No, this isn’t a post about 3M Scotch tape, which many of us are struggling to find now that it’s present-wrapping season. I always buy some ridiculous 96-pack of the stuff and still somehow never have a roll on hand when I really need it. Also, did Scotch tape originate in Scotland? Just another seasonal question to ponder while you’re wrapping a pair of fitted sheets and wondering how they came to be so perfectly-folded in their package, never to be again. So many digressions, I’ve almost forgotten the point of this post.
Ahh, yes: 3M. As in three ‘M’ words that form the memory core of this post. The first being Madonna. As illustrated in the accompanying pics, she is the main thrust of what we have here, and the last one below is from her ‘Sex’ book anniversary in Miami. Her hairstyle echoes the one she wore to the premiere party of that book way back in that heady autumn of 1992. We’ve all come a long way, baby. Another digression.
The second ‘M’ is her song ‘Masterpiece’, a shuffling little ballad from the days leading into the ‘MDNA’ period – Holiday 2011 or thereabouts. Aside from a questionable ‘Santa Baby’ cover in the mid-80’s, Madonna hasn’t really done a Christmas-themed song (and the decidedly-non-Christmas ‘Holiday’ is NOT a fucking Christmas song) but for me, ‘Masterpiece’ will always come the closest thanks to my incessant playing of it on a holiday weekend in New York.
The third and final ‘M’ for the moment is Messiah – a majestic ballad from her under-rated and under-appreciated ‘Rebel Heart’ album. That too came along in a winter, post-holiday, but Christmas is supposedly all about the big M himself, Jesus Christ, and so ‘Messiah’ took on a Christmas slant, and its dramatic and slightly-forlorn feel mirrored some similarly depressing holiday moments. It ain’t all angels and holly.
Both of these songs have come to embody the holidays for me, as incongruous as Prince’s ‘Diamonds and Pearls’ perhaps, but no less lovely in my twisted heart. It always seemed that Madonna just wanted Christmas to be over so she could go back to focusing on herself and her career, but who knows – maybe she secretly loves the holiday, and has since way before Mariah made it her own. I kind of doubt it though – Madonna has never been one for sentimentality – one of the reasons I loved her in the first place.
“You’re forgiven… Everything you don’t know I forgive you for. Now let mama get her makeup done.” ~ Madonna, ‘Truth or Dare’
Almost every dilemma in my life can be solved by some reference in Madonna’s ‘Truth or Dare’ documentary, and having memorized every line of dialogue in it, I bring these little snippets of questionable wisdom with me even when the rest of the world has no idea what I’m talking about. Often it’s better that way. And for all those issues that somehow escape the wisdom of ‘Truth or Dare’, there’s always a pop song to give guidance and solace.
The more I know, the less I understand, All the things I thought I knew, I’m learning again I’ve been tryin’ to get down To the heart of the matter But my will gets weak And my thoughts seem to scatter But I think it’s about forgiveness Forgiveness
In my youth, I’d look to the simplicity of a Madonna lyric to solve the riddles of life, thinking that if it was good enough for Madonna – who seemed to be making such a fabulous life for herself – it could be good enough for me. Oddly enough, much of the time those words sustained me, or at the very least kept me alive when the typical teenage angst threatened to extinguish my mere existence. That was a time of relative innocence, and such innocence has long been destroyed.
These times are so uncertain There’s a yearning undefined People filled with rage We all need a little tenderness How can love survive in such a graceless age? And the trust and self-assurance that lead to happiness They’re the very things we kill, I guess Pride and competition cannot fill these empty arms And the wall they put between us, you know it doesn’t keep me warm
Back then, it felt like a song could save a life, even if I now see that that’s not entirely true, even if a song can only help you to save yourself, because no one else is going to do it. A harsh truth bomb, more cutting or diabolical than any dare, it helped me to understand, even at such a young age, that there was no true safety for some of us, that when we really needed help or found ourselves in dire emotional straits, it would be better not to have to rely on anyone else. That was survival, especially for a gay kid. It used to bother me that it had to be so; lately I’ve come to appreciate it, even if I’ve only gone so far as to unsheath the sword. Soft walk, big stick, you know the rest.
