Madonna. Yay or Nay.

I prefer her 2 first lps which are stone cold classics.

 

Here's some statements from Cyndi about Madonna taken from “Cindy Lauper A Memoir”...


When I became famous - I mean right away - the press always asked me about one person: Madonna.They tried to create this big rivalry, but my feeling was, you don’t ****ing knock another sister, ever.But even her record company got in on it.They ran an ad in Billboard where she was dressed in a white corset.And it said something like “This girl gonna give Cindy Lauper a run for her money.” I felt really bad about it. Everybody else was fueled up by this supposed rivalry, but I was backing up, going “I don’t wanna do this, I don’t wanna be part of this.”

The thing was, our music wasn’t even similar. (Although if you ask me, her voice was sped up in "Like A Virgin" to make it sound high like mine.) She was so smart about business and marketing (I never was) and she always was, and still is, beautiful. I kind of went the other way because I had on the war and I purposely wore clothes that were rebellious, and antifashion sometimes, especially toward the end 1985, I remember I saw Madonna for the first time at the American Music Awards at the beginning of 1985. That year I was nominated for two awards, Favorite Pop/Rock Female Artist (against Madonna) and Favorite Pop/Rock Female Video Artist (against Tina Turner). When I got up to make my acceptance for Favorite Pop/Rock Female Artist, I looked at Madonna sitting in the audience, and I felt so crummy, because she had "Like A Virgin" out and it was number one for six weeks in a row. I never had that kind of success in my life, ever. Neither had she, so I thought it was awesome for her.

So I thanked everybody and then I said, “I accept this award for the people that came before me and paved the way, and for the people that will come after me.” And I looked at her and thought, “Next year it will be you.” I meet her afterwards and said “Hey, that track of yours "Like A Virgin" is unbelievable, it’s so great, congratulations.” She was nice but it was a really short exchange, I never could have a conversation with her because she always had lots of people protecting her.

I remember Jon Pareles of the New York Times did an article comparing me again to Madonna and how I was going to do better than her, and blah blah blah. I didn’t think that was such a good idea, because you never know what will happen. And after True Colors, Madonna proved him wrong. She is brilliant at selling, and she didn’t fight her record company the way I did. I think the secret behind her success is that she would find someone who was really successful at what she wanted to do - a writer or a producer - and do it with them. I never did that. I never wanted to call up people I didn’t know. And she also had Warner Bros., and their VP Seymour Stein, behind her fighting the fight for her, and I just didn’t get that kind of support from my label. I was always fighting with them. Even Dave got caught up in the “Madonna rivalry.” One time he said, “Don’t you want to compete with Madonna?” I couldn’t believe it. I was just trying to stay focused and do my own thing.

And by the way, the song “Madonna whore” had absolutely nothing to do with Madonna.It was about the Madonna - whore complex. But of course because of the thing with me and Madonna, that’s what people were going to think. Dopey me.

But Madonna herself brought that concept into her greatest, most provocative stuff, such as "Like A Prayer", which, not for nothing, made me love her. When I saw that video I said “Alright, she’s ****ing great”. She pushed all the buttons with that one - brilliant. And Pepsi dropped her after that video, not only she did wind up taking money from them, but she used that controversy to make the video even bigger, and everyone was it, everyone. When Pepsi pushed her down like that, what they really did they pushed her up. She just knew how to work that. And like I said before, I always put my best foot forward but I didn’t know how to manipulate the press. I had no business sense. And Madonna had it and she still does.

 

Cyndi also kinda screwed up that she took too long between albums. She's So Unusual came out a couple months after Madonna's debut, her followup came out a couple months after True Blue, Madonna's third album. They both took another three years before the followups, but True Blue sold 4x what True Colors did stateside, and Madonna had been pretty much everywhere in 1987, Cyndi had some success in 86-87 but by mid-1987 she had fallen massively, and Vibes in 1988 (which was a bomb on the level of Shanghai Surprise) did not help matters. By the time she came back with A Night To Remember, she was old news and while I Drove All Night was a top 10, the album just didn't catch on and she was pretty much gone from the mainstream after that, whereas Madonna was still big with Like A Prayer. A Night To Remember was supposed to come out in 1988 but she pushed it back after the failure of Vibes, in hindsight maybe she should've put the album out then, 3 years in the 80s was an eternity

 

I'd take any of Madonna's classics over Cyndi's first two LPs.

