Almost everything about Lady Gaga – the fashion, the performances, the music – suggests she’s grown too big for her little old life in New York.

Except that couldn’t be further from the truth.

In fact, it’s the “hustle and the grind” of the Big Apple, the pop star tells Vogue magazine, that has been the inspiration for her successful career.

“It was grassroots, downtown New York, blood, sweat, and tears, dancing, music, whiskey, pummeling the streets, playing every venue I could get my hands on,” she said of her pre-fame life in the magazine’s March issue.

“It was the hustle and the grind and the traffic of New York that propelled me to where I am today,” she continued. “I don’t in any way associate my past with anything other than the hunger and the starvation for success that I still feel. It was the most beautiful time in my life.”

And, Gaga added, “funnily enough, I still live in the same apartment, hang out with the same friends, drink at the same bars, and I dance in the same studios with the same dancers. Really, nothing has changed.”

The singer echoed the same “nothing has changed” line when talking about her parents, Joe and Cynthia Germanotta.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/2011/02/10/2011-02-10_lady_gaga_the_hustle_and_grind_of_new_york_propelled_me_to_where_i_am_today.html#ixzz1DaZPSdm8