Alibaba

With the exception of a few posts throughout these four pages, there is a fundamental lack of attention given to the primary issue here. It has less to do with Madonna changing, and more to do with the concept of fame changing post-digital revolution. Madonna's type of fame was truly exceptional for the longest time, but she aged out of the Zeitgeist when corporate interests no longer saw her preeminence as commercially useful. There was more money to be made from youth-oriented culture. Doing business with an artist of Madonna's stature would have meant profit margins for the corporate entities were diminished because she could take a larger stake herself. As the industry changed and panic kicked in regarding dwindling sales and illegal downloading, replacing artists like Madonna with green-eyed younger and more malleable acts would have been a natural shift. As it turned out, Madonna and Oseary were prescient and understood that they needed to strike while the commercial iron of touring receipts was hot, thus her 360 deal with Live Nation. Sidenote: Recording music hasn't been a valid source of income for Madonna for well over a decade; she herself decided to use her records as showcases for her live performances. She approached her creative flow as a Broadway director does. The music is the soundtrack to the show. No one seems to get this. Look at how this has become a more cynical template for less successful legacy acts who all have some type of dreadful Broadway adaptation of their back catalogs in the works.
As much as it upsets many of Madonna's fans to face this truth, most of them have long stopped being a core capitalist demographic. In fact, whenever I consider Madonna's modern legacy I am more fascinated by how limited many of her fans' perspective on her evolution is. I read endless posts about how she should be promoting her music as she did Ray of Light...That she would be better off returning to Warner Bros, as if nostalgia holds some sort of commercial magic wand in an era when almost no one sells music anymore! It shows a fundamental lack of comprehension that the world itself has drastically changed over the course of Madonna's career, and the fact that her phenomenal stamina managed to give her a somewhat imperialistic hold on global pop culture for two and a half decades is unprecedented. That's enough within itself to make everything she has done since that imperial phase ended worthy of admiration and a much kinder assessment, but there is so much more to explore here. 
There is no doubt that the public essentially wrote her off after she returned to her raunchier persona post-divorce.  One cannot deny the dismal showing of Celebration was more than a commercial embarrassment; it was a global smack in the face to the woman; age seemed to offer the world the chance to finally kick her where it hurt. 
I am more shocked by people's surprise at Madonna's healthy appetite for self-preservation through plastic surgery than by the results of the surgery. In an era of digital film and photography, no one can afford to show signs of obvious aging, and as one of the world's most photographed women whose career was built in great part on the promise of video as art form, it seems entirely logical that she would succumb to the pressures of the industry. Surely people aren't shocked to learn that Madonna is vain and a narcissist? 
Madonna explained herself most effectively during her promotion for her film W.E. I don't think many actually caught on at the time when she made parallels between herself and Wallis Simpson by describing the limiting views of the masses that prevent a public person from having more than one or two characteristics. It had long become painfully obvious that Madonna could not simultaneously and successfully be a provocative showwoman, a film director, a recording artist, an actress, a business owner, a good mother, and a human being with an evolving intellect...She therefore seemed to step back until she eventually found the best way to enable her own version of that narrative to thrive by inventing the Madame X character; an empty vessel capable of being anything she wants to be at any given fork in the road. Tears of a Clown was her first foray into meta-identity-fucking, and she knew all along that the only way forward was to leave the past and its intransigent inhabitants behind. I believe Madonna is a deconstructionist at this point in her life, fully in charge and fully self-aware. Whatever anyone else thinks of her is merely a projection of something deep within themselves. The need to denigrate her choices and their results is most probably more indicative of the audience's inability to move beyond preconceived notions and prejudice. After all, in a world of bullies, everyone is somehow still a victim. Madonna's greatest achievement is that she is a living work of art, full of contradictions and the ability to elicit the fullest emotional spectrum no matter the brush stroke. 

