Today’s Vinyl of the Day is ‘Madonna’, the debut album of (of course) Madonna Louise Ciccone, 1983. This album together with the accompanying music videos made Madonna a superstar, and one of the founding pillars of everything about the ‘80s - affecting movies, television, fashion, music, you name it. I remember when she hit radio and especially MTV, it was like an explosion — and overnight she became the fashion and lifestyle icon of GAZILLIONS of young women with her persona of toughness, independence, and sexual freedom. And of course she continued being an icon throughout her career, as she periodically re-invented herself during different albums, concert tours, videos, and even a movie career.
‘Madonna’ is a very upbeat mix of post-disco urban dance sounds, bringing NY club sounds into the mainstream, and almost every song on it became a huge hit, in the clubs, on the radio, or in videos. Listening to this record will immediately transport you back to those heady days in the mid-80's where this music was inescapable. You could spend your Saturday night in a dance club and hear most of these songs played once...most twice.
To me there are a lot of problems with this first album though - Madonna made a very conscious decision to really ‘bubblegum’ up her voice, as opposed to her much more accomplished ‘timbre’ of the rest of her career. Also, all the instruments are synthetic, which REALLY makes the sound of the whole record very harsh and very much lock it into the 80s period. These were flaws that Madonna was very quick to recognize and change in her following albums, much to her credit — such as using her more natural singing voice, and a more musical mix with actual instruments.
Still, you can't argue with success! Everything that was Madonna is fully on view in this record, she knew exactly what would appeal to the audience she wanted, and it was enough to catapult her to the position of Queen of Pop for a good 20 years, starting off an amazing career that had an affect on the world seldom equaled. It’s really interesting to look and listen to her at her very beginning, when she was still just a hungry artist trying to carve herself a piece of the pie.
From Wikipedia;
Madonna is the eponymous debut studio album by American singer and songwriter Madonna, released on July 27, 1983 by Sire Records. It was renamed Madonna: The First Album for the 1985 international re-release of the album. In 1982, while establishing herself as a singer in Downtown New York, Madonna met Seymour Stein, president of Sire Records, who signed her after listening to her single “Everybody”. The success of the single prompted Sire to sign her for an album’s deal. Reggie Lucas was chosen as the primary producer, while Madonna solely wrote five of eight tracks on the album. However, she was not happy with the completed tracks and disagreed with Lucas’s production techniques. She then invited John “Jellybean” Benitez to help her finish the album. Benitez remixed many of the tracks and produced “Holiday”.
Contemporary critics have applauded the album, but Madonna was dismissed by some critics when it was released in 1983. In 2008, the album was ranked at number five on Entertainment Weekly’s list of “Top 100 Best Albums of Past 25 Years.” The album peaked at number eight on the Billboard 200, and was certified five-times platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America(RIAA) for shipment of five million copies across the United States. It also reached the top ten of the charts in Australia, France, Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden and the United Kingdom, while selling more than 10 million copies worldwide. Critics retrospectively noted that the album helped popularize dance music in mainstream recording industry. It pointed the direction for numerous female artists of the 1980s and set the standard for dance-pop for decades afterward.
AllMusic Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Although she never left it behind, it's been easy to overlook that Madonna began her career as a disco diva in an era that didn't have disco divas. It was an era where disco was anathema to the mainstream pop, and she had a huge role in popularizing dance music as a popular music again, crashing through the door Michael Jackson opened with Thriller. Certainly, her undeniable charisma, chutzpah, and sex appeal had a lot to do with that -- it always did, throughout her career -- but she wouldn't have broken through if the music wasn't so good. And her eponymous debut isn't simply good, it set the standard for dance-pop for the next 20 years. Why did it do so? Because it cleverly incorporated great pop songs with stylish, state-of-the-art beats, and it shrewdly walked a line between being a rush of sound and a showcase for a dynamic lead singer. This is music where all of the elements may not particularly impressive on their own -- the arrangement, synth, and drum programming are fairly rudimentary; Madonna's singing isn't particularly strong; the songs, while hooky and memorable, couldn't necessarily hold up on their own without the production -- but taken together, it's utterly irresistible. And that's the hallmark of dance-pop: every element blends together into an intoxicating sound, where the hooks and rhythms are so hooky, the shallowness is something to celebrate. And there are some great songs here, whether it's the effervescent "Lucky Star," "Borderline," and "Holiday" or the darker, carnal urgency of "Burning Up" and "Physical Attraction." And if Madonna would later sing better, she illustrates here that a good voice is secondary to dance-pop. What's really necessary is personality, since that sells a song where there are no instruments that sound real. Here, Madonna is on fire, and that's the reason why it launched her career, launched dance-pop, and remains a terrific, nearly timeless, listen.
Personally I really identify with the sleazy photographer in this video….
