You never forget your first love, in romance as well as in art, and Gossip’s Beth Ditto still remembers what it was like to experience the magic of music as a young kid — something she guesses today’s budding pop fanatics are doing with Lady Gaga, whose music she describes as “for 5-year-olds.”

Explains Ditto, “Like when I was 5, for me it was Madonna, Cyndi Lauper and Michael Jackson. Those people were iconic. I’m 31, so that was like 26 years ago. I think that for the 5-year-old watching MTV right now, Lady Gaga is going to be an iconic person. In 20 years, the people who are here and talking to journalists will be like, ‘Oh Lady Gaga changed my life, Nicki Minaj changed my life.'”

Just to be clear, Ditto counts herself as one of Gaga’s fans — she just understands that the experience is more exciting for a younger audience. “‘I think that what she does is interesting, and you know it’s contributing in a really big way. But if you’re watching Lady Gaga as a kid it’s so much different than when you’re 31. It’s like, yeah, we like her songs, but because we’re experiencing them as 31-year-olds it doesn’t have the same impact. The 5-year-olds listening to Lady Gaga are ripping their hair out because they’ve never seen or heard anything like it.”