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Appreciation thread: Ghosttown TV performances


Curtains
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Favorite TV performance of Ghosttown?  

27 members voted

  1. 1. Favorite TV performance of Ghosttown?

    • The Jonathan Ross Show (UK)
      3
    • Che tempo che fa (Italy)
      3
    • Le Grand Journal (France)
      4
    • The Ellen DeGeneres Show (US)
      3
    • The 2015 iHeart Radio Music Awards
      14


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I was watching some of Madonna's TV performances lately and rediscovered all of these Ghosttown performances. I love them and felt they aren't really talked about that much so I decided to make this topic. They are pretty simple performances, kinda like how The Power of Good-Bye was performed in 1998, but I just love how she was able to convey emotions with her vocals. Plus she looked really great in them, as she did during the promo tour of Rebel Heart in early 2015. I was wondering what you thought of them.

And to answer the question of the poll, my favorite is probably the one at the Jonathan Ross Show. I liked her slightly softer voice and felt she was more in tune overall. Plus, while it's a detail, I love how she kept smiling at the beginning of the performance. She really did the song justice at that show in my opinion. :)

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  • Curtains changed the title to Appreciation thread: Ghosttown TV performances

if you don't mind, without voting on Ghost Town just yet, i would like to add a small comment. i watched the Ellen show live with my Mom who does not really like modern music. i think she probably stopped really listening to modern music in the 80s. also she is also the same age as Madonna. anyway, she really enjoyed the performance of Joan of Arc which i believe is the same broadcast. Just a random anecdote i always like to share. i think when Madonna does Ballads she can connect with the Older audiences who may treasure the "original" Madonna vibe... like when Jimmy Fallon asked her do Borderline with President Obama, there can be some middle ground. although i do not want her to pander to the masses. i love it when she is divisive and true to her intentions. omg once again i am rambling. i will watch all of the videos you posted and pick my favorite. thank you for the quality and thought provoking content!!! 

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Jonathan ross: immediately giving me Bad girl snl vibes. must be the hair .then we get to see the lighting. kiley dean and Nikki on bg. rickey p on drums? loving it. you can hear madonnas vocoder, that's part of how they want the song to sound. she is having fun, with a great hair style. this is a cool butt bearing costume, we are getting all the elements we love in a new way. madame x art on the drum kit... this is a triumphant performance. 

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che tiempo: immediately better staging. of course it was rickey p on the keys and monte strumming idk who it was in the drums. better staging, i love this gothic dress madonna is wearing holy shit. her vocals are perfect with less vocoder ??? her hair reminds me of during the next best thing era when she would do like crimps or something.

maybe i'm imagining how i thought it looked! it's almost like an evita kind of long sleeve. it's like she is wearing more clothes than usual and the cross on her necklace is so prominent -

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le grand journal- omg living for ghosttown . perfect hair and make up and she is feeling the energy of the crowd. i think this may be the most passionate and it may be the french audience, or maybe 🤔 who knows! the cross on her neck looks sexy in this case because the loving for love costume was more provocative and kind of bondage -y versus the previous performance where she looked more "wrapped up" i hate how that sounds, but i am writing in a "train of thought" style. i like when the crosses and such are provocative and subversive. 

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ok now i am at ellen, vocals sound good immediately , vocoder is good . giving me power of goodbye vibes with that "leather" long sleeve look. ok i Fucking Love this look. that dress is my fave so far. omg what if she had done another song. like Skin, Swim, or Power of Goodbye, or "tragic

girl" or "wash all over me"

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21 minutes ago, Humanfly said:

le grand journal- omg living for ghosttown . perfect hair and make up and she is feeling the energy of the crowd. i think this may be the most passionate and it may be the french audience, or maybe 🤔 who knows! the cross on her neck looks sexy in this case because the loving for love costume was more provocative and kind of bondage -y versus the previous performance where she looked more "wrapped up" i hate how that sounds, but i am writing in a "train of thought" style. i like when the crosses and such are provocative and subversive. 

This is my favorite also. It's also my favorite televised Living for Love rendition. The Jonathan Ross performance is way too autotuned and you can hear it the whole way through the song. I think Journal got it just right with the balance where she sounds like a human but gets a boost during the vocal runs. 

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@Humanfly I agree with some of your points above. I think she looked the best at the Grand Journal, even though it was technically her Living for Love costume, it looks great on her. Great make-up as well. Also, for some trivia, I've read from someone that was in the audience that the performance aired is actually the second time they recorded the song on the show, as the first time she wasn't fully happy with it so she requested to perform it again right after.

And yes the dress at Ellen is really reminiscent of the one she wore at the Fashion Awards in 1998, I totally agree. Ellen actually introduced her performance, I think that's a nice coincidence. :) 

(By the way, this is probably her best performance of the song, but that's for another thread)

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6 hours ago, MDNA22 said:

Still amazed it was not in the standard set list for the Rebel Heart Tour  - maybe she was cross it was not a bigger hit after promoting it so much 

Absolutely! And what´s more, it seems the whole concert wenton fire each time she did it unexpectedly, and it was a very emotional moment and she did really amazing vocally with it.

 

I think thats from a time when she really tried to do things great. I think this not being succesful despite it´s greatness it is one of the things that have depressed her and make her not care about doing things as she would normally do: rehearsing, training, trying the singing, an all of that.

