As Billboard’s Woman of the Year, it’s fair to say that Lady GaGa has enjoyed a pretty successful 2015, which has seen the ‘Born This Way; singer back on top. But the 29-year-old has revealed that just one year ago she considered quitting music altogether, after feeling as if she’d been written off.

Lady GagaBillboard’s Woman of the Year, Lady Gaga.

Speaking to Billboard as part of their Woman of the Year cover story, Gaga said: “At the end of 2014, my stylist asked, ‘Do you even want to be a pop star anymore?’ I looked at him and I go, ‘You know, if I could just stop this train right now, today, I would. I just can’t. [But] I need to get off now because I’m going to die.’”

“When you’re going so fast you don’t feel safe anymore, you feel like you’re being slapped around and you can’t think straight. But then I felt hands lifting me. It was like everybody came together to try and put a star back in the sky, and they weren’t going to let me down.”

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But after feeling as if the whole music industry had turned their back on her, it was veteran crooner Tony Bennett who helped Gaga get back to doing what she does best. “There is nobody more badass than Tony Bennett,” Gaga said.

“That man is a part of the history of music in a way that is extremely powerful, and he taught me to stay true to who I am, to not let anybody exploit me. He is responsible in so many ways for making me happy, and I can say the same for Elton [John]. When the whole industry turned their back on me during Artpop, they were the ones who said, ‘Hey, this is a blip. It’s going to go away.’”

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The singer has also been looking ahead to her 30s and says she wants to use the next decade to show women what they can still do once their 20s are over. “My birthday is in March, so these are the last moments of my 20s. I already mourned that in a way, and now I’m really excited about showing girls, and even men, what it can mean to be a woman in her 30s.”

“I want to show women they don’t need to try to keep up with the 19-year-olds and the 21-year-olds in order to have a hit,” Gaga added. “Women in music, they feel like they need to f---ing sell everything to be a star. It’s so sad. I want to explode as I go into my 30s.”