Maybe it's because I'm older, but '80s Madonna has always been my favorite and the idea that those first three albums are anything less than classic is kinda painful to even comprehend. Her self-titled is literally hit after hit, with "I Know It" being the only modest sagging point; the other two aren't as strong with their album tracks (like you said, they aren't great but I mostly enjoy them regardless), but then again we're talking about albums where more than half the songs were released as singles - almost all of them now ~iconic~ in pop culture, naturally.
~iconic~
Teach me. I don't think it's just the age thing, I'm just really ignorant and opinionated :lol
I think that Like a Prayer was the first major leap in terms of sound with the intro to the title track being so rocky and different, and then it turning into choirs and gospel and all the rest of it, so it becomes very singular when you're going through her discography, and then everything feels distinct from that point onwards. LaP marks the moment when most critics etc. recognise the birth of Madonna as a shape-shifting phenomenon, and I guess I just go along with what critics say. Every album from that point onwards is very different in terms of image and musical style.
I tend to forget that Madonna, Like a Virgin and True Blue are quite small by modern album standards- Madonna is only eight tracks, LaV was nine until ITG made it ten, and True Blue is also ten. So it all goes by very quickly from a modern perspective, unlike back in the day
P) when you had the time to get accustomed to them and absorbed them into the cultural consciousness.
Re-evaluating, I think I'll listen to them again. I've never really given them quite the same attention as Like a Prayer onwards because I've tended to view them as this homogeneous trinity of albums that embodied the 80s and I could just take the main hits and move on. I definitely liked them, more than the first three studio albums of any other pop artist you could name on first listen, but I never really tried hard with them because it all felt so familiar in the first place, almost.
Talking about b-sides and whatnot, I really like a lot of the extended 12" and dub mixes we got back then, both of which sadly died out in the late '90s. There was some real artistry to those things, making a nice natural extension of the album versions. I think some of these are used on the greatest hits? I've never actually had one of her collections before, tbh.
"I Want You" was a fantastic exclusive to Something To Remember, though. Also hard to believe that
"Let Down Your Guard" has still never released outside the UK.
Oh, yeah, I know about the extended mixes. I've gotten into hers, Donna Summer's and Grace Jones's 12"s quite a lot, actually. Just a shame they aren't likely to play them at the clubs in my neck of the woods, so I just dance on my own, lol.
I think some of them are bonuses on the remastered versions of the first three albums, and then of course people rip vinyls so they're on YouTube as well. My Dad actually owns some old CD singles so I've gotten some off of there as well. I actually regret how I neglected to distinguish them as their own thing, because I do like how you can get into a 12".
My interest definitely tapers off after RoL, although someone (Matt?) wrote up really great, insightful reviews of Music and American Life last year that got me to revisit them and now I've come to appreciate those eras more. I've since added them to my Queen Madge vinyl collection; just gotta find a copy of Erotica and I'll have a straight 20-year run on my shelf
I even have an embarassing 12" of
Cosmic Climb/
We Are the Gods, lordT.
You revisited Music and American Life, I'm revisiting the first three. Hee. Yeah, I adore Music because that was one half of my introduction to her. Ray of Light, from the first bars of Drowned World/SfL through to Mer Girl, had me transfixed (and Mer Girl is still the most evocative non-Kate Bush song I've ever heard), so it was interesting to move directly from that to a bit more of a party album with strange vocal effects out the wazoo.
American Life is interesting. It's very odd. It's worth a few listens, but I don't put it on a portable like most of her other stuff because I can't really take tracks out of it in the same way. It's a bold political statement, and I find it interesting that it actually spawned 7 Top Billboard Dance Hits or whatever because it just makes me think too much to dance lol.
Sis, I would totally collect vinyls if I had the equipment and the money lol. As it stands my Dad has a huge collection but nothing to play them on. I just take them out to look at the artwork sometimes, it's weird how good-looking some album covers really are when they have big pictures. It's a shame how nowadays album art has basically become irrelevant because it's a completely different market.
I think it's interesting to hear your viewpoint, because it's one thing to analyse things dispassionately but it's always good to hear from someone who actually lived it. I just read articles and think I'm an expert, lol.
/essay