All of this is complete projection. A place doesn't define a person. Neither does a partner. Madonna is an intuitively intelligent person. We know nothing of her friendships, or anything else for that matter. Anything we see of Madonna is what she decides to project of herself. What we see is probably a very artificial and condensed version of one tiny part of who she is. How the rest of her informs her future is what remains to be seen, and it's what remains exciting about seeing a true maverick navigate uncharted territory. 
 
We have no knowledge that Madonna became less involved in Kabbalah at any point. We only know she stopped talking about it in very controlled promotional press junkets and interviews, and we stopped seeing her heading in and out of the Kabbalah Center. Much of this probably had to do with the fact that Madonna has in recent years consistently lived in homes where the public never sees her enter or leave. 
The false narrative regarding Madonna's lack of input in projects the fanbase dislikes or likes less is another example of pure projection. In my opinion, also projection, William Orbit had a temporary lapse in judgment by going public with his personal frustration that Madonna did not make him the primary producer of MDNA. He wanted to have another immersive experience like Ray of Light, but Madonna was also into Martin S and wanted to pursue other avenues. 
While Madonna herself may be able to look back on her last two albums as periods of lesser inspiration, hindsight is mostly subjective too. Without those experiences, she wouldn't have come to the place of inspiration that led to Madame X. To me, Hard Candy is Madonna's least inspired modern album, but to others it's MDNA. I think MDNA is full of solid music and that it will undoubtedly eventually be reviewed with greater reverence. Her disenfranchisement over the Rebel Heart leak and its relative commercial failure was justifiable and understandably disappointing, but I think Madonna was very proud of her work on that album. Perhaps she is the worst perpetrator of her fans' failings in dismissing things because they weren't "big". Then again, she performed Candy Shop on three tours in seven years. 
And finally, I think it would be foolish to ignore that creativity is aloof and temperamental, and goes through a good deal of reformatting throughout a lifetime. If someone is lucky enough to be able to live from their art, they are going to still have periods when they question the purpose, the relevance and the trajectory of their work. Most people don't look at a Picasso or a Van Gogh and truthfully feel empowered and entitled to state that one period in their creative careers was vastly superior to another. One may appeal more to their sensibility, but the body of work is considered as a whole before it is dissected. Madonna is still alive and still creating. Therefore, I think her legacy is in a permanent state of fluidity. Only when she is no longer here will there be any solid universal reevaluation. She knows that, and that's why she now seemingly does whatever makes her happy. 
 
 

Understood! I can't pretend to know what makes one person see improvement where another sees otherwise; there's personal taste at the forefront of the debate, and that being totally subjective makes for a weak argument, and so I won't try to elaborate, but I appreciate your point of view.
What I can say is that I have struggled with my own perception of Madonna and my admiration for her over the past decade, and so I know how to contextualize the perception of diminishing returns. I have spent many hours in potential disillusionment upon experiencing various new Madonna projects. That said, I grew up very aware that everything Madonna did was reviled or dismissed by at least some faction of society, and I learned to become one of her fiercest advocates in my youth. Eventually, at around the time of the emergence of Kabbalah in Madonna's creative vernacular I became more questioning and cynical myself. I became more private in my experience of Madonna. I wasn't the targeted demographic of the children's books, and I didn't enjoy her GAP jeans ITG, or her discomfort with the worth of her own music at times...Fortunately, there was always something much meatier and more intense and dense to keep me interested; American Life was the first time that I saw Madonna universally dismissed for something that I found profoundly futuristic and thoroughly enthralling; a subtler monument to her power, but one that matched her evolving maturity. I stuck to that narrative throughout the subsequent years of resurgence and renaissance via COADF and grew to love that version of Madonna; the spiritually political mother and wife. When she then reemerged with Hard Candy I had to readapt again, but this time I was excited to see Madonna's defiance regarding her age. She was so physically powerful...It didn't matter that my private conversations with fellow fans and friends revolved around "did she/didn't she?' plastic surgery analysis and circumspection. I didn't take to the music on Hard Candy in the same way I had to her previous albums. I, like many other fans, had enjoyed the increasing creative influence of Stuart Price, and had hoped for Eurocentric Madonna to prevail. But Hard Candy was Madonna's clapback to Guy Ritchie's English fantasy/nightmare, and I accepted that I was essentially two steps behind, something I have always assumed whenever Madonna has made me uncomfortable or when my devotion has faltered...I know for a fact with hindsight that Madonna and Ritchie had split long before their relationship was publicly dissolved. It made sense that the entire HC era was an act of implicit rebellion. I have reassessed my experience of that period of her career and my life in accordance with that understanding! 
And that is where I was going with all of this...Thanks for being patient enough to get this far! When I was growing up and Madonna was ubiquitous and omnipotent, the channels that delivered her message and her vision targeted the masses. Everyone was exposed to the mainstream. There were fewer choices, and therefore there was more opportunity for an established act to have a huge cultural impact. Madonna was hyperaware of that rare opportunity and she made it work for her no matter the consequences. That hasn't been true for a good while - for her and any other artist for that matter - and so I think it is impossible to have the same experience of Madonna as we were lucky enough to experience twenty or thirty years ago. Madonna has produced music that I find exquisite and deeply moving in the last ten years that will never reach the ears that heard Material Girl or Vogue or Into The Groove. It doesn't make it lesser in quality in my opinion, but I know the lack of cultural impact of a song like Masterpiece makes it seem a diminished work in many people's minds. That's how I perceive things in any case.
 
