But, at the core of Gaga’s songs are rock-solid songwriting, which she demonstrated on The Howard Stern Show today (March 11), with acoustic performances of Mayhem highlights “Abracadabra” and “Perfect Celebrity” ( the performances can be heard here ). Gaga turned the latter into a piano ballad and gave the latter a guitar-based arrangement.

Speaking of “Abracadabra,” Lady Gaga may have pulled off the ultimate “Saturday Night Live” magic trick during her two musical numbers in this week’s episode: dancing furiously and singing live. That combination is not for every “SNL” musical guest,

It is as complete a statement about who Lady Gaga is in 2025 as anything could be. MAYHEM repositions Gaga as a dance diva heavily indebted to the icons who came before her to an audience as likely to know her for wearing a meat dress as for performing with Tony Bennett.