What. Is. Your. Problem???? Actually, I don't even own Who's That Girl, but I can see that. And I find Music a disappointing, overproduced mess (although when it works on a couple of tracks it really works), although I don't know if You Can Dance is better. But I think Ray of Light is probably the best thing she's ever done, and everything since sort of a betrayal to one degree or another, since clearly she's capable of much better work...
On March 2, 1989, Madonna's Pepsi commercial aired for the first and only time during The Cosby Show. A day later, the video for Madonna's new single, "Like a Prayer", would debut on MTV and ignite a controversy that resulted in the ad getting pulled.
I actually don't mind that aspect of You Can Dance at all. I actually like that they're mostly just extended mixes of the originals - works great for dance tracks like "Physical Attraction". My only problem is that they mess up maybe the best cut on the record after "Into The Groove" ("Everybody") with a crappy, annoying mix instead of one that focused on the record's incredible groove. It might have been a more interesting record if they'd done a few more really out there reinterpretations of some of her tracks, but I often find those really tedious. The actual results could have been a lot worse than the extended mixes, which is essentially all we got here. That having been said, the dub mixes that conclude the disc are somewhere between "meh" to just plain "nope", especially since they're repeating tracks we'd already gotten. For those I really wish they'd have either included three more extended mixes of three different tracks or three really radical reinterpretations of some of her work. That's where You Can Dance really missed the opportunity to be something greater than just a cash grab / way to get "Into The Groove" on CD...
Gotta hand it to her, she collected a big fat paycheck ("selling out"), filmed a by-the-numbers crappy rock star music video commercial, and then rendered it completely unusable within a single day. That was some brilliant ****.
Like a Prayer Release date: March 21, 1989 Billboard 200 Chart Peak: No. 1 Track list: 01. Like a Prayer (Madonna/Leonard) 02. Express Yourself (Madonna/Bray) 03. Love Song (Madonna/Prince) 04. Till Death Do Us Part (Madonna/Leonard) 05. Promise to Try (Madonna/Leonard) 06. Cherish (Madonna/Leonard) 07. Dear Jessie (Madonna/Leonard) 08. Oh Father (Madonna/Leonard) 09. Keep It Together (Madonna/Bray) 10. Spanish Eyes (Madonna/Leonard) 11. Act of Contrition (Madonna/Leonard) Known outtakes: "Supernatural" (released as a b-side on the "Cherish" single; a remixed version later appeared on the Red Hot + Dance charity compilation) "Possessive Love" (a version was recorded and released by Marilyn Martin) "Love Attack" "First Was a Kiss" "Just a Dream" (later recorded and released by Donna DeLory) "Angels With Dirty Faces" Singles (in order of release): 1. "Like a Prayer" (Billboard Hot 100: No. 1; US Dance: No. 1; US Adult Contemporary: No. 3) 2. "Express Yourself" (Billboard Hot 100: No. 2; US Dance: No. 1) 3. "Cherish" (Billboard Hot 100: No. 2; US Adult Contemporary: No. 1) 4. "Oh Father" (Billboard Hot 100: No. 20) 5. "Dear Jessie" (not released in North America, but reached the Top 10 in the UK, Ireland, and the European Hot 100) 5. "Keep It Together" (Billboard Hot 100: No. 8; US Dance: No. 1) 1988 marked the first year since the release of "Everybody" in 1982 where there was no new music from Madonna. In a relatively quiet year for her, she spent several months appearing on Broadway in Speed-the-Plow, as well as working on what would become her fourth album, Like a Prayer. While she was one of the most commercially successful artists of the decade, she rarely got the same level of respect from music critics and wanted to be taken more seriously as an artist. With Like a Prayer, Madonna made her most personal album to date, writing about the death of her mother, the dissolution of her marriage, and her relationships with her father and family. The album reflected a new maturity and would prove to be the turning point where many started regarding her as an artist, not just a pop singer. While Like a Prayer didn't sell quite as much as Like a Virgin or True Blue, it was still one of the biggest albums of 1989, launched four Top 10 hits in the US, saw Madonna begin a new chapter in her career, and set the stage for her to continue making more ambitious albums. Given how prolific Madonna had been to that point, the wait for Like a Prayer felt excruciating. In the time since True Blue was released, my parents had separated; I was living with my mom and visited my father every other weekend. The Friday after Like a Prayer was released, he surprised me with the cassette when my sister and I went to visit him. He was always dismissive of Madonna and it was the only time I could remember where he indulged my fandom. I proceeded the play the album at least a dozen times that weekend; the cassette then spent most of that spring and summer in my walkman. A year later when I got my first CD player, it was one of the first CDs I bought. The album has remained one of my favourite Madonna albums throughout the years. Along with her debut, this is one of her most consistent records. "Like a Prayer", "Express Yourself", "Cherish", "Promise to Try" and "Oh Father" are all exceptional and still some of her most notable songs; as I've mentioned earlier in the thread, I also think that "Keep It Together" is extremely underrated. The only song here that really disappoints is "Love Song", which falls short of the expectations I had for a Madonna/Prince collaboration. I know a lot of people are dismissive of "Act of Contrition", but I still find it an amusing end to the album all these years later. (If this album had come out a few years later, I'm sure it would have been a hidden track instead, though.)
I never knew people were dismissive. All of my friends thought "Act Of Contrition" was genius, funny, self-mocking and just a kick*ss way to conclude that album. We all wanted a whole record of stuff just as out-there.
Can we trade friends then? No one else I know appreciates "Act of Contrition", but I think it's brilliant.
Speaking of out-there tracks, I realize "Supernatural" probably wouldn't have fit well on the album, but I enjoy it a lot. I'm glad it got released as a b-side on the "Cherish" single.
I also think it's brilliant, so that's three of us (plus Sunspot42's friends in 1989). I have a reservation. I HAVE a reservation. What do you mean it's not in the computer!?!?!?!?!?!
I don't really count "Act Of Contrition" as a proper track. It's just a bit of fun at the end. It wouldn't break my heart if it wasn't there, but it doesn't hurt the album either.
I love Like A Prayer. It was a formative album for me in 1989. I would say it was certainly the peak of my Madonna fandom... like, I was a super fan before, but LAP was next level. Madonna became, unequivocally, my favourite artist. "Express Yourself" and "Oh Father" are both in my top 3 or 4 Madonna songs (and the video for the former, directed by David Fincher, is, I think, one of her two best, next to "Vogue"... also directed by Fincher). I'd love to know exactly why it spoke to me so much in 1989 (like, I was 15/16 then, so it's not like I related to the songs on a literal level), but it's one of the elite albums in my life that I was totally obsessed with, for a period of months. As I said before, the patchouli scent instantly transports me to the winter (Southern Hemisphere) of 1989, listening to my LAP tape. I think, possibly, it was because the album presented a vulnerable, or human/more human, Madonna. "Till Death Do Us Part" and "Oh Father" especially are more revealing than any previous songs, or at least they seem so to me. As such, the album just feels more multidimensional, with more shading and texture, than its predecessors. So yeah, short answer: I love it.
"Music" took years to grow on me. It did well at the time and seemed to be reviewed well, but I struggled with it. It's main problem, of course, is that it had to follow "Ray Of Light". As usual, she went in the opposite direction and it took some getting used to.
As on True Blue and You Can Dance, the iconic cover image was shot by Herb Ritts, who also filmed the "Cherish" video. I know not everyone loves it, but I think it's one of my top 3 Madonna album covers.
I was a little disappointed with the front cover of LAP. I loved the long dark hair and her general look at this time and would have preferred something that showed that off. Typical Madonna.. Of course, she cut the long hair short and dyed it blonde virtually as soon as the album was released.
Never listened to her. Took the time to watch quite a few of these videos tonight. It will be the first and last time I hear her stuff. No thanks.
One more comment (for now): my favourite song on the album is "Oh Father", but I still can't decide if it's more about her father (who, in fact, idolised Madonna, because she so resembled her late mother/his wife, if Christopher Ciccone is to be believed...), God/the Catholic church, or Sean Penn. Either/or, it's in my opinion the most powerful and affecting song (and vocal) in her whole catalogue.
And for the chart nerds: LAP debuted on the Billboard Top 200 on April 8 1989, at No. 11. The current No. 1 was Electric Youth by Debbie Gibson (co-produced by former Madonna synth ace Fred Zarr, and an album I know @TheSeventhStranger loves...) LAP then jumped to No. 3, and then topped the chart on April 22 (toppling rapper Tone-Loc, of "Wild Thing" fame). It remained at No. 1 for six weeks, before being unseated by English trio Fine Young Cannibals, who were at their peak then with back-to-back Hot 100 No. 1 hits ("She Drives Me Crazy" and "Good Thing"). In contrast, True Blue had debuted at No. 29, and took five weeks to ascend to No. 1, and held the top spot for five weeks.
"Supernatural" is a weird one. It manages to sound like some of the other material on LAP yet still seem out of place. I like it, though.
I don't know anything for certain, but I always thought that she had very little to do with the YCD project and it was essentially all the record label trying to make as much money as they could as they would have known that 1988 was going to be a quiet year for Madonna whilst she worked on Like A Prayer. The fact that 'Spotlight' never had a video would seem to reinforce this. Madonna had already moved on!
This was the first Madonna record I bought new. I'd read her interview in Vanity Fair shortly before it was released, and that's where I realized she was definitely going to be transcending her earlier work with this one. A buddy of mine said she was going to be grabbing her crotch in one of her videos - Michael Jackson style - based on a shot he'd seen somewhere, but I thought he was nuts. Well... "Like A Prayer" of course was a controversy-driven monster the likes of which nobody had seen before on the pop charts. Introduced via a little morality play of a video, it functioned as a pretty good test of who was bright enough to understand what a metaphor is and who wasn't. More importantly for Madge though, the song itself was unlike anything she'd done before. Improbably gospel inspired, and with that blistering guitar intro from Prince, it was also lyrically far more sophisticated than any of her earlier work, and deftly mixed R&B and pop in a way Madonna hadn't done before. For a lot of people, it remains their favorite Madonna song. And that theme - gospel and R&B inflected pop - continued on the record's next track and second single "Express Yourself". With an exquisite, David Fincher-directed, Metropolis-inspired video (featuring a cross-dressing Madonna and that crotch grab), she really outdid herself on this one by releasing videos with two different mixes of the track. One edition, played on VH1 as I recall, used the more pop album mix of the song, while the other version of the video used a more dance/club oriented, technoized mix (my favorite). The most expensive video ever shot at the time of its release, the back to back monster hits catapulted Madonna straight to the top of the music industry hierarchy, eclipsing a fading Michael Jackson and increasingly erratic Prince. Speaking of which, we get their duet on "Love Song", the record's first - and by far largest - dud. I think pretty much everybody was shocked by how lazy and half-arsed this track is. My suspicion has always been that Prince, with his star descending, had no interest in helping Madonna out too much, and so deliberately delivered a crap track that she went ahead and used anyhow in order to establish some artistic cred. And for the most part that worked for Madonna - critics certainly heaped a bunch of praise on her for "growth" with this album. If Prince thought delivering a dud would hurt her though that plan backfired - pretty much all of her material on this record is better than this P.O.S., so "Love Song" just ends up making him look like a hack. Madge had never revealed too much about herself prior to this record, so "'Till Death Do Us Part" came as a tremendous surprise, a clear journal regarding her failed marriage to Sean Penn, with a genuinely chilling end. This was way less "True Blue" and much more in keeping with the increasingly serious, decreasingly electronic tenor of pop music at the end of the '80s, and the rise of acts like 10,000 Maniacs, Suzanne Vega and REM, who were themselves just starting to become major pop stars at this time. There are a slew of guitars all over Like A Prayer - electric, acoustic, steel (as on this track), you name it - representing a massive shift in Madonna's sound. The remarkable thing is, she pulls it off without a hitch - nothing sounds especially strained or unnatural. Speaking of REM, "Promise To Try", an homage to her late mother, isn't all that different from pop ballads to come from that act, like "Nightswimming". I didn't love this cut at the time, although I respected it, but in hindsight it was a really effective snapshot of where the market was going and if anything demonstrates she was riding the bleeding edge and not just following the crowd with this album. She could keep it sweet without producing pap, too. "Cherish" is one of her most infectious tunes ever, an earworm with great pop lyrics, including one of the most-perfect little couplets I've ever heard in a song ("Romeo and Juliet, they never felt this way I bet..."). The video was a Herb Ritts delight as well, Madonna the mermaid frolicking in the surf and sand complete with a cherubic child. This kind of uplifting track would become an increasingly rare component of her output going forward, which is too bad as I feel that "Cherish" - unlike some of the preceding album's lighter tracks - is a perfectly crafted little jewel that's simply transcendent. The '60s psychedelia and revisionism of "Dear Jesse" isn't quite as successful - Tears For Fears and others (Prince!) had already beaten her to the punch here leaving "Jesse" feeling perhaps a bit stale. The song has grown on me over the years though, and the chorus was always a particularly memorable passage. She was at least aiming for something timeless here, even if it isn't entirely successful. "Oh Father" featured another brilliant Fincher video, this time cribbing from Citizen Kane instead of Metropolis. It's a beautiful, stark video for a beautiful, stark song, but it's a song that also bears more than a passing resemblance to the superior "Live To Tell" off its predecessor. And that's too bad, because lyrically this thing feels even more charged, and as sincere, as "'Till Death Do Us Part", but unfortunately I think it'll always be destined to dwell in the shadow of "Live To Tell" and come up lacking as a result. It isn't the only track that looks backward stylistically, either. The end of the record harks back perhaps a bit too strongly to Madonna's past - it doesn't push forward nearly as hard as the first half. If "Oh Father" recalls a single song from its predecessor, "Keep It Together" recalls her whole oeuvre prior to this album. Which perhaps isn't surprising, since it's one of the two Stephen Bray tracks on the record, but while I like it and its production meshes well enough with the rest of the record - and its personal themes are much richer than what she'd usually reveal before - it seems a bit more by-the-numbers than the album's other hits. "Spanish Eyes" is another dip back into the "La Isla Bonita" faux-Latin well, featuring her worst vocals on the record. They aren't quite botching "Love Don't Live Here Anymore" bad, but it's close in spots. I've always thought lyrically it was a somewhat presumptuous attempt to comment on the then-epidemic of gang violence in Los Angeles, wedded to a somewhat bland, stereotypical melody. Sonically, this cut is also a throwback to True Blue, and doesn't quite fit in with the rest of the record, which perhaps is why it was exiled toward the end. Finally, we get the off-the-wall, eclectic "Act Of Contrition" to close the album, by far the most experimental thing Madge had dared to place on a record up 'till this point. Featuring more guitar squalls courtesy Prince, it's an amazingly loose, self-mocking and totally surprising cut that almost makes up for Like A Prayer's eleventh-hour artistic retrenchment. From a sound quality standpoint, the album is crisp, with the mixes somewhat more transparent than on True Blue, but there's also a dryness and a creeping brittleness - common with a slew of records from this era. There's deep bass here, but the midbass feels anemic and thin in many spots - intentionally, clearly. It isn't an unpleasant listen by any means, but I don't find the sound of the record to be nearly as enjoyable as on her debut or Like A Virgin, although perhaps the naturalness of some of it, the increasing amount of acoustic instruments, and the clarity makes it somewhat more interesting to listen to than True Blue. With the massive commercial and increasing critical success enjoyed by this record, you'd think she'd have spun up Like A Prayer Vol II within twelve months or so. But Madonna had other plans, and her film career would drive her to deliver her biggest departure yet, an album that was something of a commercial and critical flop - the first really of her career - but that also delivered one of the biggest hit singles of all time and arguably her signature tune. Well, she was always full of surprises, wasn't she?