I love this debate by the way! Please keep it going! 

With the exception of a few posts throughout these four pages, there is a fundamental lack of attention given to the primary issue here. It has less to do with Madonna changing, and more to do with the concept of fame changing post-digital revolution. Madonna's type of fame was truly exceptional for the longest time, but she aged out of the Zeitgeist when corporate interests no longer saw her preeminence as commercially useful. There was more money to be made from youth-oriented culture. Doing business with an artist of Madonna's stature would have meant profit margins for the corporate entities were diminished because she could take a larger stake herself. As the industry changed and panic kicked in regarding dwindling sales and illegal downloading, replacing artists like Madonna with green-eyed younger and more malleable acts would have been a natural shift. As it turned out, Madonna and Oseary were prescient and understood that they needed to strike while the commercial iron of touring receipts was hot, thus her 360 deal with Live Nation. Sidenote: Recording music hasn't been a valid source of income for Madonna for well over a decade; she herself decided to use her records as showcases for her live performances. She approached her creative flow as a Broadway director does. The music is the soundtrack to the show. No one seems to get this. Look at how this has become a more cynical template for less successful legacy acts who all have some type of dreadful Broadway adaptation of their back catalogs in the works.
As much as it upsets many of Madonna's fans to face this truth, most of them have long stopped being a core capitalist demographic. In fact, whenever I consider Madonna's modern legacy I am more fascinated by how limited many of her fans' perspective on her evolution is. I read endless posts about how she should be promoting her music as she did Ray of Light...That she would be better off returning to Warner Bros, as if nostalgia holds some sort of commercial magic wand in an era when almost no one sells music anymore! It shows a fundamental lack of comprehension that the world itself has drastically changed over the course of Madonna's career, and the fact that her phenomenal stamina managed to give her a somewhat imperialistic hold on global pop culture for two and a half decades is unprecedented. That's enough within itself to make everything she has done since that imperial phase ended worthy of admiration and a much kinder assessment, but there is so much more to explore here. 
There is no doubt that the public essentially wrote her off after she returned to her raunchier persona post-divorce.  One cannot deny the dismal showing of Celebration was more than a commercial embarrassment; it was a global smack in the face to the woman; age seemed to offer the world the chance to finally kick her where it hurt. 
I am more shocked by people's surprise at Madonna's healthy appetite for self-preservation through plastic surgery than by the results of the surgery. In an era of digital film and photography, no one can afford to show signs of obvious aging, and as one of the world's most photographed women whose career was built in great part on the promise of video as art form, it seems entirely logical that she would succumb to the pressures of the industry. Surely people aren't shocked to learn that Madonna is vain and a narcissist? 
Madonna explained herself most effectively during her promotion for her film W.E. I don't think many actually caught on at the time when she made parallels between herself and Wallis Simpson by describing the limiting views of the masses that prevent a public person from having more than one or two characteristics. It had long become painfully obvious that Madonna could not simultaneously and successfully be a provocative showwoman, a film director, a recording artist, an actress, a business owner, a good mother, and a human being with an evolving intellect...She therefore seemed to step back until she eventually found the best way to enable her own version of that narrative to thrive by inventing the Madame X character; an empty vessel capable of being anything she wants to be at any given fork in the road. Tears of a Clown was her first foray into meta-identity-fucking, and she knew all along that the only way forward was to leave the past and its intransigent inhabitants behind. I believe Madonna is a deconstructionist at this point in her life, fully in charge and fully self-aware. Whatever anyone else thinks of her is merely a projection of something deep within themselves. The need to denigrate her choices and their results is most probably more indicative of the audience's inability to move beyond preconceived notions and prejudice. After all, in a world of bullies, everyone is somehow still a victim. Madonna's greatest achievement is that she is a living work of art, full of contradictions and the ability to elicit the fullest emotional spectrum no matter the brush stroke. 

