AMERICAN LIFE at 20 : a flashback in real time via Mad-Eyes news archives

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

Of all the historical Madonna pages still online (Madonnalicious, MadonnaTribe, DrownedMadonna...) only Mad-Eyes.net still have all their archives online since they started in 2001.

Reading the built up to the release of the American Life album in real time, with it's rumours, speculations and other fan fic is fantasti and brings back memory. I've made caps of what only concerned the album and extended the read up until the first rumours regarding what was going to be Confessions on a dance floor.

The legal beef between Warner and Maverick happened in the midst of the tour so i made another thread just for it. 

It starts with speeches she made at the Los Angeles last stops of the DWT 3 days after 9/11 since it informed the album and added a bit of an MSN chat promoting GHV2 where she talked about what she was listening to at the time and i think Nick Drake, she namechecks him, is a big influence on the sound of AL.

The track sent to her by AIR was Alpha Beta Gaga, they finally put it on their Walkie Talkie album and said while promoting it that the track is still missing her voice. The real reason why it did not work out is Mirwais, he said while promoting his first novel last year in an interview that he vetoed the collab, telling Madonna she would not like how they work.

Thanks to mad-eyes.net you can read it all and more (the bits i did not captured and build ups to other albums post AL in their news archives)

 

 

 

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

 

[Shoful 7,906]

WHOEVER HAS THIS TAPE. GIVE ME IT YOU SOBS 

[Prayer 9,063]

THANKS A LOT!

- "Can't You See My Mind": never truly existed and it was just the code title for "Die Another Day" so it didn't leak, right? I remember this fake title was EVERYWHERE in Spring/Summer 2002 hahaha.

- The Air collaboration: glad it didn't happen, that song is not very Madonna? But who knows, maybe it would have been great.

- The 12-minute track on "AL" that never was... I also remember that!

- The 20th anniversary box set and the "AL" special edition with DVD... both cancelled!

- How she sold the "American Life" digital single on her website... in 2003 that wasn't that common.

- The glory for the fans and general confusing mess of the "Nothing Fails"/"Love Profusion" - while the Britney singles was hot and the EP released - singles strategy.

- That "American Life Sessions" promo CD-R was fake, right?

[deathproof 9,118]

4 hours ago, Prayer said:

Can't You See My Mind": never truly existed and it was just the code title for "Die Another Day" so it didn't leak, right? I remember this fake title was EVERYWHERE in Spring/Summer 2002 hahaha.

Not a code name. Was the original and working title for the song. CYSMMY/DAD went through many iterations, before and after Michael Colombier came on board.

[androiduser 1,302]

I remember all of this... Ein Sof.... Mindtrappa... My Ejector... so many of the titles sound like fan fiction

[RUADJAI 13,243]

So many rumors that amounted to NOTHING! 

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

9 hours ago, Prayer said:

THANKS A LOT!

- "Can't You See My Mind": never truly existed and it was just the code title for "Die Another Day" so it didn't leak, right? I remember this fake title was EVERYWHERE in Spring/Summer 2002 hahaha.

- The Air collaboration: glad it didn't happen, that song is not very Madonna? But who knows, maybe it would have been great.

- The 12-minute track on "AL" that never was... I also remember that!

- The 20th anniversary box set and the "AL" special edition with DVD... both cancelled!

- How she sold the "American Life" digital single on her website... in 2003 that wasn't that common.

- The glory for the fans and general confusing mess of the "Nothing Fails"/"Love Profusion" - while the Britney singles was hot and the EP released - singles strategy.

- That "American Life Sessions" promo CD-R was fake, right?

Like Deathproof said Can't You See My Mind is an early version of Die Another Day, the director of the movie is quoted above saying the final song was quite different from what she first presented because she modified it a lot. Mosty the lyrics because she HAD to have the song sharing the same title as the movie. It must be a situation like Beat Goes On.

The only interesting thing about the Air collab would have been the title of the track because fans would have said later that Lady Germanotta stole it for her name hahaha.

Even the American Life single was a messy released, the song charted first in the UK thanks to imports. It took forever to be released in stores and fans were wondering if their digital purchases (only in the us) would count for Billboard. The Nothing Fails/Nobody Knows Me/Love Profusion saga is probably the biggest mess of them all (not even Human Nature remixes or Power Of Goodbye and Nothing Really Matters singles were that badly handled) and they threw R&R in the middle of it AND the children books.

Reading all this (and it's even more obvious reading ALL the 2002/2003/2004 news at mad-eyes and not just the bits on the album i chose to assemble only) gives the impression of a big chaos. Elton started dissing her since 2002 and he kept going and going but he wasn't the only one. There were many flops back to back. Swept Away (and there was a lawsuit by Vincent d'Onofrio who said he gave them the idea for the remake) a lawsuit for the Hollywood video, Up for grabs was destroyed by the critics and there were tensions with the director of the play AND the director of the theater resigned accusing her, the legal battle with Warner etc... Contrary to what she wanted to project, she seemed very unhappy and angry. There were already some tensions with the Church of Kaballah, she had the London head fired after terrible comments he made about the Holocaust and in another interview she said that the center had changed a lot since she joined and that she was not too keen on the merchandising. 

She was preachy, stuck up and boring in interviews. As if she had adopted Gwyneth's personality. The whole era is gloomy and austere in retrospect but the whole world was as well. That said, i adore this album. In W she said she did not want to promote it and maybe she should have not. The promo was huge and ott. She gave so many interviews to tv stations around the world. It was not that kind of album.

