After Lady Gaga moved out of Gaga's parent's house, she started hanging out downtown, performing in the Lower East Side club scene with bands Mackin Pulsifer and SGBand. Finding Gaga herself surrounded by singers who all wrote the same style of music, Lady Gaga decided to do something fresh and provocative in the rock 'n roll underground: pop music.
Lady Gaga's entrepreneur father was shocked when she ran off to the Lower East Side to dabble in drugs and appear in burlesque shows at dive bars with drag queens and go-go dancers. "He couldn't look at me for a few months," Lady Gaga admits of her early experimentation. "I was in leather thongs, so it was hard for him — he just didn't understand."