MCL_1993

She toured with her and carried a lot of the backing for choruses during the 2nd leg of the SST. During the 2008 leg, pre-recorded or even studio vocals were used more prominently. During both runs, the girls were part of the crew. Nicki richards provided a lot of ad-libs and harmonies and Kylie sang along Madonna's lead vocal

The thing is: Stuart knew how to get the most even out of a very weak vocal because he produced his sound live as he went and it shows from the early 2000s onward. Actually, honestly, the vocals for all the IGTTYAS songs from the live album sound so clean… IDK how to explain this because I am not a producer... Stuart had a certain quality to his sound. You could tell that it was Sennheiser who made the mic Madonna is singing into and Stuart worked his magic live on stage. When you extract those vocals - even with a free AI - you still got a decent vocal stem. You can just tell. That weirdly high quality sound is present on the confessions DVD, for instance. Especially when she takes a breath. You can just hear that she was singing live (although these were mostly rehearsal takes mixed and produced wonderfully) and the effects were done live. And you can hear it in every rehearsal and every performance that she has had Stuart in her team. When Kevin took over, it went a little south. Although, Kylie Dean who sang most of M's parts for the SST 2009 blended perfectly with M's tired vocals. I know that some people think Kevin destroyed Madonna's touring career BUT there is a reason the Sticky & Sweet Tour became the best selling (Fuck You, Taylor Swift). In the first leg, he only began using more pre-recorded stuff towards the end of the tour but mostly relied on heavy studio backing tracks. He said in an interview that the high quality hardware he used for Sticky gave him the most consistent sound in his carreer and talked a lot about the mixing of the DVD. “You know, I didn't really have a say in that. I approached it in a similar fashion as Stuart did with the previous tours. I took a good vocal performance and mixed it with the soundboard from Argentina but we quickly ran into the issue of her being out of tune a lot during those shows. You need to understand that we were almost at the end of the tour and Madonna's voice wasn't getting enough rest during the south american dates. So, we decided to pitch her up a little to mix better with the rehearsal takes. Then when the label reviewed it, Madonna's tour director requested a clean-up of all the instrumentals we recorded during filming of the footage in Buenos Aires. It was very unfortunate because after that clean-up, everything sounded more studio-esque, which apparently, Madonna aimed for. With our PA system, it was very easy to work on that tour because our sound was very consistent across the board. If we didn't run into issues with the venue or technical stuff screwing us over - which rarely happened, anyway- the show in Berlin would sound just as good as the show in Los Angeles, for instance. I also did a version of the soundboard using stems from shows in which she gave good vocal performances and played it to her but she didn't like it very much. So, at the end of the day, a more artificial sound was preferred over a more rough mix. Sadly, for the audience noise, I had to use stock recordings to get it right sometimes. “ Fun Fact: I was today years old when I realized that the opening of 'Music' from the SST DVD was not a fuck-up by DJ Enferno because he mixed the samples live and was slightly off beat. It does not go 'Put your hands up for De-New York', they changed it as an agterthought during the production of the DVD audio and it says 'Lift your hands up, ArgentiNAAH'. Please tell me I am not the only one to notice after 15 years. Also, why did the use the fucked up lyric during Devil 'led along the legde ISH much higher than it seems' WTF! They went so overboard with the production and let THAT slip

B-Day Song Some Girls GMAYL (the only good version is the MDNA Tour mix because of the theme and the great performance, otherwise it sucks ass) I fvcked up (OMG! i realize I hate almost half of MDNA) Cherish (what a cheesy piece of crap) Sky Fits Heaven Mer Girl I'm going Bananas Bitch, I'm Madonna (like, we know it's you, you've been in the business for almost half a century. And dare anyone who says it's meant to be 'ironic') Bitch I'm Loca (because of that cringe spoken outro 'You can put it inside' WTF!!!) Too bad we were asked to list only 10

Elsewhere??? 👂👂👂

I am confused as to why it has to be a physical item. Who says so? 🤷🏼‍♂️🤷🏼‍♂️🤷🏼‍♂️ Let's just buy that SSTPetersburg already!!!

IKR!!! I an other universe, this would have been a banger that finall got M back on track for the younger generation but this is just some mediocre talking over an instrumental. Like Vogue Break My Soul Pt2 or sth.

Feels like an eternity

Hey, I am desperately seeking this wonderful edit our talented friend Dan K created but YT blocked it and I can't find a link anywhere else. Please, if someone could share it. (Audio only will do) Thank You so much!

Luvs, I TRULY love the lyrics of Gang Bang! It is TRULY a song I TRULY appreciate, the production value of it is TRULY unprecedented. No seriously, it is a masterpiece and it is overlooked by so many people (as in 'the public', not so much by real fans!!)

I can't help myself but he's kinda hot in this. (Sorry for not conforming to woke terminology, btw)

Preach, honey! I always felt the same, too with Kevin's SS versions. Also, considering we already have a lot of stems and mixdowns of the MDNA Tour (oh, how I wish anything remotely close to that leaked from CT Moscow) the MDNA Tour is, from a production standpoint, brilliantly executed for a live show. The DVD is another story, though. Stuart really knows how to process a mediocre vocal and what he did with the official audio is brilliant, too!

As I said, if you want an award, you need a project to promote… and I don't think she will be considered for lifetime achievement after all the bad press she is getting lately.

EGOT for what? Tony Award for her outstanding portayal of Madonna on stage? If you want an Oscar, you have to be an actor…. in movies…. 🤷🏻‍♂️🤷🏻‍♂️🤷🏻‍♂️ and M clearly isn't. I am not trying to stir up the ago-old debate on how shitty she was in Swept Away or how great she was as Susan and Eva - it's just that if you wanna be considered for an Oscar, you need a movie to promote to the academy! Same goes for the Emmy. Do you think the TV academy will consider her for her outrageous instagram posts or what?