*Formal Critique of Poker Face by Lady Gaga

[This is part of the Seven Challenge]
(This is broken up into three pieces, the 1st is the original piece, the 2nd is my line by line edits/thoughts, and 3rd is an overall critique, all separated by: ***)

Poker Face
by Lady Gaga
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAoPJxTvZOQ)

I wanna hold em like they do in Texas Plays
Fold em let em hit me raise it baby stay with me, I love it
Luck and intuition play the cards with spades to start
and after he’s hooked I’ll play the one thats on his heart
[A]
Oh, oh, oh
I’ll get him hot, show him what I’ve got
{X2}
[B]
Can’t read my, can’t read my
no he can’t read my poker face
(She’s got to love nobody)
{X2}
[C]
P-p-p-poker face, p-p-poker face
(mum mum mum mah)
{X2}

I wanna roll with him a hard pair we will be
a little gambling is fun when you’re with me, I love it
russian roulette is not the same without a gun
and baby when it’s love if it’s not rough it isn’t fun
[A]
[B]
[C]

I wont tell you that I love you
Kiss or hug you
Cause im bluffin’ with my muffin
I’m not lying I’m just stunnin’ with my love-glue-gunning

Just like a chick in the casino
Take your bank before I pay you out
I promise this, promise this
Check this hand cause I’m marvelous
[B]
[B]
[B]
[C]
[C]
[C]
***

"I wanna hold em like they do in Texas Plays/" -- As in 'plays' with actors on a stage? How can you hold them (whoever them are) like a play, and a Texas play specifically? Going by the title this would be Texas Gambling, i.e. Texas Hold 'em, and ' 'em' would be cards. Do the Texans hold their cards differently than other gamblers not native to Texas? I don't know that much about gambling--Texan gamblers especially-- but even if they do is this a good line to start with? Is this piece about how the speaker likes to hold her cards while she gambles?

"Fold em let em hit me raise it baby stay with me, I love it/" -- This line can be taken two ways, both of which would be improved by the inclusion of punctuation. The first way is the most obvious: going by the title, which would be poker terminology. That would mean that the speaker makes her opponents fold, lets them hit, and raise against her cards, and her pleading for her opponents to keep up with her, assuming she is a card shark, and that she loves the game and its process. The other way to take this line is by sexual innuendo using slang. That would mean Fold the bodies up (as in sexual positions in which people, usually women are folded up i.e. "fold her legs behind her head") let them (presumably men) have vigourous sex with her, raise it (their penises) baby stay with me (don't come before I do, no premature ejaculation) and she loves it. This line almost works both ways, if you want the innuendo to work better perhaps say ,"Let em hit me, fold me, raise it baby..." but this would imply that the speaker loses once in a while, which is an impression I don't get from the rest of the piece. I get the impression she always wins, which I doubt--she has to lose once in a while, yeah? Why not here? It would give an impression of fun, of chance, if she always wins the game it isn't fun (especially for her opponents). The possibility of loosing is part of the thrill of gambling, and I think it should be included somewhere, and here would be a good place.

"Luck and intuition play the cards with spades to start/" -- Why spades to start? Are you playing Hearts? Hearts is not a gambling game to my knowledge, but then again I don't know that much about gambling. Maybe you are right. Because luck and intuition are (obviously?) the things that steer the card game, this line seems to be used solely to get the end word 'start' to rhyme with the next line's end word 'heart.'

"And after he's hooked I'll play the one thats on his heart/" -- The first use of the word 'he,' Who is 'he,' what is 'he' hooked on, and what is on 'his' heart that you can play? I assume 'he' is the most attractive of the speaker's opponents, and 'he' is hooked on the speaker's... gambling prowess? Good looks? Winning streak? What? I don't know because it isn't written in this piece. And I don't know what is on his heart, but whatever it is the speaker can play it like a hand of cards, which hints that 'he' is powerless to whatever it is 'she' is doing. This line is unclear to me because of who 'he' is, what 'he' is hooked on, and what is on 'his' heart. I think if you clear this up it could be a powerful line, but as it is now it sounds like it is trying to sound profound, and it misses the mark because the rest of the line is unclear.