 

Ghostown for me it´s one of the best things she has ever done, despite not being huge at the moment.

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7 minutes ago, Drownedboy said:

Absolutely! And what´s more, it seems the whole concert when on fire each time she did it unexpectedly, and it was a very emotional moment and she did really amazing vocally with it.

I think thats from a time when she really tried to do things great. I think this not being succesful despite it´s greatness it is one of the things that have depressed her and make her not care about doing things as she would normally do: rehearsing, training, trying the singing, an all of that.

Ghostown for me it´s one of the best things she has ever done, despite not being huge at the moment.

I honestly think she could have cut the 80's medley in the Latin/Gypsy version to leave room for Ghosttown and more acoustic songs. To me it was one of the best parts of the show because you never knew in advance what songs she was going to perform in that section since she changed it from show to show. Still, I think fans would have been happy with Ghosttown being performed every night.

Secret and Take a Bow were other highlights to me, loved that she sang other songs from the Bedtime Story album besides Human Nature. Crazy for You was also nice and of course fans always go crazy for Like a Prayer.

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3 minutes ago, Curtains said:

I honestly think she could have cut the 80's medley in the Latin/Gypsy version to leave room for Ghosttown and more acoustic songs. To me it was one of the best parts of the show because you never knew in advance what songs she was going to perform in that section since she changed it from show to show. Still, I think fans would have been happy with Ghosttown being performed every night.

Secret and Take a Bow were other highlights to me, loved that she sang other songs from the Bedtime Story album besides Human Nature. Crazy for You was also nice and of course fans always go crazy for Like a Prayer.

She has such an amazing catalogue, and it´s a pity she has overdone vogue, lap, la isla bonita, music and lately frozen or human nature when she could have doing amazing with many others...She should reconsider her live shows from that point of view also, I think.

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She was completely robbed with this one. As Diplo said (and it wasn't even one of his songs on that album): it would have been a hit song for any other young artist.

That said, I prefer the performance with Taylor, is more organic and you can hear her voice more clearly. On all the others there's something going on with her voice: I think it's live autotune, you can hear it clearly on: Everything's bound to breaaaak and Everything's gone to heeeell. I know it's an artistic decision but I find it distracting in a ballad and gives her a metallic/robotic sound that I don't enjoy that much - I much prefer the sound of the iHeart Awards. It sounds like the old live Balladonna we all loved, not perfect but with so much feeling.

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4 hours ago, Drownedboy said:

She has such an amazing catalogue, and it´s a pity she has overdone vogue, lap, la isla bonita, music and lately frozen or human nature when she could have doing amazing with many others...She should reconsider her live shows from that point of view also, I think.

I'd love to hear her sing more of Confessions again. Because besides the Jump sample during Into the Groove in Sticky and Sweet, and a couple of Hung Up performances, it's like she doesn't know the album exists. Like It or Not at Tears of a Clown Miami was a nice surprise but where the heck is Get Together?  :Madonna023:

Love Profusion was also never performed and Nothing Fails wasn't performed in almost 20 years (though I guess she avoids these as they're related to Guy in some way), despite them being pretty manageable vocally I believe.

I also wish that I'll witness the day she'll perform Promise to Try and Love Tried to Welcome Me, but that's in my dreams I guess. :) 

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11 hours ago, Curtains said:

I honestly think she could have cut the 80's medley in the Latin/Gypsy version to leave room for Ghosttown and more acoustic songs. To me it was one of the best parts of the show because you never knew in advance what songs she was going to perform in that section since she changed it from show to show. Still, I think fans would have been happy with Ghosttown being performed every night.

Secret and Take a Bow were other highlights to me, loved that she sang other songs from the Bedtime Story album besides Human Nature. Crazy for You was also nice and of course fans always go crazy for Like a Prayer.

Totally agree the acoustic part of Rebel Heart was for me too the best part of the Rebel Heart tour  where it is just her and the audience no dancing no big production singing some of the songs the fans love and connecting with the audience  - Secret, Who's That Girl, Frozen , Take a Bow, Crazy For You, Ghostown, Drowned World, Like a Prayer etc - I think she should have done more of this when she don't the theatre tour  

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1 hour ago, MDNA22 said:

Totally agree the acoustic part of Rebel Heart was for me too the best part of the Rebel Heart tour  where it is just her and the audience no dancing no big production singing some of the songs the fans love and connecting with the audience  - Secret, Who's That Girl, Frozen , Take a Bow, Crazy For You, Ghostown, Drowned World, Like a Prayer etc - I think she should have done more of this when she don't the theatre tour  

The setlist of Tears of a Clown in Melbourne was great in that regard, singing obscure tracks that only fans would know for the most part. I thought Madame X would have been more like that, although it was a great show too. :)

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On 6/14/2022 at 7:29 AM, The First Citizen said:

Ghost Town was the highlight of Rebel Heart for me and I love all her live performances of the song. Makes me sad to think a song I adore so much never got the attention it deserved:suffer:

I always imagine the success artists like Adele would have got had they originally recorded the song 

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I'm actually surprised that the iHeart Radio Music Awards performance is the one winning here. I love her look and the slightly more acoustic arrangement. But I think she probably was more nervous and it shows in her vocals. Would have loved Taylor to sing some bits as well, I find it stranged that she's just playing guitar. Still a great performance obviously. :) 

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