Saturday, November 2, 2024

Madonna’s Leaked Album May Be Her Best: Glue Sniffing Salvation and A Joan of Arc Complex

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UPDATE: Madonna released six tracks today http://www.showbiz411.com/2014/12/20/madonna-pulls-a-beyonce-surprise-releases-6-new-tracks-to-itunes-same-ones-she-said-were-leaked

EARLIER: “It might sound like I’m an unapologetic bitch/Sometimes you know I gotta call it like it is.” That’s Madonna, from what may be the title track for a new album. The album was leaked this week, at least in part, and it’s floating around the internet in bits and pieces. Madonna says she’s upset, but I think she doth protest too much. After several flops, (MDNA, anyone?) Madge had to try something new.

I can’t really review an unfinished album that’s come out unofficially. But if this the work in progress, then Madonna’s on the right road. I haven’t been able to turn off “Addicted to The One that Got Away,” a really great dance single that’s also a sharply composed pop song. Of the six tracks I’ve heard, that’s the most commercial and destined for radio.

The other songs are not dance, really, and are more serious: religion is a consistent theme, and I don’t mean Kabbalah. For the first time in eons, Madonna sounds honest and invested in what she’s singing about. On some of these tracks her voice is refreshingly unprocessed. Her tendency toward reediness works– especially when the songs are spare, acoustic guitar and piano driven. There’s also one, “Messiah,” produced with strings that’s got a majestic anthem like feel.

Of course, Madonna likes to shock. In “Make the Devil Pray,” which musically owes a lot to the Animals’ “House of the Rising Sun,” she sings about redemption after indulgence : “We can do drugs, we can smoke weed, and we can drink whiskey. We can get high, and we could get stoned, we can sniff glue, and we could do E, and we can drop acid.”

But there may be focus mostly on “Joan of Arc.” That’s where Madonna complains about media scrutiny, and criticism. “Each time they take a photograph,” she sings, “I lose a part of me I can’t get back.” She’s upset about media “dragging my soul through the dirt…One little lie can ruin my day.” She admits: “I’m not Joan of Arc (not yet).”

Oh my! There’s more, and I can’t wait for Madonna to give us the whole project the way she wants it.

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Spend New Year’s Eve at Joe’s Pub with the legendary New York rocker Garland Jeffreys!

http://joespub.publictheater.org/en/Tickets/Calendar/PlayDetailsCollection/Joes-Pub/2014/G/Garland-Jeffreys-New-Years-Eve/?SiteTheme=JoesPub

Roger Friedman
Roger Friedmanhttps://www.showbiz411.com
Roger Friedman began his Showbiz411 column in April 2009 after 10 years with Fox News, where he created the Fox411 column. His movie reviews are carried by Rotten Tomatoes, and he is a member of both the movie and TV branches of the Critics Choice Awards. His articles have appeared in dozens of publications over the years including New York Magazine, where he wrote the Intelligencer column in the mid 90s and covered the OJ Simpson trial, and Fox News (when it wasn't so crazy) where he covered Michael Jackson. He is also the writer and co-producer of "Only the Strong Survive," a selection of the Cannes, Sundance, and Telluride Film festivals, directed by DA Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus.

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