There are people in your life who’ve come and gone They let you down You know they’ve hurt your pride You better put it all behind you baby ’cause life goes on You keep carryin’ that anger It’ll eat you up inside baby
I’ve been trying to get down to the heart of the matter But my will gets weak And my thoughts seem to scatter But I think it’s about forgiveness Forgiveness Even if, even if you don’t love me
This isn’t to blame anyone for not being there. It’s just a little stream of consciousness, and streams can be messy and meandering, winding their way in convoluted form, eating away at banks we thought would stand like bulwarks for our lifetime. No, there is no blame here, aside from the heaps I am placing on myself, and maybe that’s why there is the need for forgiveness. This fall has been filled with a strange sense of nostalgia, of looking back at my past and making better sense of it now that my thoughts feel clearer. It’s mostly been a good thing, and I’ve mostly done it alone, because I was the only one who was there. Besides, when it comes to the real shit, not the silly histrionic squawking in which I usually engage, but the real hardcore trouble that fucks people up, I’ve found the following passage from Alexandre Dumas to be most helpful: “I’ll bury my grief deep inside me and I’ll make it so secret and obscure that you won’t even have to take the trouble to sympathize with me.”
Revenge and redemption was at the heart of ‘The Count of Monte Cristo’, where that quote originated, but that’s not what I’m after either. The most hollow words a person can utter are “I told you so.” More often than not, being right is simply being lonely.
For all my self-imposed alone time, I rarely felt like I was lonely, but I’ve been rethinking that too. Looking back at that scared little boy, and the man he grew to become, I’m thinking about forgiveness… forgiveness…
I’ve been tryin’ to get down To the heart of the matter Because the flesh will get weak And the ashes will scatter So, I’m thinkin’ about forgiveness Forgiveness Even if, even if you don’t love me anymore
{Note: The Madonna Timeline is an ongoing feature, where I put the iPod on shuffle and write a little anecdote on whatever was going on in my life when that Madonna song was released and/or came to prominence in my mind.}
How strangely beautiful that just as our weather turns foul, this summer bop comes along with sultry memories of heat and sun, and the restless infatuations that once made up a summer night. Sandwiched between Madonna’s brilliant ‘Ray of Light’ album and the soon-to-be-stomper of ‘Music’, this William Orbit soundtrack tune set the aural stage for her ‘American Pie‘ cover and found Madonna in-between projects just as I was in-between boyfriends.
A summer in Boston can be gorgeously disconcerting when one is between boyfriends, and shuffling along from crush to obsession to debilitating bewilderment is not made easier by the tricky heat and humidity of the season. Those dizzying days blur together now, somewhere between retail work at Structure and my first office job at John Hancock, somewhere in my early-to-mid-twenties, when everyone is allowed and expected to act the supreme fool with all the unjustified and false self-confidence of youth. Everything was stultifyingly serious and silly at once – as deadly as it was ridiculous – and Madonna decided to throw her fuckery into the ring with this song created for a goddamned Austin Powers movie (which I still have not seen).
I immediately put the swirling psychedelic opening onto my answering machine (because we had manual answering machines back then, and CD players) and used the title of the song as my screensaver. It was the 90’s for fuck’s sake – we were doing the best we knew to do, and more often than not failing miserably. As a die-another-day Madonna fan, I felt she could do no wrong, and I fell giddily under the spell of this song, just as I fell under the spells of all those beautiful boys who crossed my path at night.
Haven’t we met? You’re some kind of beautiful stranger You could be good for me I have a taste for the danger…
A Boston summer night, with all its mystery and sparkle, unfurled beyond the stretch of steps that led up to the condo. Watching the street below, I paused there as the street lamps glowed yellow, lighting the ways of workers winding along their paths home, or revelers just embarking on the start of a night out. All potential opportunities, all possible love stories – because isn’t that what every night was at that point in life? Even when we pretended it wasn’t, it always was. I knew it, and I knew my heart wouldn’t stop yearning just because I told it to stop.
