Lady Gaga Is Recording A Jazz Album… With Tony Bennett

Lady Gaga is reportedly hard at work on a new jazz album. No, seriously.

Before you take your collection of jazz records and burn them in the front yard, it’s worth noting that Mother Monster is taking this effort very seriously. In fact, Gaga has allegedly enlisted the services of Tony Bennett for the upcoming record. Did the commercial and critical failure of Artpop force the singer to plot a different musical course?

Although a collection of pop standards generally arrives pretty late in an artist’s career, Lady Gaga is breaking the proverbial mold by doing so while she’s still commercially relevant. According to Billboard, Gaga started work on the album Cheek to Cheek a while ago, though various delays have ultimately forced the songs onto the back burner.

Despite the various setbacks, Lady Gaga is apparently still committed to bringing the project to fruition. Idolator reports that Mother Monster recently headed back to the studio with Tony Bennett to record more tracks for the record. Details are few and far between, but at least fans can rest assured that something is still coming together.

To prove to the world that she’s dedicated to making this thing happen, Lady Gaga posted a few shots from the studio on Instagram. If you love staring at photographs of recording artists doing their thing, then you’re about to have your mind completely blown.

The question remains: Will Gaga adopt a softer and more jazz-friendly approach to promotion when the album is finally released? Can fans expect to see the singer belt out Frank Sinatra tunes while Tony Bennett colorfully vomits on her cleavage? While that scenario is probably very appealing to some (this writer chooses to plead the Fifth), chances are it’s not going to happen. Fingers crossed, though.

Recording pop standards isn’t the only thing keeping Lady Gaga busy these days. People magazine reports that the singer was recently the victim of some brutal online “fat shaming,” criticisms she’s encountered a few times in the past. Instead of simply ignoring the nastiness, Gaga decided to fire back at the haters.

The retaliation arrived in the form of a black-and-white photo on — you guessed it — Instagram. Instead of hiding her curves from the world, Lady Gaga decided to give her detractors even more fuel for the virtual fire.

“Curvy and proud,” she captioned the following photo.

Are you looking forward to Lady Gaga’s album of pop standards?

[Lead image via Bing]