Lady Gaga: 'Applause inspired by fan support'

Lady Gaga Applause

Lady Gaga has revealed that her new single 'Applause' was inspired by fan support while she was struggling at the end of her 'Born This Way Ball' tour. The singer cancelled several of the tour's dates in February to have an operation to fix a hip injury.

Gaga has now revealed to On Air with Ryan Seacrest that the inspiration for her new single 'Applause' came from three months of performing while in severe pain.

"When I was finishing the tour I really was physically breaking, and I was in a lot of pain," she recalled. "Any performer that does these world tours will tell you that your body goes through a tremendous amount of stress and I just didn't know what was wrong because I'm kind of a hardcore chick and I have a very strong threshold for pain." 

She continued: "I kept slapping myself, saying, 'Come on, get it together, what's going on with you?' I was really going kind of crazy, thinking, 'Your moves don't feel the same and it doesn't feel the same when you stand centre stage', and everything just started to dwindle inside. 

"And the only thing that kept me going was the applause of the fans and their screaming and their faces every night looking up and me, saying, 'Gaga, we love you no matter what' - it really kept me going." 

Gaga's new single 'Applause' will feature on her upcoming studio album ARTPOP. 

She will perform the new track on the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards, airing from Brooklyn, New York at the Barclays Center on Sunday, August 25 from 9pm ET.