If I’m smart then I’ll run away But I’m not so I guess I’ll stay Heaven forbid I’ll take my chance on a beautiful stranger
I looked into your eyes and my world came tumblin’ down You’re the devil in disguise that’s why I’m singin’ this song
To know you is to love you
He said his name was Freddy. At least, I think he did. He lived just a street or two away, near an incongruous mimosa tree that lent its perfume to that strange stretch of summer, and he seemed a little too magical to be true. He passed by only in the deep hours of night, and we smiled our smiles that bordered on snickers because we both had no idea what we were doing.
Those summer nights mixed with liquor in ways that were both wonderful and disconcerting, and on one particular late evening, we wound up on my couch, as young gents are often wont to do. It wasn’t like it usually was – rough and hungry and frantic, when two young men are so into each other they devour all in sight, driving tongues and appendages deeply and relentlessly into whatever is physically possible – this was almost like a moment of stilled time. No hurried pulling off of underwear, no rushed grabbing of backs or fronts, no quick tumble onto the bed while still joined desperately at the mouth. Instead, we sat silently. No one moved. The air felt still too. Even with the open windows everything had stopped, stilled like a movie moment out of ‘The Matrix’.
It was the strangest thing. He didn’t want a drink. I didn’t want another. We simply stayed sitting there, not even talking, and no one moved to break the spell. It was impossible to tell if this was weird for him too, but he remained silent, and so it became less weird for me. I already half-believed he wasn’t really there.
You’re everywhere I go And everybody knows To love you is to be part of you I pay for you with tears And swallow all my pride
The dim light of a lone lamp near the door was all that glowed in that moment. A little more came from the street outside, and the uppermost floors of what was then the John Hancock tower sparkled in the distance. Afraid to seek out his eyes and be seen in return, I slowly unbuttoned the top few buttons of his shirt and slid my hand across his chest. Was he even real? And if he was, what did he even want? I straddled him decisively then, to pin him down in case he was a ghost. He didn’t squirm or try to get away – instead our lips just barely touched, our noses only lightly grazing one another, and never before or since have I had a wisp of a kiss that left me wondering whether or not it had actually happened. Hovering over him, thighs upon thighs, I watched as he slowly unbuttoned the top few buttons of my shirt, and then leaned his head into my chest.
I pulled him closer into me, my chin resting on his soft hair as he breathed in the scent of my skin. We were impossibly young and saw no reason why it wouldn’t last.
He leaned back into the couch then, keeping his eyes down and his gaze averted. I wanted so badly to see him and to look into his eyes, but I followed his lead and didn’t pry, gently maneuvering off of his lap. Aside from our shirt buttons, our clothes were all still on, all still intact. We hadn’t even mussed our hair.
If I’m smart then I’ll run away But I’m not, so I guess I’ll stay Haven’t you heard? I fell in love with a beautiful stranger
I looked into your face My heart was dancin’ all over the place I’d like to change my point of view If I could just forget about you
To know you is to love you
In all the nights and years that came before and would later ensue, in the many men and people who would occupy my bed and my body, this would be one of the few times I felt so intensely attuned to someone that it was a spiritual moment of connection which transcended the physical world. It wasn’t because of who he was, it wasn’t because of who I was, it was simply because of some magical alchemy that brought two people into each other’s orbits for a night, when a mimosa tree sprinkled its ripe perfume onto two young men who couldn’t quite bear the idea of being alone at that hour, on that street, in that summer.
In the following weeks, I would watch for him, but never very seriously. I didn’t seek out where he lived, or haunt the general vicinity like I would do for others. Maybe our schedules were off-kilter, maybe his nights weren’t his alone anymore, maybe he never existed outside of the conjured longings of my overactive imagination. Whatever the case, I would never see him again, and I would never really look. My heart didn’t want to find him, and my head knew that to see him again would break such a perfect spell.
