Lady Gaga teases new Top Gun: Maverick song 'Hold My Hand' as 'a love letter to the world'

Lady Gaga's vocals will soon be soaring through the skies with Tom Cruise in director Joseph Kosinski's upcoming Top Gun: Maverick.

On Wednesday, the Oscar-winning A Star Is Born actress-songwriter teased "Hold My Hand," her first single in more than two years, a tune she's long been working on for the Paramount film's soundtrack, which also features work from legendary composer Hans Zimmer. She later released a snippet of the song (below) on Friday.

"When I wrote this song for Top Gun: Maverick, I didn't even realize the multiple layers it spanned across the film's heart, my own psyche, and the nature of the world we've been living in," she wrote on Instagram. "I've been working on it for years, perfecting it, trying to make it ours. I wanted to make music into a song where we share our deep need to both be understood and try to understand each other — a longing to be close when we feel so far away and an ability to celebrate life's heroes."

She continued, "I'm so grateful to Tom and Hans and Joe for this opportunity — and it's been a beautiful experience working with them. Me, BloodPop, Ben Rice, and everyone else who worked on it with us are so excited to share it to you. This song is a love letter to the world during and after a very hard time. I've wanted you to hear it for so long. And I'm so excited to give it to you on May 3."

"Hold My Hand" follows in the footsteps of the original 1986 Top Gun movie's Oscar-winning song "Take My Breath Away," which was performed by Berlin and composed by Giorgio Moroder and lyricist Tom Whitlock. The single reached No. 20 in the United States during the Tony Scott–directed film's life cycle.

Gaga won her first Academy Award for writing the original song "Shallow" for the movie A Star Is Born. She first received a nod for writing "Til It Happens to You" for the documentary The Hunting Ground.

Emma McIntyre/Getty Images; Scott Garfield/Paramount Lady Gaga; Tom Cruise in 'Top Gun: Maverick'

In a November 2021 interview with EW, Gaga teased that she was working on new solo pop material amid the promotional cycle for her second jazz album with Tony Bennett, Love for Sale.

"There's always music in my heart, in the works. It's just about [asking], 'What will it be?'" she explained when asked about releasing new pop music for the first time since dropping 2020's Chromatica. "I'm not ready to answer that yet. But what I will say is that... I'm always thinking about music. It just comes out in different forms."

Shortly after Chromatica's debut, executive producer BloodPop told EW to expect more material to drop as part of its album cycle, including possible songs recorded with late producer SOPHIE.

"We worked with SOPHIE very early on. [She was] the first collaborator of those sessions," he said. "Those days were fun. We set up six microphones and recorded [Gaga's] Lamborghini exhaust, and SOPHIE cut it up into samples. [Though they didn't make the album], we still plan to finish those songs and present something special within the Chromatica universe."

Hear a snippet of "Hold My Hand" above.

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