Lady Gaga performed a stripped-down version of her song, "Hold My Hand", at the Oscars. She also explained why the song is important to her. Lady Gaga was on stage the night of March 12, wearing just a black t-shirt and ripped jeans. She performed her song at LA's Dolby Theater, for the 95th Academy Awards. This is after claiming she wouldn't be there.
Before she started performing, she talked about the song and why it was important to her. She had spent years working on the song with her friend, BloodPop for Top Gun: Maverick. The song is about how we all need heroes, but we have to be our own heroes sometimes, according to her. “I wrote this song with my friend BloodPop for the film Top Gun: Maverick in my studio basement." Lady Gaga explains, "It’s deeply personal for me and I think that we all need each other. We need a lot of love to walk through this life and we all need a hero sometimes. There’s heroes all around us in unassuming places, but you might find that you can be your own hero even if you feel broken inside.”
Lady Gaga's "Hold my Hand"
Lady Gaga produced the song with BloodPop and Benjamin Rice. When she released the music video, it had scenes from both the 1986 original, Top Gun, as well as the 2022 sequel, Top Gun Maverick. There were also scenes of her playing the piano and singing on an airstrip mixed in.
Lady Gaga's "Hold my Hand" was one of the songs that were nominated this year for Best Original Song. Its competition was Rihanna's "Lift Me Up" from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Son Lux, Mitski, and David Byrne’s "This is a Life" from Everything Everywhere All at Once, and Sofia Carson’s “Applause”, as well as the winner, Rahul Sipligunj, Kaala Bhairava, and M.M. Keeravani's "Naatu Naatu" from RRR. While she did not win the award, Lady Gaga gave a beautiful performance and gave a little more insight into the song and what it means to her. It is always interesting for a songwriter to talk about what they think the song they wrote is about.