You’re everywhere I go And everybody knows
I looked into your eyes And my world came tumblin’ down You’re the devil in disguise That’s why I’m singin’ this song to you
To know you is to love you You’re everywhere I go And everybody knows I pay for you with tears And swallow all my pride
{Note: The Madonna Timeline is an ongoing feature, where I put the iPod on shuffle and write a little anecdote on whatever was going on in my life when that Madonna song was released and/or came to prominence in my mind.}
I’m goin’ through it, yeah I know you see the tragic in it Just hold on to the little bit of magic in it I can’t break down now I can’t take that now Died a thousand times Managed to survive I can’t break down now I can’t take that (I can’t take that)
I rise, I rise I rise up above it, up above it I rise, I rise I rise up above it all
For all of her strengths and triumphs, Madonna has been remarkably hit-or-miss when it comes to putting the closing song of an album together. For every ‘Vogue‘ there is a ‘Gone’, for every ‘Mer Girl‘ there is an ‘Act of Contrition‘. Mostly they are filler, albeit decent-enough filler – as in ‘Easy Ride‘ or ‘Like It Or Not‘, but only in that first example did she hit it out of the park. This Madonna Timeline entry, ‘I Rise’, from 2019’s ‘Madame X’ effort, is another decent-enough closer, but there’s not much more to say about it. That sort of dovetails with my thoughts on Madonna at the moment.
Of course I still love her, she simply hasn’t done anything in a long time that has sparked my fandom or stoked the fires of that love. This song would probably be her shrugging off such doubt in her, even from one of her lifelong fans. I’m absolutely certain she will rise again, and I can’t wait to see it.
Freedom’s what you choose to do with what’s been done to you No one can hurt you now unless you want them to (Unless you want) No one can hurt you now unless you love ’em too (B.S.) Unless you love ’em too
‘Cause I’m going through it Yeah, I know you see the tragic in it Just hold on to the little bit of magic in it (Magic in it) I can’t break down now I can’t take that (I can’t take that)
I rise, I rise (Rise) I rise up above it, up above it (I rise) I rise, I rise (Rise) I rise up above it all
Yeah, we gonna rise up Yeah, we gonna rise up Yeah, we gonna get up Yeah, we gonna get up Yeah, we gonna get up Yes, we can, we can get it together We’ll rise up, we can get it together
Racing through the backroads of upstate New York on a rainy night, I can no longer tell the difference between my tears and the rain on the windshield. With visibility low even absent my crying, the salty water further muddles the obscured view I had. It feels only right since everything else in life feels so wrong. The car careens to the side of the road, rain still beating against the windshield, while the wipers do their best to stave off blindness. I do not mind in the least. Destruction is welcome here.
I am on a self-appointed date with death, driving on one last journey before I’d return home to end my life, while the remnants of some hurricane wreak their weakened havoc on inland New York. In a couple of days Madonna will release her ‘Erotica’ album – the album that formed the culmination and central-crisis of a career that has always defied the odds. So it was that as my heroine was bringing me along on a sexual journey, I was on a path toward self-annihilation. Sex and death were instantly and irrevocably intertwined at that moment, as if entering adolescence under the specter of AIDS hadn’t fucked enough of us burgeoning gay boys up. Determined to be in sole control over how it all ended, and despondent for any number of closeted reasons, I’d made the determination to end my life… immediately after I heard the new Madonna album.
The whole world knew it was coming. More than ‘Like A Virgin‘, more than its follow-up ‘True Blue‘ – even more than the ‘Like A Prayer‘ brouhaha – ‘Erotica’ was probably the most-hyped album of her career, coming as it did with the never-before-or-since-duplicated ‘Sex’ book. Madonna fans especially watched and waited with keen anticipation, and back then radio stations had early copies to play as they wished. The local station was playing it as I drove along on that rainy night – if I got to hear it all, there might not be anything left to wait for.
Maple leaves fluttered messily down as the wind and rain ripped them from their perches. The air was filled with debris and it felt like the whole world was bearing down on the car as I slowed and pulled off the road. Sitting there, I listened as the song ‘Rain’ came on, its calming harmonies and steady ticking momentarily quelling my tears.
Somehow, I survive the next week.