With the exception of a few posts throughout these four pages, there is a fundamental lack of attention given to the primary issue here. It has less to do with Madonna changing, and more to do with the concept of fame changing post-digital revolution. Madonna's type of fame was truly exceptional for the longest time, but she aged out of the Zeitgeist when corporate interests no longer saw her preeminence as commercially useful. There was more money to be made from youth-oriented culture. Doing business with an artist of Madonna's stature would have meant profit margins for the corporate entities were diminished because she could take a larger stake herself. As the industry changed and panic kicked in regarding dwindling sales and illegal downloading, replacing artists like Madonna with green-eyed younger and more malleable acts would have been a natural shift. As it turned out, Madonna and Oseary were prescient and understood that they needed to strike while the commercial iron of touring receipts was hot, thus her 360 deal with Live Nation. Sidenote: Recording music hasn't been a valid source of income for Madonna for well over a decade; she herself decided to use her records as showcases for her live performances. She approached her creative flow as a Broadway director does. The music is the soundtrack to the show. No one seems to get this. Look at how this has become a more cynical template for less successful legacy acts who all have some type of dreadful Broadway adaptation of their back catalogs in the works.
As much as it upsets many of Madonna's fans to face this truth, most of them have long stopped being a core capitalist demographic. In fact, whenever I consider Madonna's modern legacy I am more fascinated by how limited many of her fans' perspective on her evolution is. I read endless posts about how she should be promoting her music as she did Ray of Light...That she would be better off returning to Warner Bros, as if nostalgia holds some sort of commercial magic wand in an era when almost no one sells music anymore! It shows a fundamental lack of comprehension that the world itself has drastically changed over the course of Madonna's career, and the fact that her phenomenal stamina managed to give her a somewhat imperialistic hold on global pop culture for two and a half decades is unprecedented. That's enough within itself to make everything she has done since that imperial phase ended worthy of admiration and a much kinder assessment, but there is so much more to explore here. 
There is no doubt that the public essentially wrote her off after she returned to her raunchier persona post-divorce.  One cannot deny the dismal showing of Celebration was more than a commercial embarrassment; it was a global smack in the face to the woman; age seemed to offer the world the chance to finally kick her where it hurt. 
I am more shocked by people's surprise at Madonna's healthy appetite for self-preservation through plastic surgery than by the results of the surgery. In an era of digital film and photography, no one can afford to show signs of obvious aging, and as one of the world's most photographed women whose career was built in great part on the promise of video as art form, it seems entirely logical that she would succumb to the pressures of the industry. Surely people aren't shocked to learn that Madonna is vain and a narcissist? 
Madonna explained herself most effectively during her promotion for her film W.E. I don't think many actually caught on at the time when she made parallels between herself and Wallis Simpson by describing the limiting views of the masses that prevent a public person from having more than one or two characteristics. It had long become painfully obvious that Madonna could not simultaneously and successfully be a provocative showwoman, a film director, a recording artist, an actress, a business owner, a good mother, and a human being with an evolving intellect...She therefore seemed to step back until she eventually found the best way to enable her own version of that narrative to thrive by inventing the Madame X character; an empty vessel capable of being anything she wants to be at any given fork in the road. Tears of a Clown was her first foray into meta-identity-fucking, and she knew all along that the only way forward was to leave the past and its intransigent inhabitants behind. I believe Madonna is a deconstructionist at this point in her life, fully in charge and fully self-aware. Whatever anyone else thinks of her is merely a projection of something deep within themselves. The need to denigrate her choices and their results is most probably more indicative of the audience's inability to move beyond preconceived notions and prejudice. After all, in a world of bullies, everyone is somehow still a victim. Madonna's greatest achievement is that she is a living work of art, full of contradictions and the ability to elicit the fullest emotional spectrum no matter the brush stroke. 

