Category Archives: Madonna

Tomorrow the next installment of the Madonna Timeline returns with a cut from her latest album ‘Rebel Heart’. When in doubt, I always come back to Madonna for inspiration and invigoration. This song proves no exception, but before we dive into the beauty of ‘Inside Out’ here is a quick look back at the last few timeline entries, as there was a bit of a stretch without them.

‘Easy Ride‘ ~ American Life

‘Devil Pray‘ ~ Rebel Heart

‘Pray for Spanish Eyes‘ ~ Like A Prayer

‘Messiah‘ ~ Rebel Heart

‘Spotlight‘ ~ You Can Dance

‘Jump‘ ~ Confessions on a Dancefloor

‘Survival‘ ~ Bedtime Stories

‘Wash All Over Me‘ ~ Rebel Heart

Yesterday’s return of the Madonna Timeline is fortuitously timed to coincide with her latest Harper’s Bazaar cover story. It’s easily her best photo shoot in years, reminiscent of her ‘Bedtime Stories’ period, with a lace-filled, bead-addled soft sensuality that revels in its own sumptuous beauty. This is the Madonna that many of us like best – gorgeous, sexy, and slightly provocative, with a feel that’s both new and nostalgic. It’s a tough hat trick to pull off, yet she’s been doing it for three decades. There are tantalizing hints of a new album, but the new movie she’s set to direct (‘Loved’) sounds like it will be her next creative endeavor.

There’s an exquisite video snippet of this photo shoot that Madonna recently posted as well, and it’s insanely beautiful. She remains, as ever, her own living work of art. I love when she embraces her glamorous side. There is enough ugliness in the world today. We need beauty. We need art. We need a government with a heart!

Madonna has been on a ski holiday with her family, but in a few days she’ll be back where she belongs – on the cover of a magazine. This marks her umpteenth Harper’s Bazaar cover, the magazine that did one of her most stunning photo shoots (the premiere of her geisha look from 1999). I like the feel of this one, with its decadent 1920’s flapper look.

I’ll be returning to the Madonna Timeline entries very soon. The next selection is ‘Easy Ride’ so get ready to return to the scorching landscape of ‘American Life’ – and there’s never been a better time.

Madonna has played an unlikely part in my holidays since I was a boy, even if the only official Christmas connection she’s ever fostered was her rather wretched version of ‘Santa Baby’ during the ‘Who’s That Girl’ stretch. I won’t bother posting that rendition (it sounded like she had a cold during the recording) but I will post my own photos from her recent Rebel Heart Tour. This was the closest I’ve gotten to my idol, and Suzie and I squealed like we always do in the presence of such greatness.

The holiday connection comes during the period in which my fandom was at its zenith – the white-hot prime of the fall of 1991. She was on the precipice of the ‘Sex‘ book/’Erotica‘ album, but not quite there yet, so her star power had been growing steadily for about eight or nine years. Many of us consider this one of her most regal periods, when she had the eyes of the whole world, and some begrudging admiration to go along with it. Her ‘Like A Prayer’ album had earned her artistic worth, while her ‘Truth or Dare’ documentary had become one of the most successful documentaries at that time. After bring dismissed for years as a pop lightweight, she suddenly had the history and experience and success to assume her rightful place on the pop culture throne.

As the fall months led into the latter days of the year, and I was asked what I wanted for Christmas, I did not hesitate: a laser-disc player. It was being heralded as the next big thing, but I didn’t care so much for technological advances as I did about the fact that this was, and remains, the only format on which Madonna’s epic ‘Blond Ambition’ tour was officially available.

My Mom indulged me, and we brought home the Laserdisc player right before Christmas, and then I received the official Blond Ambition disc – three times the size of a CD – and set it all up in our basement. My Christmas memories were indelibly linked to the performances from that tour. Despite initial hesitation, I came to love this concert. With the pristine quality of the laserdisc, the impeccable sound system, and one of Madonna’s most amazing performances, it became emblematic of something special – something that resonates to this very day.

I’d study each dance move and vocal inflection, every nuanced wink and audience interaction, right down to the broken chair during the ‘Keep It Together’ finale, and I gained a little confidence with every little exhibition of power. It was what kept me going through the rocky path of adolescence.

During Christmas vacation, after the holiday obligations were done and the stretch of non-school days stretched gloriously out ahead of us, I’d pad down to the cellar and watch the Blond Ambition Tour. The time was golden. School vacation made memories more indelible. Madonna’s music added to the experience. The thrill of the Blond Ambition Tour set it all off. I fear I’m unable to fully convey what it all meant, but that’s all right.

