Lady Gaga gushes over ‘uniquely special mentor’ Elton John ahead of anticipated Chromatica collaboration
Lady Gaga and Elton John attend the 2016 Vanity Fair Oscar Party Hosted By Graydon Carter at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts on February 28, 2016 in Beverly Hills, California. (Pascal Le Segretain/Getty)
Lady Gaga, the singer behind the concept of sound itself, has opened up about her “mentor” Elton John ahead of their Chromatica collaboration.
With only days left until Gaga’s sixth studio album drop, the “Stupid Love” hitmaker told Apple Music’s Beats 1 about her creative relationship with the 73-year-old singer.
The pair are set to team-up for the song “SINE From Above”.
And with Chromatica being an album which, Gaga said, will delve deep into her “painful” past, it only makes sense that she included John in the process, who was a lodestar for her during her road to recovery.
Lady Gaga: Elton John is ‘so uniquely special’.
“He’s been my mentor for a long time,” a candyfloss pink-haired Gaga said in the interview, broadcast May 21.
“I mean, he’s always challenged me to keep my head above water and it’s something that I always appreciate is that he knows when I’m down.
“He just does. And he knows because I hide because I never want anyone to see me when I’m like that.
“Elton’s always really challenged me to take care of my artistry and to really take care of myself.
“And I really, really honour that about him. He is so, so uniquely special.”
She added: “And I cannot tell you how instrumental in my life he’s been to showing me that you can go all the way in life and be authentic and be you and do good things in the world and take care of yourself and be there.”
Chromatica will explore Lady Gaga’s ‘extremely painful past’.
Elsewhere in the interview, Lady Gaga candidly chatted about what it was that ultimately brought her back to the studio after four years.
she said: “The sound, the music, being myself.
“How can I take something that’s extremely painful for me and find the one piece of it that’s universally human and help somebody else? And then see what it sounds like.”
Lady Gaga, a wellspring of inspirational quotes, added: “I’m making a dance record again and this dance floor… it’s mine, I earned it, and all that stuff that I went through.
“I don’t have to feel pain about it anymore, it can just be apart of me and I can keep going,”
Lady Gaga has, in the past, been outspoken about her rocky road when it comes to love, having ended engagements to actor Taylor Kinney and talent agent Christian Carino.
She is currently seeing investor Michael Polansky.