Thank you for telling us all what to do and how to feel. Appreciated. 

I honestly don't feel that way about Madonna's music at all. I think her music and her voice have only improved with time. She cannot help that a large majority of her fanbase and the general public associate the hits of the first 15-20 years of her career with an idealized version of her iconic legacy. At the end of the day, her fans want her to be loved, and it seems evident that when she isn't given accolades and adulation she is seen as a diminished version of her former self. I'm not stating this to be your perspective, but I do feel this is often the case for other fans, and in turn this becomes the collective narrative.  

All of this is complete projection. A place doesn't define a person. Neither does a partner. Madonna is an intuitively intelligent person. We know nothing of her friendships, or anything else for that matter. Anything we see of Madonna is what she decides to project of herself. What we see is probably a very artificial and condensed version of one tiny part of who she is. How the rest of her informs her future is what remains to be seen, and it's what remains exciting about seeing a true maverick navigate uncharted territory. 
 
We have no knowledge that Madonna became less involved in Kabbalah at any point. We only know she stopped talking about it in very controlled promotional press junkets and interviews, and we stopped seeing her heading in and out of the Kabbalah Center. Much of this probably had to do with the fact that Madonna has in recent years consistently lived in homes where the public never sees her enter or leave. 
The false narrative regarding Madonna's lack of input in projects the fanbase dislikes or likes less is another example of pure projection. In my opinion, also projection, William Orbit had a temporary lapse in judgment by going public with his personal frustration that Madonna did not make him the primary producer of MDNA. He wanted to have another immersive experience like Ray of Light, but Madonna was also into Martin S and wanted to pursue other avenues. 
While Madonna herself may be able to look back on her last two albums as periods of lesser inspiration, hindsight is mostly subjective too. Without those experiences, she wouldn't have come to the place of inspiration that led to Madame X. To me, Hard Candy is Madonna's least inspired modern album, but to others it's MDNA. I think MDNA is full of solid music and that it will undoubtedly eventually be reviewed with greater reverence. Her disenfranchisement over the Rebel Heart leak and its relative commercial failure was justifiable and understandably disappointing, but I think Madonna was very proud of her work on that album. Perhaps she is the worst perpetrator of her fans' failings in dismissing things because they weren't "big". Then again, she performed Candy Shop on three tours in seven years. 
And finally, I think it would be foolish to ignore that creativity is aloof and temperamental, and goes through a good deal of reformatting throughout a lifetime. If someone is lucky enough to be able to live from their art, they are going to still have periods when they question the purpose, the relevance and the trajectory of their work. Most people don't look at a Picasso or a Van Gogh and truthfully feel empowered and entitled to state that one period in their creative careers was vastly superior to another. One may appeal more to their sensibility, but the body of work is considered as a whole before it is dissected. Madonna is still alive and still creating. Therefore, I think her legacy is in a permanent state of fluidity. Only when she is no longer here will there be any solid universal reevaluation. She knows that, and that's why she now seemingly does whatever makes her happy. 
 