{Here I have to pause. That sentence contains more than you will ever know – more than I will truly remember – and leaving it there like that, or even less, is all I can muster.}
Somehow… I survive.
I don’t remember getting back on the road, or sneaking back into the house. I don’t even remember which Madonna song they ended on (they didn’t end up playing the whole album after all). I only know I made it back home, back into bed, back into the impossibly forlorn state that a teenage boy just barely 17 years old could uncomfortably inhabit. I couldn’t feel more out of place and alone – and somehow I understood that it was only the beginning. Maybe that’s why I wanted so badly to give up then and there. The totality of such a difficult journey presented itself in full. I didn’t know enough to take it one minute at a time, to focus on that present moment, to feel the joy, however hidden or obscure or absent. The only time I came close was when a Madonna song was playing.
But something kept me from going through with the planned execution process I’d marked in the book ‘Final Exit’ that week, and it was enough to see me through the night. And the next day. And the next. And when at last Tuesday, October 20th arrived, my friend Ann and her Mom drove me to Rotterdam Square Mall to pick up the ‘Erotica’ album and the ‘Sex’ book.
At that scary time in my life, my friends, and often their parents, indulged me in such nonsense. It was as if they could tell, sometimes more than I could tell at times, that I needed something to hang onto, to keep going, to not give it all up. If that came in the form of a new Madonna album, maybe it was enough to get me past the danger zone. The expanse of an entire life looming before a teenager is more daunting, taunting, and debilitating than most of us as adults ever seem to remember. But some do, and they held out a hand for me at key moments. By the time Ann and her Mom dropped me off at my house, half of the album had been played, and all of our laughter had helped.
Back home, in the safety of our unfurnished basement, beneath two brightly clinical bulbs of fluorescent light, I open up the ‘Sex’ book while the ‘Erotica’ single played in the background. This was Madonna’s grand project – the ultimate union of music and visuals – and as I unzipped the book from its mythical mylar encasement like some enormous condom, feeling the cold metallic covers in my hand, I was grateful for being alive in that month of October in the year 1992. I knew I almost wasn’t.
Linking sex with death isn’t the healthiest way of discovering your sexuality, but we don’t usually get to choose the way sex enters our lives, we just have to make the best of when it does. In this case, the detached artistic take on the subject was the safest way to get down and dirty in the age of AIDS, and exploring the topic with the vastly varying songs of the ‘Erotica’ album was a roller coaster that included life and death moments, such as on ‘In This Life’, a ballad dedicated to two friends Madonna had lost to AIDS.
Those two gay men, long gone by the time Madonna released ‘Erotica’, had taught her the power and importance of art and beauty, and their memories had stayed with her. The majesty and might of making a piece of art was suddenly understood as a way of survival, even in the face of death. The rest of the ‘Erotica album was soaked in further brilliance ~ the whirling escapism of its greatest single ‘Deeper and Deeper‘ or the cinematic masterpiece of ‘Bad Girl’ or the psychedelic melodrama of ‘Secret Garden‘ – it was all waiting there for further exploration. That kept me going for the next few weeks and months. With each new video and performance, I sat mesmerized and enthralled by what this pop icon goddess would do next, watching and waiting and finally finding something on which to grasp to make it through the rest of the wilderness.
Thirty years later, the scratch of a vinyl record still evokes that iconic opening of the ‘Erotica’ album, and then that insinuating bass-line brings it all crashing back – a baptism and rebirth and the very point ‘Where Life Begins’ – and the first furtive, fumbling motions to finding my own sexuality as I writhed through equal parts desire and destruction. Madonna led me down the rabbit’s hole, and I willingly followed, needing sexual fantasies to distract me from suicidal fantasies, and even if it was a profoundly fucked-up way of beating one set of demons, it worked and got me through that rough patch. To this day, I am grateful to Madonna for that, as silly as it sounds. You never know what little thing might serve such a pivotal role – in this case it was a woman breathily singing the word ‘erotic’.