Some memories don’t signify anything more than a marker of time. This one means a little more to me, but perhaps not anyone else. It was, after all, a memory of solitude, of loneliness, even if I would never admit it. It’s from a time in my life when I wasn’t quite sure of myself, when I didn’t really love myself, and when I was pretty sure no one else ever would. Yet there was the seed of something greater inside of me, and despite all my efforts at self-destruction, something helped me hang onto the hope that there was more to my story than hiding in the basement. Madonna shouted out in French the opening clarion call of the concert, “Do you believe in love?”

My heart resounded, “Yes!… Yes!… Yes.”

As a lifelong Madonna fan who loves almost everything the woman has done, it should come as no surprise that I was completely enthralled by this speech. Give it a listen, as she is doing something she has never done before. Just when you think she can no longer surprise or stage a rebellion, think again.

Madonna’s Rebel Heart Tour gets its premiere on Showtime tonight, and we’ll be watching the grand spectacle unfold from the comfort of the couch. This was one of the more enjoyable tours she’s put on of late, so I’ll be interested to see how it translates to television viewing. My review of her performance in Boston is here, and there have been a number of Madonna Timelines that came from the Rebel Heart album, as seen below.

Living For Love

Devil Pray

Ghosttown

Unapologetic Bitch

Hold Tight

Bitch I’m Madonna

Holy Water

S.E.X.

Best Night

Messiah

Wash All Over Me

Autotune Baby

Rebel Heart

For those who were unlucky enough to have missed out on seeing the Rebel Heart Tour, this is your chance. It’s a good one – one of her warmest tours ever – so hunker down and let our lady of perpetual provocation do her thing. No one does it better.

Finally, it happened.

And it was worth the wait.

Classics and new classics.

(‘Papa Don’t Preach‘, ‘Music‘, ‘Bitch I’m Madonna‘ and more.)

There was humor, there were laughs, and only one or two thuds.

There was even a ‘Don’t Cry For Me Argentina‘ duet.

Best of all, Madonna goes earnestly with the flow.

“You’re not gonna get me with red flannel, baby.”

Thus it was spoken.

Madonna: Rebel Heart Tour

September 26, 2015 — TD Banknorth Boston

She stands there, resplendent in the Bob Mackie gown she wore to the 1991 Oscar ceremony, looking every inch the superstar, dripping in diamonds, her bright blond hair glowing like a halo around her. Those blue eyes twinkle as she shimmies and shakes, and only when the camera pulls away slightly do we see that she is caged. A metal screen holds her back, framing her legendary body. Bumping and grinding, she shakes her booty just as she did at the end of that legendary 1991 Oscar appearance.

But all is not well, as the stomping of soldiers and the brutality of actions results in a bruised and battered Madonna, her gown sullied and her diamonds encrusted with blood. Is this what the world has done to her, or what she has done to herself, her image, her entire history?

She is beaten down, bloodied and left for dead at the hands of masked soldiers.

She waits to be rescued but it’s not a knight in shining armor who comes to her aid, it’s Madonna herself in flowing ‘Ray of Light’ hair, suited up in black fight gear, racing and leading a group of soldiers to the start of a revolution. That’s always been her way – saving herself and not counting on a man, or a woman, or anyone other than her own multitude of selves.

The battle cry of the ‘Rebel Heart Tour’ has been sounded, and the clarion of ‘Iconic’ sees her descending and breaking out of a metal cage that deposits her in the center of the maelstrom. She begins as Woman Warrior, dispensing cross wielding samurai with assured ease. Her own bulky get-up of red streaked with black is also soon dispensed, revealing an elegant black brocade dress for the polarizing ‘Bitch I’m Madonna’ and early hit ‘Burning Up‘ (for which she also plays a mean electric guitar).

Costumes and choreography are the mainstay of any proper Madonna show, and this evening finds her making clever use of a multi-song strip-down that ends with a sheer nun-inspired look for ‘Holy Water‘ – arguably the most controversial portion of the show. In all fairness, it’s pretty benign, even if it does find Madonna pole-dancing with scantily-clad nun figures. Getting beyond that, though, it also provides the evening’s seminal set-piece: a last supper brought to thrilling life. The image is an indelible one, and it fittingly segues into ‘Vogue’ because, well, didn’t Jesus Christ himself strike the most iconic pose of all? There are no such crucifixion scenes here, and after pushing the envelope (a phrase seemingly crafted for the sole purpose of Madonna) she comes to a new salvation in ‘Devil Pray’.

