Lady Gaga on ‘Mayhem’, Fiancé Michael Polansky and Her Future Kids for ELLE Magazine

Posted on January 28, 2025

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Lady Gaga appears on global covers of ELLE, including the ELLE US 2025 February Issue, on newsstands February 4th and the ELLE UK March Issue, on newsstands February 6th. Lady Gaga sat down with British writer Lotte Jeffs for an in-depth conversation about her groundbreaking new album Mayhem, life at home with fiancé Michael Polansky, finding a new sense of calm and normalcy—and her future kids.

Gaga discusses the chaos that inspired Mayhem, her genre-defying seventh album that pulls from “’90s alternative, electro-grunge, Prince and Bowie melodies, guitar and attitude, funky bass lines, French electronic dance, and analog synths. Mayhem is utter chaos! It breaks a lot of rules and has a lot of fun,” she says. “It’s about following your own chaos into whatever cranny of your life it takes you to.”

In a candid discussion, Gaga shares how making Mayhem became a process of rediscovery, allowing her to confront personal challenges and embrace her true self. “The chaos I thought was long gone is fully intact and ready to greet me whenever I’d like,” she says. “Part of the message of even the first song on the album is that your demons are with you in the beginning and they are with you in the end, and I don’t mean it in a bleak way. Maybe we can make friends sooner with this reality instead of running all the time.”

Now approaching 40, Gaga is focused on building a future with her fiancé, Michael Polansky and having children. “I used to drink a lot and smoke a lot, and I was always looking for an out. I used to call it the trapdoor. I used to be like, ‘I need an escape route.’” she admits. “Sometimes I worry people will say I’m boring these days, but honestly, thank God I’m boring. Thank God! Because I was living on the edge. I don’t know what was going to happen to me living that way. So the fact that I have these answers, on the one hand, I’m like, ‘Oh man, snooze fest!’ But actually, I’m so grateful. Because I found a sense of happiness and joy that is true to me.”

Lady Gaga also answered ELLE’s burning questions for ELLE’s Ask Me Anything video series, opening up about exploring jazz, date nights with her fiancé, and the moment she first felt like she made it—which had more to do with thrift shopping than actual record sales. Watch as Gaga reveals her favorite lyrics and explains why she loves watching her Little Monsters decode her easter eggs. Plus, she breaks down what makes her upcoming album, Mayhem, so sonically unique.

 

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Lady Gaga on whether she’d consider dropping her stage name: “No! I love being Lady Gaga. I love being me. I became a star when I was 20. Everything gets reflected back to you that this persona is what makes you special.”

On how when making music Gaga sees a wall of color—a phenomenon known as synesthesia: “As I’m writing, it assembles in my brain, then through the recording it becomes a full piece of color,” she says. “Every song is a different shade. A lot of the songs on this album have a maroon, brown color to them. ‘Bad Romance’ was like that—it was reddish.”

I ask how she knows if a song is going to be a hit. “There are great records that I make that will have their moment of completion and I’ll go, it’s not a hit, but I love it,” she says. “Other records, I’ll just know that it has everything it needs. A hit is very powerful at conveying that the energy in the artist is going to get transferred into the listener.”

Lady Gaga on rediscovering herself through the making of Mayhem and the importance of embracing one’s true self: We talk about this separation of public and private self and how it has affected her over two decades. She admits to having “a broken feeling” about some of the mental health issues she has had in her life. “I feel some embarrassment, and that’s a very vulnerable thing to share. But I think through making this album, I was able to really love myself through all of that. Confronting the music was a way of confronting some of the things I’ve been through and going, ‘It’s OK that’s who you are.’ And celebrating that about myself, instead of trying to pretend it’s not real.”

She tells me that making Mayhem was a process of rediscovery. “The chaos I thought was long gone is fully intact and ready to greet me whenever I’d like. Part of the message of even the first song on the album is that your demons are with you in the beginning and they are with you in the end, and I don’t mean it in a bleak way. Maybe we can make friends sooner with this reality instead of running all the time.”

Lady Gaga on being herself and finding happiness with fiancé Michael Polansky: With Polansky, Gaga’s life has a different shade to it; it’s more wholesome. “He used to say to me when we first met, ‘You are a special human being when the cameras aren’t on you. And I get to see that all the time,’” she tells me.

Lady Gaga on the importance of family as she looks to start her own: Family has always been a steadying force for Gaga. But now, for the first time, she’s considering starting her own with Michael. “Family—it’s like the roots of the tree,” she says. “They grow long, and sometimes they’re mangled, and sometimes they’re full of water, and sometimes they’re thirsty. Family is what makes you who you are, and it also defines your need for change.”

Lady Gaga on what she would want her future child to understand about her life: It’s not an easy question, but she has a thoughtful answer: “That whatever my artistry means to them is totally up to them. Maybe other than that, I just did my best. And tried to stay true to myself along the way. It’s such an intense thing for kids coming into the world. And they’re told how to think and what to believe in and how to eat…I just want to let my kids find out who they are.” Unless, she jokes, they want to work in entertainment.

Lady Gaga’s fiancé Michael Polansky on navigating a relationship with someone in the public eye: I’m interested in what it’s like navigating a relationship with someone so famous. “Accepting that you won’t have the privacy others might have was the hardest part,” he says. “But Stefani’s comfort with it and patience with me has been amazing. Our relationship is probably a lot like everyone else’s. We just have to figure out how to do some of it in public. That makes it even more important for us to have strong friendships and close family relationships. We find normalcy where we can.”

Lady Gaga on the results of the recent U.S. presidential election: We meet six days after the results of the American election are announced. Mayhem has been unleashed on a global political stage—no one could accuse Gaga of not reading the room. “What’s bizarre is I did not write this album thinking that this would happen. I prayed it would not. But here we are.”

“The main thing is I have so much compassion and love for so many people who are afraid today. I want to acknowledge that I’m a very blessed person, and I feel grateful for so much in my life every day. I know for a lot of people, this election was devastating for their existence, so community is going to be the number one thing. I am one of many people who support the [LGBTQ and other marginalized] communities. And we’re not going down without a fight. We will stick together. It’s going to be hard, but I’m up for it. We’re up for it. And I just want everyone to know how deeply they’re loved and not invisible.”

Lady Gaga on the advice she’d give to young pop artists starting out in the industry: If she could tell these younger pop artists anything, “it would be that the whole you matters. Who you are at home is just as valuable as who you are when you’re onstage. And no matter what anyone says to you, you can value who you are outside of all of this.”

Lady Gaga reflects on her journey of overcoming unhealthy habits like drinking and smoking, which she previously used as a means of escape: The concept of “radical acceptance” comes up a lot during our chat, and feels key to the message she wants to convey about who she is and how she feels about her life and art right now. “I’m not going to torture myself,” she says. “I’m going to celebrate. I used to drink a lot and smoke a lot, and I was always looking for an out. I used to call it the trapdoor. I used to be like, ‘I need an escape route.’ And I stopped doing that. And I actually started feeling it. Being present. As an artist, it’s hard to go through that and not want to share that with my fans.”

Lady Gaga shares her hopes of shifting her perspective outward and discovering ways to support others as she approaches 40: Lady Gaga is just two years away from 40. So what is she most interested in understanding about herself today? “This is going to be the most weird answer. I’d like things to be less about me. The thing I’d like in my forties is to discover all the ways I can show up better for people in my life. All the ways that I can create positivity and joy.”

 

[Photo Credit: Gray Sorrenti for ELLE Magazine]

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