than not. The intensely catchy lead single "Just Dance" is an excellent indicator of what to expect, as the rest of the The Fame, though not exactly intellectually stimulating, does manage to get you moving and grooving at an almost effortless pace. Part of this success comes from the fact that The Fame isn't designed to be a club record: it's simply a pop record with dancefloor intentions, which, really, gives the disc a meaty backbone that relies on hooks more than grooves, making each song all the more digestible and accessible (the whole disc clocks in at a very manageable 50 minutes). "Paparazzi" and "Poker Face" both mine much of the same glitzy territory that "Just Dance" covered, but never once does it feel like Gaga is deliberately repeating herself; instead, her faults only come from covering territory that she's obviously not prepared for. On the plus side, there are times when she's deliberately self-conscious of her place in the pop music food chain (the fact that she wants to take a boy to see the Killers in concert during "Boys Boys Boys" serves as a key tip-off). On the down side, her vocoder-assisted white girl rapping during "Paper Gangster" feels tired and outdated (a "California Love" reference? Really?), proving that, more than ever, the world needs a new Princess Superstar record. Yet for those expecting this disc to be a non-stop soundtrack to dorm room dance parties, The Fame's best surprises come from Gaga's stylistic curveballs. Closing track "Summerboy" is a full-bodied Blondie pastiche, replete with mid-range disco drum beats and new-wave guitar licks. The awe-inspiring title track, meanwhile, is an even better modernization of the B-52s sound than even the B-52s themselves were able to pull off with last year's Funplex. It's moments like these that make Flo Rida's regrettable cameo on the very Scott Storch-esque "Starstruck" all the more forgivable. Much of the album's success can be attributed to rising club producer RedOne (who's biggest credits to date include remixing a song for Robyn and producing the latest New Kids on the Block album). This Moroccan studio whiz knows his way around a good synth hook, which is perhaps why he produces a majority of Gaga's best tracks ("Just Dance", "Lovegame", "Boys Boys Boys"). Though Gaga started out in New York's tough-to-break club scene, her ability to pick out a good hook (along with her ability to spot a good producer) makes The Fame sound like a unified whole—something that's truly amazing when you account for the fact that five different producers/beatmakers were brought in to craft this disc. So is The Fame a modern-day club classic? Sadly, no, as Gaga's desire to try new sounds and genres can sometimes submerge her in waters in which she's just not ready to swim in. Yet The Fame is still a solid dance album—and, really, when you're in the middle of your favorite nightclub at 2 a.m. in the morning, dancing like there's no tomorrow, isn't that all that matters? Rating: Multiple songs MySpace Evan Sawdey started contributing to PopMatters in late 2005, and has also had his work featured in publications such as SLUG Magazine, The Metro (U.K.), Soundvenue Magazine (Denmark), the Daily Dot, and multiple national newspapers. Evan has been a guest on WNYC's Soundcheck (an NPR affiliate), was the Executive Producer for the Good With Words: A Tribute to Benjamin Durdle album (available for free at GoodWithWordsAlbum.com), and wrote the liner notes for the 2011 re-release of Andre Cymone's hit 1985 album A.C. (Big Break Records), the 2012 re-release of 'Til Tuesday's 1985 debut Voices Carry, and many others. He is a current member of The Recording Academy and resides in Chicago, Illinois. You can follow him @SawdEye should you be so inclined. Tagged as: lady gaga Lady GaGa - Just Dance Related Articles Lady Gaga's Round of "Applause" (single review) By Evan Sawdey 15 Aug 2013 As Gaga and Perry go toe-to-leopard-print-toe, it's obvious which diva comes out on top. Shame then that neither track are indicative of either artist's actual strengths ... Pop Divas Are Making a Spectacle of Themselves By Gerrick D. Kennedy 26 Mar 2013 In Defense Of ... Not Going Goo-goo Over Lady Gaga By Colin McGuire 22 Aug 2012 Seven days. Two letters. And one angry animals rights group. The Mother Monster's recent struggles highlight how possible it is that Lady Gaga's rein at the top is possibly nearing its end. 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Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)
Critical reception.
"Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)" received mixed reviews from music critics. Alexis Petridis from "The Guardian" noted that "Eh, Eh" bears the influence of early 1990s Europop and "is the first song in a long time that warrants comparison to the œuvre of Ace of Base. Matthew Chisling of AllMusic gave a negative review of the song saying "The Fame has it's ["sic"] 'ballad,' however the breezy 'Eh, Eh' doesn't hold water on this album; rather, it feels dry and lifeless, something which holds this album back". Sal Cinquemani of "Slant Magazine" said that "the breezy island vibe and soft demeanor of 'Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)' is hard to buy when sandwiched between songs like 'Poker Face' and 'Beautiful, Dirty, Rich.'" In another article analysing about the music videos released by Gaga, Oscar Moralde from "Slant Magazine" noted that "Eh, Eh" as a track "is an intriguing case: rather than the tech-assisted sexy-androgynous dance pop that dominates a good chunk of "The Fame", it and its sister tracks 'Brown Eyes' and 'Again Again' are evidence of a stripped-down, simpler, sincere Gaga. 