[Chorus A] "Oh, oh, oh/" I assume this is used for the sake of musicality, and adds to the innuendo of sex because "Oh" is often times the vocal expression of impending climax.

"I'll get him hot, show him what I've got/" I assume 'him' is the same 'he' from above. And using slang, 'get him hot,' means make him aroused for sex. And if the speaker shows him what she has that would mean either she would show him her naked body, or during intercourse she would show him her sexual prowess, perhaps to rival his. I think the speaker means the second option. But why is she trying to compete against 'him' in this way? I guess this could also refer to poker, where 'he' is actually sweating because 'he' is about to find out if 'he' is winning or losing this round as she reveals her cards to the table. (In the video for this she throws a single pelvic thrust to the sky while laying on her back every time this line occurs. And the written word 'hot' sounds like 'hard,' which is even less innuendo, and more obvert, leaving little room to ponder the meaning.)

[Chorus B] "Can't read my, can't read my/ No he can't read my poker face" --Why repeated? Does the speaker stutter/have a verbal tic? If she does, this could be really strong because people who stutter/tic do so when they are nervous, so if the speaker only stutters here it would mean she is nervous about presenting a false face to 'him' (I will assume from now on that 'he' and 'him' all refer to the same undescribed individual from above), a front, a mask, a façade, a dishonest, unreadable face meant to deceive.

“(She’s got to love nobody)/” -- Who says this? Assuming this is true, why must she love nobody? Has she been hurt in previous relationships? If she has, it would be good to know, yeah?

[Chorus C] “P-p-p-poker face, p-p-poker face/” -- more stutters about the poker face, the speaker must have issues with being dishonest in her heterosexual relationships (whoever short they may be), but not at cards. (Interestingly, the written part, ‘p-p-poker face’ sounds like ‘f-f-fuck her face’ when it is vocalized. This sounds deliberate because the actual sounds are different, the first being “poe-ker fais” the second being “puh-ker fais,” and if you can read lips you can see she makes a “u” sound instead of an “o” sound the second time.)

“(Mum mum mum mah)/” Who makes these noises? They sound like kiss noises, like when actors on the read carpet kiss their hand to the crowd they say ,”mwua, mwua” with their lips. Is this sound doing much for this piece? I guess if “f-f-fuck her face” is used, these sounds would be face-fucking sounds, but even if that’s the case, who is her? The speaker? Or another nameless, undescribed individual?

“I wanna roll with him a hard pair we will be/” -- The speaker wants to be around the ‘him,’ which I am tired of writing, so I am going to make up a name for him, ‘he’ and ‘him’ will refer to an imaginary guy named ‘David’ from now on. She wants to be around David, and the two of them will be ‘hard’. I can only guess that hard in this case means strong, or in some way positive. So the two of them together would be good, they would make a good couple, David and her. She doesn’t go into detail here, which is problematic because David has no descriptions to his name (not even a name to his name). Why would the speaker and David be ‘hard’ together? What is it about David and her that allows for a beneficial relationship? Does the speaker want a relationship?

“A little gambling is fun when you’re with me, I love it/” -- Is this true? If she always wins at poker, her opponents lose every time and losing isn’t fun, is it? If the speaker hints throughout this piece that sometimes she does in fact lose once in awhile, this line would work, but as it is now I doubt the validity of this line, which pulls me out of the piece to question it rather than flow over to the next stanza.

“Russian Roulette is not the same without a gun” -- Russian Roulette is not Russian Roulette without a gun. A gun in essential to Russian Roulette, as is a baseball bat to baseball or ice skates to ice skating or a soccer ball to soccer. Essentially what is said here is “Baseball is not the same without a bat,” which is so obvious that calling attention to it is redundant, and pointless. This line means nothing to me. I think this is a throw away line used to rhyme the word “gun” with the end word of the next line “fun.” If this is true, that’s weak, and a waste of words. Surely something poignant could be said here, maybe keep gun if it’s important. If it is important, than expand on this, does the speaker carry a gun? Why would she need a gun?

