Lady Gaga: ‘My Whole Career Is a Tribute to David Bowie’

Following Lady Gaga‘s tribute to David Bowie at the Grammys, the singer opened up about how the late rock legend inspired her artistically in a new interview. “I feel like my whole career is a tribute to David Bowie,” Gaga told NPR.

In the interview, Gaga revealed that her love of Bowie first began when she saw the Aladdin Sane cover for the first time. “I was 19 years old, and it just changed my perspective on everything, forever. It was an image that changed my life,” Gaga said. “I remember I took the vinyl record out of the casing and I put it on my vinyl player — which was on my stovetop in my kitchen, because I was living in this really tiny apartment and I had my turntable on my stove. ‘Watch That Man’ came on and, I mean, that was just the beginning of my artistic birth. I started to dress more expressively. I started to go to the library and look through more art books. I took an art history class. I was playing with a band.”

Gaga credited Bowie’s music for introducing her to “a lifestyle of total immersion in music, fashion, art and technology.” “You meet or see a musician that has something that is of another planet, of another time, and it changes you forever,” she said. “I believe everyone has that, don’t you? That one thing you saw as a kid that made you go, “Oh, okay. Now I know who I am.”

Even after the Bowie tribute, Gaga continues to be immersed in his music. “I’ve been watching his videos all day long, and also listening to Blackstar, his last album, which is a truly incredible piece of music,” Gaga said. “It’s one of the single greatest things an artist has ever done: making a masterpiece album that is their own eulogy. Can you imagine? To go into the studio every day and put your heart in that place, where you are saying goodbye to life? I mean, his art made him strong.”