There would be other attempts at self-destruction to ensue, even as I understood the stupidity of what I was doing, even as Madonna survived her own reckoning in the fall-out of the ‘Sex’ book and ‘Erotica’ album. She would help save me then too.
At that time, however, the only way to make it through some nights was by putting on a song like ‘Rain’, imagining what a future might look like, and letting Madonna lead me away from the sadness and loneliness I felt. Thirty years later, she still casts that spell.
While my favorite books remain ‘The God in Flight’ by Laura Argiri and ‘The Great Gatsby‘ by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the inspirational work that has most informed my creative output in projects and how I present my artistic work to the world is easily Madonna’s infamous ‘Sex’ tome. Flashy and trashy, cheeky and freaky, low-brow and big-wow – ‘Sex’ was salacious, sultry, seductive, silly, and scintillating in all the best ways.
The promotional roll-out was christened by a topless runway walk at a Jean Paul Gautier fashion show by the Mistress of Ceremonies herself, and as Madonna as Dita smiled a golden-tooth-accented smile she sent the entire world into salivating anticipation for a book. That the woman who had made the art of the music video into a vaunted exercise in cinematic glory would put forth a book of sexual fantasies was a novel idea in many ways, starting with its metallic covers and spiral binding, and ending with its ridiculous comic book coda. In-between the aluminum was Madonna in all states of undress and erotic scenarios. As she had done for all her career, she was playing a part, or a series of roles, in an artistic expression on a theme – that the theme was sex heightened the allure and controversy, and the way she executed this mass-seduction of the world’s attention was a master-class in provocation to get one’s point across. As we moved into the digital age, it would become increasingly difficult to make such an imprint and impression on such a grand scale, but the lesson had already been learned.
Accompanying the ‘Sex’ book was the ‘Erotica’ album – and while ‘Sex’ may have brought about all the bombast, it was ‘Erotica’ that made the sounds that mattered. A work of edgy brilliance that remains a provocative slice of 90’s vibes, the album was strangely maligned by some, and recognized by others as the genius stroke of art-pop that it was. In anticipation of tomorrow’s 30th anniversary of this extraordinary period in Madonna’s legendary career, and a blog post that is slightly more somber and serious than the topic at hand might otherwise demand, here’s the track-listing of the ‘Erotica’ album and the Madonna Timeline entries that have been written thus far.
Inside: 674 pp, updated entry-by-entry through 9/1/22, includes new interviews (Liz Rosenberg’s first Madonna-centric Q&A in 30 years, Susan Seidelman with screen grabs from “Desperately Seeking Susan” auditions, many more)
The wait for a rather simple remix album seems worthy of the wait for a proper original studio album, and maybe that’s because we haven’t had a new Madonna release since 2019’s ‘Madame X’. We are definitely due for more, and this is hardly enough. A collection of Madonna’s 50 #1 Dance Chart hits (a record-breaker for any artist in any single category), ‘Finally Enough Love’ encompasses everything from ‘Holiday’ to ‘I Don’t Search I Find’, a lyric from the latter giving title to this opus (which could also be considered as GHV4?) It comes out, in its full incarnation, tomorrow. While I put this on my Amazon Wish List, the days of me eagerly waiting for and instantly going out to purchase a physical format of the latest Madonna release are long gone. That said, there’s always a bit of magic in the air when Madonna does anything, even if it’s a re-issue of songs that every true fan already owns. Here’s looking forward to the next musical chapter, and may it come sooner rather than later.