 

With the exception of a few posts throughout these four pages, there is a fundamental lack of attention given to the primary issue here. It has less to do with Madonna changing, and more to do with the concept of fame changing post-digital revolution. Madonna's type of fame was truly exceptional for the longest time, but she aged out of the Zeitgeist when corporate interests no longer saw her preeminence as commercially useful. There was more money to be made from youth-oriented culture. Doing business with an artist of Madonna's stature would have meant profit margins for the corporate entities were diminished because she could take a larger stake herself. As the industry changed and panic kicked in regarding dwindling sales and illegal downloading, replacing artists like Madonna with green-eyed younger and more malleable acts would have been a natural shift. As it turned out, Madonna and Oseary were prescient and understood that they needed to strike while the commercial iron of touring receipts was hot, thus her 360 deal with Live Nation. Sidenote: Recording music hasn't been a valid source of income for Madonna for well over a decade; she herself decided to use her records as showcases for her live performances. She approached her creative flow as a Broadway director does. The music is the soundtrack to the show. No one seems to get this. Look at how this has become a more cynical template for less successful legacy acts who all have some type of dreadful Broadway adaptation of their back catalogs in the works.
As much as it upsets many of Madonna's fans to face this truth, most of them have long stopped being a core capitalist demographic. In fact, whenever I consider Madonna's modern legacy I am more fascinated by how limited many of her fans' perspective on her evolution is. I read endless posts about how she should be promoting her music as she did Ray of Light...That she would be better off returning to Warner Bros, as if nostalgia holds some sort of commercial magic wand in an era when almost no one sells music anymore! It shows a fundamental lack of comprehension that the world itself has drastically changed over the course of Madonna's career, and the fact that her phenomenal stamina managed to give her a somewhat imperialistic hold on global pop culture for two and a half decades is unprecedented. That's enough within itself to make everything she has done since that imperial phase ended worthy of admiration and a much kinder assessment, but there is so much more to explore here. 
There is no doubt that the public essentially wrote her off after she returned to her raunchier persona post-divorce.  One cannot deny the dismal showing of Celebration was more than a commercial embarrassment; it was a global smack in the face to the woman; age seemed to offer the world the chance to finally kick her where it hurt. 
I am more shocked by people's surprise at Madonna's healthy appetite for self-preservation through plastic surgery than by the results of the surgery. In an era of digital film and photography, no one can afford to show signs of obvious aging, and as one of the world's most photographed women whose career was built in great part on the promise of video as art form, it seems entirely logical that she would succumb to the pressures of the industry. Surely people aren't shocked to learn that Madonna is vain and a narcissist? 
Madonna explained herself most effectively during her promotion for her film W.E. I don't think many actually caught on at the time when she made parallels between herself and Wallis Simpson by describing the limiting views of the masses that prevent a public person from having more than one or two characteristics. It had long become painfully obvious that Madonna could not simultaneously and successfully be a provocative showwoman, a film director, a recording artist, an actress, a business owner, a good mother, and a human being with an evolving intellect...She therefore seemed to step back until she eventually found the best way to enable her own version of that narrative to thrive by inventing the Madame X character; an empty vessel capable of being anything she wants to be at any given fork in the road. Tears of a Clown was her first foray into meta-identity-fucking, and she knew all along that the only way forward was to leave the past and its intransigent inhabitants behind. I believe Madonna is a deconstructionist at this point in her life, fully in charge and fully self-aware. Whatever anyone else thinks of her is merely a projection of something deep within themselves. The need to denigrate her choices and their results is most probably more indicative of the audience's inability to move beyond preconceived notions and prejudice. After all, in a world of bullies, everyone is somehow still a victim. Madonna's greatest achievement is that she is a living work of art, full of contradictions and the ability to elicit the fullest emotional spectrum no matter the brush stroke. 