 

To each their own . Room for everybody. Side 1 if Unusual hard to beat...lol!

 

True. But Side 1 of "Like a Virgin" is absolutely flawless.

 

I agree. That run from Money Changes Everything to All Through The Night is a better run than any of Madonna's albums

But Madonna has a much better discography as a whole. Cyndi never could match that debut to me, though she had great singles afterwards

 

For a best "side", I think side one of True Blue is probably Madonna's best (Papa Don't Preach/Open Your Heart/White Heat/Live To Tell)

 

Cindy Lauper, who was and is very talented, puts her finger on the reasons for Madonna's extraordinary fame: beauty, business sense, the outrageous quality, getting top writers and producers. It was a formula that lasted well and entertained many people. But great musical art it wasn't, which I think Lauper was saying between the lines. Lauper was a true original, kind of a Laura Nyro of her generation. She had the same truncated career in mega-terms, but the business has been like that since the 70s.

 

Nice!

 

Cyndi's career and discography is a series of ups and downs creatively. Bring Ya to the Brink is her only post-Stars LP to really delight me. In fact, it was my entry point with her. But her first four LPs are very, very solid.

 

I agree. I have nothing but the utmost respect for Cyndi, but her discography is extremely spotty once she drifted away from her bread and butter (I'd give her Sisters Of Avalon from 96 as well). I respect that she's just doing whatever she's in the mood for today, be it folk, country, blues, standards, etc.., but most of it is just very boring.

 

Didn't we already have a long discussion about the awfulness that's "WTG"??? Why are we soiling this thread with it again???

 

It cropped up briefly. It's gone again now.

 

"Failure"??? You have an odd notion of "failure"...

Good God, do you ever stop with your claims that Gaga is washed up/has-been/etc.?

She's on the award shows because she's popular. They're not gonna put her on the Oscars or on the Super Bowl or on the Grammys if they don't think people want to see her...

 

Really? You've seen into the future and know exactly how their careers will go from here, eh?

 

No one called Lauper "the next Madonna". She was too different than Madonna - and she was successful at exactly the same time.

You can't be the "next" somebody when your career starts at the same time!

 

Not really. "Like a Virgin" sold 10 million US compared to 6 million for "SSU".

"SSU" was a big hit, but Lauper at her peak didn't rival Madonna...

 

I don't think Whitney was ever close to that level. Very successful? Sure, but not really "dominant".

I think the closest she came to "dominance" was actually in the 90s, as "Bodyguard" was so freakin' popular, but by then, she had to share the "diva spotlight" with Mariah.

Never really saw Whitney as "competition" for Madonna - I think they largely appealed to different audiences...

 

Technically? Sure, but technical ability is next to meaningless in pop music.

Technically there are skillions of singers superior to Mick Jagger, but there's no one else I'd rather hear sing the Stones!

 

Whitney did outsell Madonna. "LAV" is Madonna's biggest at 10 million US, while Whitney has 2 albums that sold more than that - and another that peaked at 9 million.

Madonna really only had 2 true "blockbuster albums": "LAV" and "True Blue". Most of the rest sold very well but not to the enormo-hit degree of those two.

Janet's two biggest sold 6 million each, which puts her below Whitney's 3 biggest and Madonna's two biggest. Janet was very successful but not quite in Madonna territory - especially because her career petered out more quickly...

 

Agree. Whitney could sell records like nobody's business, but it takes more than that to be a real "pop icon".

And Whitney didn't have it. As you note, she just never had much of a "public personality" - people loved the music but she didn't make a real cultural impact otherwise...

 

One more important ingredient in Madonna's success and longevity has been her publicist and allies in the press. All Madonna would have to do is hire a new producer, get some new clothes and change her hairstyle. Then her publicist would release a statement, "Madonna's reinvented herself AGAIN!" Fawning media praise ensued every single time. Worked like a charm.

 

Suddenly, a wild Oatsdad appears!

 

All that wouldn't mean much if the fans (and even non-fans) didn't pay attention. It's not like now when people find it hard to muster any interest even in Justin Bieber's nude pics. Madonna was born for the limelight and was born in a time when it still mattered.