The track listing of the entry compilation is as follows, and for those we have already chronicled in the Madonna Timeline, click on the title for the link:
1. “Holiday” (7” Version) 2. “Like A Virgin” (7” Version) 3. “Material Girl” (7” Version) 4. “Into The Groove” (You Can Dance Remix Edit) 5. “Open Your Heart” (Video Version) 6. “Physical Attraction” (You Can Dance Remix Edit) 7. “Everybody” (You Can Dance Remix Edit) 8. “Like A Prayer” (Remix/Edit) 9. “Express Yourself” (Remix/Edit) 10. “Keep It Together” (Alternate Single Remix) 11. “Vogue” (Single Version) 12. “Justify My Love” (Orbit Edit) 13. “Erotica” (Underground Club Mix) 14. “Deeper And Deeper” (David’s Radio Edit) 15. “Fever” (Radio Edit) 16. “Secret” (Junior’s Luscious Single Mix) 17. “Bedtime Story” (Junior’s Single Mix) 18. “Don’t Cry For Me Argentina” (Miami Mix Edit) 19. “Frozen” (Extended Club Mix Edit) 20. “Ray Of Light” (Sasha Ultra Violet Mix Edit) 21. “Nothing Really Matters” (Club 69 Radio Mix) 22. “Beautiful Stranger” (Calderone Radio Mix) 23. “American Pie” (Richard ‘Humpty’ Vission Radio Mix) 24. “Music” (Deep Dish Dot Com Radio Edit) 25. “Don’t Tell Me” (Thunderpuss Video Remix) 26. “What It Feels Like For A Girl” (Above And Beyond Club Radio Edit) 27. “Impressive Instant” (Peter Rauhofer’s Universal Radio Mixshow Mix) 28. “Die Another Day” (Deepsky Radio Edit) 29. “American Life” (Felix Da Housecat’s Devin Dazzle Edit) 30. “Hollywood” (Calderone & Quayle Edit) 31. “Me Against The Music” (Peter Rauhofer Radio Mix) – Britney Spears feat. Madonna 32. “Nothing Fails” (Tracy Young’s Underground Radio Edit) 33. “Love Profusion” (Ralphi Rosario House Vocal Edit) 34. “Hung Up” (SDP Extended Vocal Edit) 35. “Sorry” (PSB Maxi Mix Edit) 36. “Get Together” (Jacques Lu Cont Vocal Edit) 37. “Jump” (Axwell Remix Edit) 38. “4 Minutes” (Bob Sinclar Space Funk Edit) – feat. Justin Timberlake & Timbaland 39. “Give It 2 Me” (Eddie Amador Club 5 Edit) 40. “Celebration” (Benny Benassi Remix Edit) 41. “Give Me All Your Luvin’” (Party Rock Remix) – feat. LMFAO & Nicki Minaj 42. “Girl Gone Wild” (Avicii’s UMF Mix) 43. “Turn Up The Radio” (Offer Nissim Remix Edit) 44. “Living For Love” (Offer Nissim Promo Mix) 45. “Ghosttown” (Dirty Pop Intro Remix) 46. “Bitch I’m Madonna” (Sander Kleinenberg Video Edit) – feat. Nicki Minaj 47. “Medellín” (Offer Nissim Madame X In The Sphinx Mix) – Madonna and Maluma 48. “I Rise” (Tracy Young’s Pride Intro Radio Remix) 49. “Crave” (Tracy Young Dangerous Remix) – feat. Swae Lee 50. “I Don’t Search I Find” (Honey Dijon Radio Mix)
Holiday, celebration, come together in every nation!
Our Queen Pop Icon Goddess Madonna celebrates her birthday today, and so we celebrate her legacy and body of work, just as she is about to release another greatest hits collection – this of her 50 #1 dance songs (yes, she’s had 50 #1 songs on the dance chart, far and away more than anyone else in the world, living or dead, and the most any single artist has amassed on any single chart). She’s celebrating in Italy this year, and though it’s been a bit of a rocky go of it over the past year (she’s had a break-up, been attacked by fans and non-fans alike for her plastic surgery and looks, and made a few questionable moves on social media) she seems to be plotting the next main Madonna event. Her appearance at Gay Pride back in June was epic and reminded everyone who the fuck she was, and always has been.
My favorite Madonna songs shift and undulate, like the charts she once ruled. Depending on the season or the mood, certain songs come back into focus, while others fade more obscurely into the past. My top three, however, have remained static and in place for the better part of two decades. I’ll post the links here, in honor of the day:
For some of a certain age, the summer of 1989 was defined by Madonna’s ‘Express Yourself’ – and for those too young to remember that, it’s now a year-round anthem for whenever I feel like we need to kick some ass. And there is no time like the present for kicking some ass…
Whether you have to fight for the integrity of our great country, or have your eye on something smaller like simply making it through the workday, ‘Express Yourself’ is a ball-busting exercise in maintaining a belief in yourself, a striking reminder to say what you mean and mean what you say. Who better to deliver such a message than Madonna?