A ghostly interlude of ‘Messiah’ finds one of her back-up dancers working some serious performance art, and when Madonna returns things take a brighter, if bluer, turn with the 50’s garage-themed exuberance of ‘Body Shop’. As she did on her ‘Rebel Heart’ album, Madonna manages to reconcile her rebel and romantic sides for perhaps the first time in her career. Up until now it’s usually been one or the other, with varying results for each. (For every rebellious ‘Like A Prayer‘ or ‘Erotica‘ moment there was a softer ‘Evita‘ or ‘Bedtime Stories.’) On this tour, she melds those often-opposing views into a cohesive look back (and, as ever, forward) on the duality that has made her such a transfixing icon.

The heart of the show may be her sweetly-earnest rendition of ‘True Blue’ on which she plays the ukulele. Many of us fans never thought we’d see the day she’d sing the title track of the album to which she dedicated and so generously doted on first husband Sean Penn, but here it was, transformed into an unsaid ode to those fans who have stood by her in the very truest of blue manners. Equally-pleasing was the racing performance of ‘Deeper and Deeper’ which finds her breaking things down in a West-Side-Story-meets-Michael-Jackson moment of choreographic bliss.

Madonna’s ambivalence of love has always been one of her most interesting features, and the arrival of the melancholy mash-up of ‘Heartbreak City’ and ‘Love Don’t Live Here Anymore’ is one of the more dramatic, and assuredly mature, moments of the whole show. Yet getting over heartbreak is what Madonna has done in repeatedly fine fashion; here she does so in an infectiously-retro romp through ‘Like A Virgin’ finding that shiny and new feeling for the umpteenth time. It’s a simple yet effective crown-pleaser, a throwback to the girl who giddily danced and sang all by her lonesome while the rest of the world watched in flummoxed fascination.

An immense cape seems to run the length of the entire extended stage, and Madonna throws it off before diving into an unfortunately choppy version of ‘Living For Love‘. For those who recall her cape-inflicted fall from a stage, this is a triumphant return, indicative of what Madonna has espoused over and over: the ability to get right back up from any fall. It wouldn’t be a Madonna tour without a damn performance of ‘La Isla Bonita‘, but this time it works as a lead-in for the flamenco-tinged outfits and musical slant of a majestic mash-up. This one runs through some of her earliest and most beloved hits – ‘Dress You Up‘, ‘Lucky Star‘, ‘Into the Groove‘ – given a slowed down but still-smoldering flamenco spin.

It’s the perfect personification of this tour: a magical warm-hearted amalgamation of a multitude of countries – China, Japan, Mexico, Spain, France, and of course America. It’s a tour for the world, for a multi-generational cross section of humanity which Madonna has somehow always managed to unite – in adoration, in exasperation, in inspiration. When she dives into her 1987 #1 hit ‘Who’s That Girl’ (which most Madonna fans figured we’d never hear live) accompanied only by a guitar, it’s an astounding moment of introspection served up to the world. Standing near the edge of her heart-shaped stage, she moves into a joyously-nostalgic performance of ‘Rebel Heart’ while artwork by her fans plays on an enormous video behind her. Simple stuff, but powerful as hell when you listen to the lyrics and think about how far she has come – and how far all of us who have been on this journey have come.

For the final segment of the evening, an art-deco flapper send-off that finds Madonna dripping in sparkling crystals, all elegance and showgirl sexiness as she begins a slow-burn intro to the now-classic ‘Music’ – it soon revs up into a high-octane ‘Smooth Criminal’ scene. An unnecessary re-hash of one of her weaker songs, ‘Candy Shop‘ gets some extra flapper attention here, but it’s a shimmering straight-up almost ballad-like rendition of ‘Material Girl‘ that truly shines.

On this day, her son David turned ten, and he was the surprise ‘Unapologetic Bitch‘ of the evening. As such, he showed some serious dance moves before Madonna paused in her usual banter, foregoing the usual litany of ‘fucks’ at that point, and, in charmingly awkward mother-son fashion, explained to him that sometimes it’s ok to swear if it’s in a song. Later she dedicates a vocally-precious version of ‘La Vie en Rose’ to him. It is a rare and thrilling unguarded moment where the mother kicked in, and it was both startling and heartwarming to see this woman whom we’ve watched kick ass and take no prisoners for sentimental bullshit taking off her armor. That’s what this Woman Warrior is doing with her Rebel Heart tour. She’s still an ass-kicking renegade, but underneath it all she’s human. It’s that Madonna – the only Madonna – who rules and slays and loves – whom I’ve adored for 30 years. It seems the rest of the world is finally catching on.