“And baby when it’s love if it’s not rough it isn’t fun” -- The speaker likes rough love. And by love I assume she means sex based on the previous lines, so she prefers rough sex from David. I guess the innuendo is gone now, which is a shame because innuendo is more fun than overtly stating things. She doesn’t seem to be informing David of this, but rather she is making a universal statement. And while it may be true that rough sex is more fun for her and a lot of people, it can’t be true for everyone, be careful with universal statements. More than that though, this whole stanza seems really staccato to me and doesn’t make much sense. Rolling together, gambling, russian roulette, rough sex, I think there is something important the speaker is trying to say, but she presents it unclearly. Perhaps Russian Roulette here is being used figuratively to mean risky behavior: risky behavior is not the same without a gun? I don’t know. I would work on clearing this whole stanza up.

[A]
[B]
[C]

“I wont tell you that I love you/” -- She won’t tell David she loves him. Why? David follows her around, gives her the rough sex she loves, and plays poker with her (even though he loses every-single-time, and has a lot of money to keep losing) if there was a guy who deserved to be loved it should be him, yeah?

“Kiss or hug you/” -- Poor David. No love, no kisses, no hugs, just lots of rough sex. Some men may be ok with that, but how do we know David is ok with that? Maybe David wants to be kissed and hugged and told that she loves him and appreciates him for all that he does for her. I suggest describing David somewhere, otherwise he is a faceless throw away character, a piece of meat, if you will.

“Cause I’m bluffin’ with my muffin/” --While the internal rhyme is cute, muffin is slang for vagina, so this line means: I am deceiving [you, David] with my vagina (in the video she points directly to her vagina at this part). Which doesn’t make much sense if she is getting folded up and rough-sexed by David from the above lines. It sounds like her vagina isn’t deceiving anyone, and David continues to “call her bluff with her muff,” if you will by a constant supply of rough sex, which she loves, she said so.

“I’m not lying I’m just stunnin’ with my love-glue-gunning/” -- Love-glue sounds like a euphemism for the clear vaginal discharge that lubricates the vagina during sex, and I have heard it used that way before. I am confused by ‘love-glue-gunning’ though, I don’t know what that is--unless she means gunning in the informal sense of gunning an engine, which would mean causing the engine to race, so figuratively/informally this means her love-glue is racing, which makes her ‘extremely impressive or attractive.’ Ok, so from the beginning: ‘I am not deceiving you (David?), I am just extremely attractive with my racing (free-flowing?) vaginal discharge.’ While it may be true that free-flowing vaginal discharge--i.e. visibly vagina-soaked clothing-- is extremely attractive to an aroused heterosexual man, this counters the previous line however. You can not bluff with a vagina if its dripping wet in a state of arousal. That is like: I can deceive you about how attracted to you I am with my deceptively erect penis. That just doesn’t work, and has never worked. However I like the gender role reversal the speaker plays with here, it is usually the male that cannot hide how he feels about an attractive female. Because a female can hide how she feels about an attractive male, which leads to the whole obvious/hard/male and secretive/soft/female dichotomy in art, film and dance. I would reword these two lines so they don’t counter one another though, and play with the gender role reversal/dichotomy more.

“Just like a chick in the casino/” -- Who is? The speaker? Isn’t the speaker female? Is the speaker referring to David here? Is David transgendered? If he/she is, perhaps hint at that earlier? Or is she referring to herself stereotypically? If she is, isn't that strange?

“Take your bank before I pay you out/” -- Bank is slang for money as in “I make bank at my job,” meaning “I make a lot of money at my job.” So the speaker will take David’s money before she pays him out. “Pay you out” means pay a large sum of money from funds under one’s control or let out a rope. Although pay you out could also be informal for put out, as in sex. So, this could mean: [someone is] Just like a woman in the casino to take all your money (David) before she lets out a rope or; just like a woman in the casino to take your money before she returns your money from her own large fund or; just like a woman to take your money before she is willing to have sexual intercourse with you. I don’t know if this means the speaker is really nice and gives David all his money back after winning all the time (I doubt it, judging from the above lines) or if she is making a statement about how women in casinos stereotypically are, that you need to spend a lot of money on casino women before they are willing to have sex with you. The way in which this is said reminds me of when Humphrey Bogart says, “Just like a dame to do... (something)” thus making a statement about women stereotypically. It seems strange to me that the speaker, a woman, would make a stereotypical statement about women in this way, and a negative statement at that. It leads me to believe the speaker is confused about her role in a heterosexual relationship, as though she wants to be both chased and chaser, the dominate and passive one, and then make disparaging comments about her own sex, as a man might say in frustration.

