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Is Erotica trip hop?


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On 11/27/2021 at 4:57 PM, kesiak said:

What's the source of this info? :)

Sorry for the late answer. This is the source:

Electronic Musician (April 1, 2000): An interview by Paul Myers with songwriter David Frank

“One day I got a call from Lou Bolognese, who owned a 24-track studio in Long Island. He wanted me to do a session as a favor, and he offered me some studio time in return. I thought I’d just do some demos and sample commercials with the time, but but Lou said, ‘Why don’t you do a song? You know, a dance song, a 12-inch. Just get a singer, you can do it!'”

Frank programmed a song in a few weeks, but he still needed a singer. Why not ask the girl upstairs? he thought. “The girl upstairs was Madonna,” Frank explains. “This was in 1981, before she had a record deal. We were in a pickup band together, and she was the singer. We rehearsed in the same building, called the Music Building, on 37th Street and 8th Avenue. I was actually paid to write with her. I made $30 for four hours of work,” he laughs.

Frank had only the title for the song, “Crimes of Passion.” He brought in the future mogul to write some words and a melody. Then fate intervened. “We were all set to do it. But the night before we were going to cut the song, Madonna called me and asked if Steve Bray, her drummer, could be in on the session as coproducer. “I love Steve, but I knew he would want to put guitars on the track. I had visualized it as a synth-only song, which was still a bit of a novelty at that time.”

The conflict meant that Madonna was out. “I called up Mic Murphy, a singer I knew,” Frank continues. “He wrote a new melody for the song and changed the words to “In Times of Passion.” We recorded and mixed all of it in one day. He took it to a friend of his, who cut an acetate, a 12-inch, and we got a record deal with Atlantic the next day.”

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18 hours ago, Roland Barthes said:

Actually Madonna approached Nellee Hooper to produce Erotica since she like his work on Massive Attack's first album "Blue lines" (released the year prior) and on O'Connor's "Nothing compares 2 U". Massive Attack was supposed to  work on Bedtime Stories but they turned her offer down because they wanted to spend the summer of 94 free to watch the world cup. 

Justify my love is considered as trip hop. Betts prods have elements of trip hop in them. His remix of Justify My Love is clearly more trip hop than hip hop.

Do you have any source for this, just curious. To me Nellee Hooper was supposed to work on Ray of Light (he actually listened to the demos of the songs and served as an adviser) before he had a fall-out with Madonna, never heard that he was supposed to work on Erotica (although Junior Vasquez was).

As for Massive Attack, i always thought that the collaboration only happened for I Want You, as the song was supposed to feature another vocalist before Nellee Hooper arranged a meeting after Bedtime Stories was completed. The confusion might come from the fact that Hooper was also from the original collective that spawn Massive Attack.

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24 minutes ago, Curtains said:

Do you have any source for this, just curious. To me Nellee Hooper was supposed to work on Ray of Light (he actually listened to the demos of the songs and served as an adviser) before he had a fall-out with Madonna, never heard that he was supposed to work on Erotica (although Junior Vasquez was).

As for Massive Attack, i always thought that the collaboration only happened for I Want You, as the song was supposed to feature another vocalist before Nellee Hooper arranged a meeting after Bedtime Stories was completed. The confusion might come from the fact that Hooper was also from the original collective that spawn Massive Attack.

I was a huge fan of Massive Attack when they came out so i collected interviews as well as Madonnas. They spoke about it in The Face two times at least. The world cup thing when Protection was released. They Nonetheless hung out in the studio since they were in Los Angeles (where the world cup was). Chaka Khan, the first choice for I Want you, gave them a diva attitude so it did not go through. Only Del Naja & Hooper were in the studio in NYC for Madonna's vocal takes. The Erotica thing was reported at the time around 1991/early 1992 which as a fan really got me excited, it was probably in Smash Hits (and maybe something they made up like they sometimes used to) or NME, so i was very disapointed when it did not materialize. For Ray of Light he asked for credits on the tracks because he considered that his work was more than remixing her demos, she refused (though she agreed to give credit to Orbit on Frozen when it is identical to the Leonard demo. I guess they made a deal since a lot of the ROL demos with Orbit were already written as well....Candy Perfume Girl & Swim were written by Susannah Melvoin for a project with Orbit that never came to fruition and she wasn't credited on Swim though this song about the death of her Brother Jonathan...she says she does not care about it). In another early Massive Attack interview while promoting Protection they said that Madonna told them she listened to Blue Lines (their first album) while fucking (i believe them since it's totally a Madonna thing she's say). Also Madonna loved Hooper since Soul II Soul so she probably mentionned that in an interview in 91 and journalists ran with it. Also Shep Pettibone's remixes of Keep It Together were total rip offs Soul II Soul so he definitely was on her radar. 

