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Rebel Heart - Album Thread [Happy 1st Birthday!]


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Can Madonna turns song hack to her advantage?

http://www.postbulletin.com/entertainment/can-madonna-turns-song-hack-to-her-advantage/article_20d42a0f-7fcd-541f-a741-19d0a778f30c.html

The year-end surprise album release is becoming a holiday tradition. First, Beyonce, then D'Angelo: Each of them released recordings that came out of nowhere to capture the pop imagination just in time for the New Year.

But what happens when an album release is a surprise even to the artist?

 

That's the bind Madonna is in right now. Last week, 13 of her demos in various stages of completion were stolen and leaked to file-sharing services. The singer told the Guardian that there was a "big possibility" that her home computer had been hacked, and the singer (perhaps overheatedly) called the leak "artistic rape" and "a form of terrorism."

Her tactical response, though, was unexpected. She put an EP's worth of tracks from the album, called "Rebel Heart," up for sale immediately on iTunes. It was just enough new music to count as a last-minute winter release (she quickly topped iTunes charts in more than 40 countries). But it wasn't quite enough new music to land with the force and urgency of "Beyonce" or "Black Messiah." More pieces from the album are expected to land on Feb. 9 to preview the March 10 release on Interscope.

 

So what is this six-song partial record intended to be? An album teaser? A middle finger to the hackers? A sign the LP might not be quite finished? Or just something, anything, Madge can do to take back the narrative around "Rebel Heart"?

 

It's hard to tell if this panic-button release timeline is part of a coherent strategy. Madonna said that she had planned a traditional Valentine's Day single release for "Living for Love," but it's now on the EP, which she called an "early Christmas gift." Perhaps ironically, the sped-up timeline might keep fans coming back.

 

Serially releasing pieces of a completed artwork can be a successful strategy (see the runaway podcast hit "Serial"). But it's a new twist on the new models we have for putting out LPs. Taylor Swift can take a months-long drip-drop of singles, videos and fun stunts to tease "1989"; Beyonce can just throw it all up on iTunes in the dead of night; D'Angelo can rush it to the presses to respond in real time to salient political issues.

 

However, there's not quite the same ravenous demand for a new Madonna album in 2014 (her last one, 2012's "MDNA" was given middling reviews for its late-to-the-game rave sounds and images, and her Super Bowl halftime show was overshadowed by M.I.A.'s possibly obscene hand gestures). But by breaking "Rebel Heart" into smaller pieces, she's actually hewing closer to the release strategies of her beloved EDM acts. Skrillex became an arena-sized superstar by releasing just a spate of EPs (before this year's full album, "Recess"). Underground dance labels usually pack around two to four tracks per 12-inch release.

 

And these six tracks really are a fresh new look for Madonna. Yes, she's a couple of years behind the trap/noise party sounds she's mining on songs like "Illuminati" and "Bitch I'm Madonna." But even this album snippet features production from Kanye West and Diplo and a guest turn from Nicki Minaj. This is shaping up to be a brash, angry and self-affirming LP — one that might be less dismissable because of its stutter-step release.

 

A full Madonna LP could have come and gone in a few weeks, to no more notice than the usual flicker of the Internet's content-churn. But the scramble to get something legitimate up from "Rebel Heart" has had a strangely punkish, humanizing effect on Madonna — and right when such an approach is on-brand with her record.

 

If necessity is the mother of invention, then maybe Madge just invented a new way to keep fans on edge.

 

 

This is great!!! I hope it works out and she realises that a traditional release probably woulnd't have been anywhere near as effective.. lol

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Madonna's six new songs worth listening to
Leave it to Madonna to rhyme "illuminati" with "party," as she does on "Illuminati," from her upcoming album, "Rebel Heart."
 
Like Prince, she has always been obsessed with both earthly pleasures and spiritual transcendence. But rarely have these two themes collided in such a head-on manner as they do on the six "Rebel Heart" tracks she recently released after unfinished versions of some album tracks leaked; since then, 14 more unauthorized songs have surfaced on the Internet.
 
("Please consider these six songs as an early Christmas gift," she said in a statement, though she is selling them online, not giving them away for free. The full album will be available March 10.)
 
So what’s on Madonna’s mind? Just about everything. On "Devil Pray," a song about trying to overcome addiction, she sings "Take my sins and wash them away/Teach me how to pray." Yet "Bitch I’m Madonna," which features a guest rap from Nicki Minaj, is one of the most simplistic party anthems she’s ever done: "We’ll be drinking, ain’t nobody gonna stop us/And well be kissing everyone that’s around us."
 
"Unapologetic Bitch" is an angry breakup song, while "Living for Love" is a gospel-inflected anthem about the healing power of love, and "Ghosttown" is about retreating from the harshness of the world with your lover.
 
Granted, Madonna, 56, has never been particularly interested in thematic coherence on her albums. But these tracks are really all over the place. "The reason I wanted to call the record ‘Rebel Heart’ was because I felt like it explored two very distinct sides of my personality," Madonna told Billboard.com. "The rebellious, renegade side of me, and the romantic side of me. In my mind, it was almost like I wanted to do a two-record set."
 
"The music leads me – so I get lost in the sound of the music, and that creates a kind of emotional palate," she elaborated to RollingStone.com. "I found as I would look back at my songs and witness what I had written, I was coming from two very distinct places. … I was observing, ‘Oh, these are two very strong sides of me that I need to express.’ "
 
Not including Madonna, who co-wrote and co-produced each song, 14 co-writers and 10 co-producers are credited on these six tracks. Alicia Keys co-wrote and played piano on "Living for Love," and Kanye West co-produced "Illuminati." Diplo – whose co-produced M.I.A.’s "Paper Planes" as well as hits by Usher, Chris Brown and Alex Clare — is the dominant collaborator, with four co-writing and three co-producing credits.
 
Each song lives in a stylistic world of its own. "Living for Love" is the most ecstatic dance number, "Devil Pray" is moody mid-tempo semi-acoustic pop, and "Ghosttown" is an atmospheric, warmly crooned ballad. "Unapologetic Bitch" is ska-rap, and on the chilly "Illuminati," Madonna’s voice is processed to the point where it doesn’t really sound human. "Bitch I’m Madonna" has a swirling, futuristic sound, and Madonna sings here with a childish sing-song quality, punctuated by angry outbursts.
 
And yet, despite their differences, these tracks have one thing in common: With their strong hooks, they all have the potential to be successful singles. And that kind of consistency hasn’t really been a hallmark of Madonna’s most recent albums.
 
Madonna may have been forced into releasing these songs, and she’s not happy about it, having called it "a form of terrorism" and "artistic rape." But it’s going to work to her advantage, since these six tracks create a very good first impression of the "Rebel Heart" album.
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