She was going on about how materialistic our society is, and she was/is right but then she bought a huge mansion in Beverly Hills that may and made deals with Gap and Estée Lauder to promote her music. Reading Caresse saying above that regarding promo, everything goes, really goes against the whole concept of the album. People found her to be a phony and a hypocrite. If Kaballah seemed to have had a positive effect on her during Ray Of Light, it as the total opposite during American Life, the whole era has this negative imprint on it.

As for that CD of unreleased material, how come they don't have It's so cool, The Game or Set the Right in there ?

 

[EgoRod 3,903]

And moby wanting Madonna to be part of this  ,yikes

[HC Charge 806]

If I remembered correctly from that time, that "12-minute track" was supposed to be some upbeat electronic version of X-Static Process song, but then Warner interfered with demanding some ballad on the album and Madonna was forced to redo it, so now we have that simple guitar song... That I adore but still, that original long electronic version is still my most wanted Madonna's demo ever! Hope it will leak some day. 

The second most wanted is the original version of Hollywood that was supposed to be much more experimental, but was also redone at the very last moment. 

[Prayer 9,063]

10 minutes ago, HC Charge said:

If I remembered correctly from that time, that "12-minute track" was supposed to be some upbeat electronic version of X-Static Process song, but then Warner interfered with demanding some ballad on the album and Madonna was forced to redo it, so now we have that simple guitar song... That I adore but still, that original long electronic version is still my most wanted Madonna's demo ever! Hope it will leak some day. 

The second most wanted is the original version of Hollywood that was supposed to be much more experimental, but was also redone at the very last moment. 

I read later somewhere that the "long" track was "Nobody Knows Me", that the original version was extended and longer but not 12 minutes.

[BlondAmbition 3,208]

[Madant 572]

Interesting!

Thank you for the trip down the memory lane!

[diegolcl 4,223]

I became a fan during all of this, it was rough. Never though about it but following such a messy era as the first popstar era gave me thick skin to keep following all the flop ladies that I discovered after. 

I remember that once she went on the road with Re-Invention things started to get lighter. It was really the foundation for what was to come the following year, for sure. Madonna never loses on the stage. (The Medellín incident was a fever dream, the Medellín incident was a fever dream...).

The music still stands now though and I am sure that American Life will be given a new respect after she's gone.

[Drownedboy 1,129]

I remember how exciting it was when she become brunette again..people were thinking we had another LAP in our hands, then she sung that song in the promo for the very first time in 13 years. Some of her best live vocals ever were done during that promo tour.

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

2 hours ago, EgoRod said:

And moby wanting Madonna to be part of this  ,yikes

I did not even remember that track ! It sounds like a demo, it's so flat. Besides GO (and that most famous mix with the Twin Peaks theme in it) i can't with Moby music.

[EgoRod 3,903]

13 minutes ago, Roland Barthes said:

I did not even remember that track ! It sounds like a demo, it's so flat. Besides GO (and that most famous mix with the Twin Peaks theme in it) i can't with Moby music.

GO is the one with the Twin Peaks theme :D

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

13 minutes ago, EgoRod said:

GO is the one with the Twin Peaks theme :D

Yep but it's not on all the versions, right ? It's only on the version they made a video to, The Woodtick Mix (the original mix is rather flat).

[EgoRod 3,903]

2 hours ago, Roland Barthes said:

Yep but it's not on all the versions, right ? It's only on the version they made a video to, The Woodtick Mix (the original mix is rather flat).

no no it's the official album version and  few of the mixes. Tbh that's the Moby I enjoyed the rave , housey, techno

[RUADJAI 13,243]

“American Life is a love song to her country, think ‘dance anthem’ “

 

 

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

5 hours ago, EgoRod said:

no no it's the official album version and  few of the mixes. Tbh that's the Moby I enjoyed the rave , housey, techno

Same for years i mocked anyone who had the Play album home, which was almost everybody, i used to say it was like it came along as a freebie with every Ikea Billy Bookcase.

[EgoRod 3,903]

13 hours ago, Roland Barthes said:

Same for years i mocked anyone who had the Play album home, which was almost everybody, i used to say it was like it came along as a freebie with every Ikea Billy Bookcase.

I might have it............

 

To be fair: Play, Moon Safari and the Beach soundtrack were in everyone's house during the late 90s.

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

On 3/17/2023 at 9:26 AM, EgoRod said:

I might have it............

 

To be fair: Play, Moon Safari and the Beach soundtrack were in everyone's house during the late 90s.

Moon Safari i still enjoy but yep, everyone, hence the Billy goodie joke ^^

[Roland Barthes 4,659]

As a reminder regarding that "demos" cd, all the leaked American Life sessions demos that have leaked are registered and nowhere are the ones mentionned on that cd.  Process and Can't You See My Mind both have separate registrations than Xstatic Process and Die Another Day. Here are all the Mirwais unreleased (officially) registered tracks with Madonna from various sources of legal registration (Sacem, BMI, Biem)

 

[Shoful 7,906]

18 minutes ago, Roland Barthes said:

As a reminder regarding that "demos" cd, all the leaked American Life sessions demos that have leaked are registered and nowhere are the ones mentionned on that cd.  Process and Can't You See My Mind both have separate registrations than Xstatic Process and Die Another Day. Here are all the Mirwais unreleased (officially) registered tracks with Madonna from various sources of legal registration (Sacem, BMI, Biem)

 

Hmmm so interesting! So I assume a lot of those on that CD are fake then. There seem to be a couple registered that have yet to leak. Hopefully we get those with reissues