“I’ll teach you how to fuck,” she promised both in song and on paper.

It was October 1992, and Madonna was staking her sexual claim across the globe. Who was I to resist? At the time, my fandom was at its earliest height, and ever since then she has barely been able to do a wrong. Back then, I needed her for something more important than entertainment or amusement: I needed her to survive. In addition, I needed her to break through my shyness and social inhibition, and to help me bust out of the constraints of a conservative Catholic upbringing. All of those issues would end up killing me if I continued in my misguided beliefs, and deep down I knew that.

I was ripe for a sexual awakening, even if I didn’t know whether that would be at the hands of a man or woman, and as Madonna’s ‘Erotica’ album was casting its spell and putting me in a trance, I felt the stirrings of desire and carnal longing. As candles burned and fall winds blew, I conjured my own brew of prayers and wishes, and the hope that the secrets of sex would soon reveal themselves.

It was still such a mystery to me: slightly dangerous, slightly comical, slightly repellent, but supremely enticing. My body reacted to the sight of shirtless men while my mind thrilled to the notion of vulnerability – and as strange as it sounds the male always seemed more vulnerable than the female in my warped sense of of the world. We wore our sex on the outside, unprotected and swinging in the air, easily prone to attack or seduction.

A song like ‘Erotica’ burned red-hot and brazenly; a cut like ‘Rain‘ tripped the lights blue and fantastic. The entire ‘Erotica’ album was a rainbow of aural textures and sextures, each a little story in itself – tales of seduction and carnality as much as love and self-exploration. Coupled with the ‘Sex’ book, it was a project of sexual expression that played with the topic – sometimes coyly, sometimes overtly – and in such an extreme self-display of naked un-inhibition that it culminated in one of the most unpopular periods of Madonna’s career.

There was a wicked little lesson in that too: if you had ‘Sex’ you would get punished. She fought it against it, and ultimately so would I… but not quite yet. Though I would dip my dick in men and women soon enough, back then I kept it all to myself. I flipped the pages of ‘Sex’ and listened to the moans of ‘Erotica’ and dreamt of the day when I would share it with another.

Driving in the fall when it’s sunny out is a pleasure that seems largely underestimated these days. When so much entertainment and distraction is at hand on phones and other devices, we seem to be losing the joy in a simple ride through the changing foliage of New England. I’ll never lose touch with that, however, and when given the opportunity I’ll relish these days when all I have a drive ahead of me, and a destination where I can settle in for the night. Home is to be found where one feels comfortable enough to rest a weary pair of eyes, or relax into a state of unguarded ease. Boston and Albany provide both to me.

On this particular day, making my way from Cape Cod back to the Capital District, the sky is slightly hazy, but sections of sun shine through. It’s a ‘Bedtime Stories’ kind of day, and my mind returns to the fall of 1994, when Madonna released her most autumn-like album. Though ‘Erotica’ actually experiences its anniversary this week (bang-up sex-post coming tomorrow) this drive demands a quieter, softer soundtrack. Here are a few links to the ‘Bedtime Stories’ cuts that have already been written about on the Madonna Timeline:

• Survival
• Secret
• Take A Bow

A dry, dusty road throws clouds into the air whenever a car or truck speeds by.

The barren stretch of scorched earth expands endlessly.

Is this where the world begins, or ends?

Worn wood creaks beneath each step, groaning for the insult to injury of such dire surroundings, such repetitive beatings.

If the devil lives, here would be a good place to find him.

In a few hours, the Madonna Timeline returns, and it’s going to be a devil of a good time. Some of Madonna’s best work comes when she confronts her own relationship with religion and spirituality. Witness the majestic heights of ‘Like A Prayer‘ and the plaintive beauty of ‘Messiah‘, or the delicate yearning of ‘Pray for Spanish Eyes‘ and the choral climax of ‘Nothing Fails.’ Even lesser pieces like ‘Holy Water‘ and ‘Act of Contrition‘ have their hidden merits. Madonna has a God complex, and it’s a gorgeous thing to behold. Coming up next…