Gag Me: Fame by Lady Gaga

By Tom First, let me say that I love Lady Gaga. I like her music, I like her look, I like her loyalty to her fans and her politics. I really like that she's not some anodyne auto-tuned meat-puppet with the career lifespan of a fruit-fly. She is the real thing. Which makes Fame such a conundrum. To quote Suzanna at Bois de Jasmine (who said it far better and tested far more in depth than I was willing to), Fame is a wimp. I had read when it was announced that Gaga was going to be putting out a scent that she wanted to have the notes of blood and sperm in the juice. Now we all know that the famous Sécrétions Magnifiques pretty much covers that in spades (and in my opinion could clear a room) so it's not that hard to fathom that for something that is going to be sitting on the shelves at Family-Friendly Sephora they will have reigned it in. But did they need to strangle it? Sephora lists the notes as "Belladonna, Incense, Apricot, Honey Drops, Tiger Orchidea, Jasmin Sambac." All I get is a rather loud fruity-floral mashup that fades quickly into a soft fruity-floral mashup that would occasionally come roaring back full force as if I was being beaten with a can of air-freshener. I will say this for it: the bottle is cool looking, it's tenacious and it's cheap. But I expected more from a performer who isn't afraid to wear meat as fabric.. I was given the sample by my friend who asked for it at our local Sephora Photo Credit: Sephora