“I promise this, promise this/” -- Another stutter/tic, I think we know by now that the speaker is lying and nervous. She can’t be trusted when she promises, and she knows that and is nervous. Is she starting to have feelings for David other than biological ones? Does she not want to be hurt emotionally again? This is interesting and a great place to expand.

“Check this hand cause I’m marvelous/” -- This seemingly deliberate shift back to the card game, and the assertion that the speaker is marvelous sounds like she has some trauma involved with hetero-relationships and returning back to cards is ‘safe ground’ so to speak. It’s like a defense mechanism in the brain, when things are too painful it changes the subject or jumps back to familiar or safe topics. The assertion that the speaker is marvelous, seems like a bravado statement to convince herself that she is a good woman. Like before someone does some tough physical task they might tell themselves “I can do this, I can do this. I am a great runner/jumper/climber/whatever, here I go.”

[B]
[B]
[B]
[C]
[C]
[C]
***
Before I start on the overall critique, the etymology of Poker: Poker of mid 19th century US origin, perhaps related to German pochen “to brag,” pochspiel “bragging game.”

A poker face is an unreadable face used in gambling games to hide what the players truly have, because if you could see they are sad or happy or unsure you can use that to your advantage and win the game. The use of poker face in this piece however seems to imply that the speaker utilizes a poker face when she is in relationships with men, implying that she hides her true intentions from the man with whom she has a relationship with. Throughout the piece the speaker says she wont tell him she loves him, and must maintain her “p-p-p-poker face,” thus hiding her true intentions.

I think the project of this poem is to show how the speaker lives. She seems to spend most of her time in the casino, and seems to win all the time at cards, while she searches for rich, presumably attractive men to play cards against, cleaning their bank accounts out of their money. She uses her body to manipulate them into having rough sex with her, which they are helpless to defend against. Even though the speaker seems to be female, she speaks from a seemingly male perspective. She talks about a woman’s role in the casino, her role: take a lot of his money before having sex with him. And then to compete against him sexually, that is to compete to see who has more sexual prowess. She promises things to the men, but quickly changes her thoughts to the card game at hand. All of these things together describe a psychologically damaged speaker, one who doesn’t want to get emotionally involved with anyone. The way she talks about the ‘other’ in this piece (I called him David) rings of her being a sociopath. And her desire to compete against David sexually makes me think she has Asberger’s, or autism. So essentially what the speaker is, is an extremely attractive Sociopath with autism who spends most of her time in a casino being used as a sperm receptacle, while she thinks she is “winning” against the men she “gets.” This is a really sad and tragic character. I think it is ok that some stanzas are staccato, and don’t make much sense, because she is a damaged/fractured woman and that would express her broken/fractured nature. This also explains why the ‘other’ is never described, only “tricked” into having rough sex with her.

This is really powerful stuff, but it took me a few reads to get it. Perhaps using more punctuation would help, as well as cutting down on ambiguous slang words with many meanings. Instead of adding to the understanding of the piece these words often detracted understanding from the piece, pulling me right out and wondering which meaning is the true one. I think using more specific words could be utilized to get the tragic story of the speaker across better.

The economy of words in this piece seems a little heavy, mainly because of the repeated stanzas of the chorus. I am not sure repeating chorus B and C three times each at the end is really doing much for this piece. I would end it right at “marvelous” because it would be so powerful for her to end on her self delusion, i think, if you want a tragic piece. Some lines rhyme and some don’t, and some lines seem to exist solely for the end word rhyme. I would say that while rhyming is nice sometimes, this piece doesn’t need it. That would free up a couple lines where more understanding could be added. I suggest the Russian Roulette line should go, and maybe combine the muffin and love-glue-gunning lines allowing for two new lines to be added to clear up some confusion. Other than that Lady Gaga, thanks for sharing. You are almost there!
~Brian