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58 minutes ago, Roland Barthes said:

I was a huge fan of Massive Attack when they came out so i collected interviews as well as Madonnas. They spoke about it in The Face two times at least. The world cup thing when Protection was released. They Nonetheless hung out in the studio since they were in Los Angeles (where the world cup was). Chaka Khan, the first choice for I Want you, gave them a diva attitude so it did not go through. Only Del Naja & Hooper were in the studio in NYC for Madonna's vocal takes. The Erotica thing was reported at the time around 1991/early 1992 which as a fan really got me excited, it was probably in Smash Hits (and maybe something they made up like they sometimes used to) or NME, so i was very disapointed when it did not materialize. For Ray of Light he asked for credits on the tracks because he considered that his work was more than remixing her demos, she refused (though she agreed to give credit to Orbit on Frozen when it is identical to the Leonard demo. I guess they made a deal since a lot of the ROL demos with Orbit were already written as well....Candy Perfume Girl & Swim were written by Susannah Melvoin for a project with Orbit that never came to fruition and she wasn't credited on Swim though this song about the death of her Brother Jonathan...she says she does not care about it). In another early Massive Attack interview while promoting Protection they said that Madonna told them she listened to Blue Lines (their first album) while fucking (i believe them since it's totally a Madonna thing she's say). Also Madonna loved Hooper since Soul II Soul so she probably mentionned that in an interview in 91 and journalists ran with it. Also Shep Pettibone's remixes of Keep It Together were total rip offs Soul II Soul so he definitely was on her radar. 

Thank you for all these details, great to still discover some new trivia. :) 

EDIT: Found this in my archive, it appears she talked with Massive Attack about working together indeed.

 

November 2: Madonna does an interview with German channel VIVA2 where she talks about working on this record:

Madonna said that Massive Attack were always hanging around the recording studio with Nellee Hooper and Madonna while they were recording Bedtime Stories. Madonna and Massive Attack talked about working together and so since Madonna was suppose to do the Marvin Gaye tribute thing, they decided to work together for “I Want You.”

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3 hours ago, Curtains said:

Sorry for the late answer. This is the source:

Electronic Musician (April 1, 2000): An interview by Paul Myers with songwriter David Frank

“One day I got a call from Lou Bolognese, who owned a 24-track studio in Long Island. He wanted me to do a session as a favor, and he offered me some studio time in return. I thought I’d just do some demos and sample commercials with the time, but but Lou said, ‘Why don’t you do a song? You know, a dance song, a 12-inch. Just get a singer, you can do it!'”

Frank programmed a song in a few weeks, but he still needed a singer. Why not ask the girl upstairs? he thought. “The girl upstairs was Madonna,” Frank explains. “This was in 1981, before she had a record deal. We were in a pickup band together, and she was the singer. We rehearsed in the same building, called the Music Building, on 37th Street and 8th Avenue. I was actually paid to write with her. I made $30 for four hours of work,” he laughs.

Frank had only the title for the song, “Crimes of Passion.” He brought in the future mogul to write some words and a melody. Then fate intervened. “We were all set to do it. But the night before we were going to cut the song, Madonna called me and asked if Steve Bray, her drummer, could be in on the session as coproducer. “I love Steve, but I knew he would want to put guitars on the track. I had visualized it as a synth-only song, which was still a bit of a novelty at that time.”

The conflict meant that Madonna was out. “I called up Mic Murphy, a singer I knew,” Frank continues. “He wrote a new melody for the song and changed the words to “In Times of Passion.” We recorded and mixed all of it in one day. He took it to a friend of his, who cut an acetate, a 12-inch, and we got a record deal with Atlantic the next day.”

But how does this relate to Erotica and Madonna leaving out Dear Father because of the baseline (which could've easily been re-written anyway if that truly was the issue)?

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On 11/27/2021 at 10:57 AM, kesiak said:

What's the source of this info? :)

Madonna: Like an Icon, by Lucy O'Brien :) 

 

"But when it came to organizing the publishing, Madonna was dismayed to learn that Mic Murphy from pop/dance act The System had played a bass line, and she nixed the song. Rumor has it that she and Murphy clashed a few times in the early 80s and Madonna never forgot it."

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1 hour ago, deathproof said:

Madonna: Like an Icon, by Lucy O'Brien :) 

 

"But when it came to organizing the publishing, Madonna was dismayed to learn that Mic Murphy from pop/dance act The System had played a bass line, and she nixed the song. Rumor has it that she and Murphy clashed a few times in the early 80s and Madonna never forgot it."

Thank you! :)

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