“WITHOUT THE HEART, THERE CAN BE NO UNDERSTANDING BETWEEN THE HAND AND THE MIND.”
Recaptured brilliantly by Madonna expert Matthew Rettenmund on ‘Boyculture’ here, Madonna’s return to her throne for Pride 2022 was a smashing success, and a tell-tale signpost of why we need her more than ever. Even with the snippets and clips alone, she proves she is still one of the most thrilling entertainers of any generation. She performed various versions of several career-spanning songs – ‘Material Girl‘, ‘Hung Up‘ and ‘Celebration‘ – all of them seductive, playful, exuberant and as fresh as when they each came out for the very first time. It was a pleasant, and badly-needed, recollection of what made, and makes, her so damn great. Personally, I just needed the celebratory revelry of dance, pride, and gay fabulousness that is the hallmark of her wondrous career.
At the time of this posting the first format of Madonna’s dance hit collection – ‘Finally Enough Love‘ – will have been released, the perfect soundtrack to the summer that’s ahead. The full 50-song set drops later in August, and Madonna has been back in the promotional spotlight, performing at a Gay Pride event tonight to get us all pumped for the new release. While I’d prefer new music, Madonna’s classic dance vibes will easily do for the summer. ‘Vogue‘, ‘Turn Up the Radio‘, ‘Celebration‘, ‘Music‘, ‘Ray of Light‘ and ‘Express Yourself’ have all formed the backbones of summer sounds over the last three decades. Get up on the dance floor!
Suffering Madonna fatigue isn’t something to which I’m all that accustomed. For decades she has done little to no wrongs, but these last few years I’ve had issues with some of her choices, and, worse, I’ve found myself not even caring what she does. The world has indeed gone topsy-turvy in the midst of a pandemic, and all bets are off. Seismic shifts are now the norm, and things I once held as forever stable have melted away like the flimsiest of sandcastles.
The latest upcoming release form Madonna – ‘Finally Enough Love‘ – 50 of her #1 dance hits remixed and compiled in a sprawling collection – doesn’t kickstart that passion either. Partly because it’s a rehashing of whats been done before – sounds like these are mixes most of her fans have already heard. Hoping for some new twist, but not expecting it. Her recent remixes of ‘Frozen‘ on Tik Tok have also left me largely unimpressed. Once upon a time Madonna operated in the mode of not bothering with something if wasn’t going to be epic. Those days are done.
Two days and thirty two years ago, one of the most influential songs in my life was released: ‘Vogue’ by Madonna. The deep dive of that Madonna timeline goes into how it played out in the decades of my life, so I won’t bore you with such details. Instead, let’s go back to basics and recall the first few times I heard it playing on the radio.
Spring had just begun, and as ‘Hold On’ began a similar chart trajectory, ‘Vogue’ spoke more intently to me. Back then a new song crept slowly into the public realm. There was no immediate downloading of a song, no leaks of snippets or early versions, no Tik Tok or Instagram story proving previews for weeks beforehand – and the patience and surprise that were culled from such slow-moving musical motion resulted in a more resonant and meaningful experience. ‘Vogue’ became my dance bible. More than that, ‘Vogue’ became the portal into a future that I sensed but couldn’t yet hold in my hands, no matter how many times I could strike a pose.
Thirty two years later, I still feel the thrill of its power.
Today marks the anniversary of Madonna’s epic ‘Like A Prayer’ album. For those of us old enough to remember the spring of 1989, this will always harken to that heady time of burning crosses on MTV, and a darker, more somber and serious Madonna than we’d ever encountered before. It remains a masterpiece that holds up – a timeless classic rooted in solid songs and musical brilliance – and it has endured because of its universal themes. Let’s revisit its track-list, link by exuberant link:
