2023-07-28 10:28:21
Creative by Pam Wang with photos from Getty Images.
“Unlike the others, I would do anything / I’m not the same, I’m not ashamed,” proclaimed a very young 24-year-old Madonna in Burning Up, the second single from their self-titled debut album. At that time, the world was not yet aware of the truth of what the woman who would go from selling her singles on the dance floor to become the biggest and most influential pop star of all time. Madonna is not and has never been like “the others”, either by playing in an intimate acoustic concert or delighting thousands of people. In any case, others have been the ones who have tried to emulate her since she burst onto the scene with Madonna on July 27, 1983, forever changing pop music. Through her blend of courage, talent and willpower, she rose to the highest ranks in music history, inventing the idea of the modern pop star and becoming the best-selling artist of all time. There was Elvis. There was Michael Jackson. And there’s still Madonna.
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And boy have we witnessed the multitudes that inhabit his art throughout his four decades of career. What makes Madonna extraordinary is her perpetual reinvention. Since his Catholic and penitent days in Like a Virgin until the era Confessions on a Dance Floor, in which she embraced the cabal, the singer paved the way for aspiring pop stars to continue to evolve. Much has been said regarding the multiple ways in what Lady Gaga seems to follow the example of Madonna in her career (a comparison that Gaga herself has disproved). And it would not be an exaggeration to say that Taylor Swift owes all its concept of diverse “stages” to the legacy of Madonna. But Before reinventing yourself, you have to prove that you are someone worth paying attention to.. And just 40 years ago, that was precisely what Madonna did.
Let’s go back to New York in the early 1980s, when a twenty-something Madonna, originally Madonna Louise CicconeHailing from Bay City, Michigan, she was nothing more than a girl with a dream living in the center of the Big Apple. After trying her hand at modern dance and leading two groups, Breakfast Club and Emmy, Madonna decided to go on her own. She counts the legend that his big break came when he tried to get the DJ Mark Kamins played his demo and met Michael Rosenblatt, from Sire Records, during a night out at Danceteria. Rosenblatt introduced her to the founder of Sire, Seymour Steinwho signed her, and that’s how Madonna was born… or well, more or less.
He had not yet fully carved out a niche for himself in the music industry. This is where he comes into the picture Madonna, his debut album, with which he shares his name. Creating it wasn’t an easy process, but her ups and downs highlighted something the entire world would soon discover regarding the once-and-to-be queen of pop: she’s always known exactly what she wanted. An example: following recording Madonnawas not entirely happy with the final product and hired John “Jellybean” Benitez, a relatively unknown DJ, to help her (something that the main producer of the record, Reggie Lucas, denied). A risky decision, but she knew very well what she wanted to do with her music and how to achieve it.
Not surprisingly, the album slowly became a slow-cooked hit following it was released on July 27, 1983. Madonna slowly but surely climbed the charts, debuting on the Billboard 200 at number 190 and peaking at number eight in 1984.regarding a year following its launch, with more than 2.8 million records sold to his credit. Critics and fans were captivated by the perfect fusion of disco and pop rhythms of Madonna and the critic Don Shewey he claimed in Rolling Stone what Madonna it was an “irresistible invitation to the dance.” Of course, not everyone loved Madonna from the get-go (Robert Christgauof The Village Voicecalled the aspiring pop star a “shamelessly artificial blonde” with “shamelessly artificial sounding and tighter than her belly”), but even her worst critics mightn’t deny the confidence that her catchy debut exuded.
Listening to the record 40 years later, it’s hard to miss her spunk and self-confidence.. It becomes almost impossible not to dance with the synth funky of Lucky Star, the first cut of the album. Or not get lost in the recurring choruses of songs like Borderline, which plays with the double meaning of the title. Or not to be carried away by the jubilant percussion of Holiday, the most enduring song on the album. It’s evident that Madonna completely controlled her art, even in her early days: “You better think of me,” she demands in an especially catchy verse. And so it has been for the next 40 years.
In his review of Madonna for All Musicthe music critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine he seemed to have caught on quickly: “All the elements may not be particularly impressive on their own: the arrangements, synths and drum programming are pretty rudimentary,” he admits. “This remains true for both Madonnathe album—sublime in its simplicity—as for Madonna as a performer. It has always been more than the sum of its parts and its mystique is the result of what it has done with those parts., becoming the very personification of a pop star simply by being herself. She knows exactly who she is, what she likes and what she hates (reminder to myself: never send him some hydrangeas).
This last year has been difficult for the queen of pop. In January she started the year by announcing her world tour Celebration. But In June, Madonna was hospitalized due to a bacterial infection, forcing her to to postpone the North American leg of the tour, nothing more and nothing less than 41 concerts. “Now I am focusing on my health and getting stronger, and I assure you that I will be with you once more as soon as I can. […] I am on the mend and am incredibly grateful for all the blessings in my life,” she said in a reassuring statement.
Of course, there is no doubt that Madonna is much more than her music. There is also her movie stardom, the facet of celebrity, the controversies, the fashion, but it is in music where it all began. On July 27, 1983, it was impossible to know that Madonna would forever become synonymous with pop music, that in her future such indelible pop hits as Like a Virgin, Material Girl, Like a Prayer, Vogue y Hung Up. But what was evident even four decades ago was that a new force of nature had burst onto the music scene, fully formed and ready to take over. And you can still hear why: Madonna it laid the foundation for all iterations to come. Your lucky star may have been the kind that only passes from generation to generation, but we are by far the luckiest.
Original article published by Vanity Fair US. Access here.
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