Understood! I can't pretend to know what makes one person see improvement where another sees otherwise; there's personal taste at the forefront of the debate, and that being totally subjective makes for a weak argument, and so I won't try to elaborate, but I appreciate your point of view.
What I can say is that I have struggled with my own perception of Madonna and my admiration for her over the past decade, and so I know how to contextualize the perception of diminishing returns. I have spent many hours in potential disillusionment upon experiencing various new Madonna projects. That said, I grew up very aware that everything Madonna did was reviled or dismissed by at least some faction of society, and I learned to become one of her fiercest advocates in my youth. Eventually, at around the time of the emergence of Kabbalah in Madonna's creative vernacular I became more questioning and cynical myself. I became more private in my experience of Madonna. I wasn't the targeted demographic of the children's books, and I didn't enjoy her GAP jeans ITG, or her discomfort with the worth of her own music at times...Fortunately, there was always something much meatier and more intense and dense to keep me interested; American Life was the first time that I saw Madonna universally dismissed for something that I found profoundly futuristic and thoroughly enthralling; a subtler monument to her power, but one that matched her evolving maturity. I stuck to that narrative throughout the subsequent years of resurgence and renaissance via COADF and grew to love that version of Madonna; the spiritually political mother and wife. When she then reemerged with Hard Candy I had to readapt again, but this time I was excited to see Madonna's defiance regarding her age. She was so physically powerful...It didn't matter that my private conversations with fellow fans and friends revolved around "did she/didn't she?' plastic surgery analysis and circumspection. I didn't take to the music on Hard Candy in the same way I had to her previous albums. I, like many other fans, had enjoyed the increasing creative influence of Stuart Price, and had hoped for Eurocentric Madonna to prevail. But Hard Candy was Madonna's clapback to Guy Ritchie's English fantasy/nightmare, and I accepted that I was essentially two steps behind, something I have always assumed whenever Madonna has made me uncomfortable or when my devotion has faltered...I know for a fact with hindsight that Madonna and Ritchie had split long before their relationship was publicly dissolved. It made sense that the entire HC era was an act of implicit rebellion. I have reassessed my experience of that period of her career and my life in accordance with that understanding! 
And that is where I was going with all of this...Thanks for being patient enough to get this far! When I was growing up and Madonna was ubiquitous and omnipotent, the channels that delivered her message and her vision targeted the masses. Everyone was exposed to the mainstream. There were fewer choices, and therefore there was more opportunity for an established act to have a huge cultural impact. Madonna was hyperaware of that rare opportunity and she made it work for her no matter the consequences. That hasn't been true for a good while - for her and any other artist for that matter - and so I think it is impossible to have the same experience of Madonna as we were lucky enough to experience twenty or thirty years ago. Madonna has produced music that I find exquisite and deeply moving in the last ten years that will never reach the ears that heard Material Girl or Vogue or Into The Groove. It doesn't make it lesser in quality in my opinion, but I know the lack of cultural impact of a song like Masterpiece makes it seem a diminished work in many people's minds. That's how I perceive things in any case.
 
I love this debate by the way! Please keep it going! 

Understood! I can't pretend to know what makes one person see improvement where another sees otherwise; there's personal taste at the forefront of the debate, and that being totally subjective makes for a weak argument, and so I won't try to elaborate, but I appreciate your point of view.
What I can say is that I have struggled with my own perception of Madonna and my admiration for her over the past decade, and so I know how to contextualize the perception of diminishing returns. I have spent many hours in potential disillusionment upon experiencing various new Madonna projects. That said, I grew up very aware that everything Madonna did was reviled or dismissed by at least some faction of society, and I learned to become one of her fiercest advocates in my youth. Eventually, at around the time of the emergence of Kabbalah in Madonna's creative vernacular I became more questioning and cynical myself. I became more private in my experience of Madonna. I wasn't the targeted demographic of the children's books, and I didn't enjoy her GAP jeans ITG, or her discomfort with the worth of her own music at times...Fortunately, there was always something much meatier and more intense and dense to keep me interested; American Life was the first time that I saw Madonna universally dismissed for something that I found profoundly futuristic and thoroughly enthralling; a subtler monument to her power, but one that matched her evolving maturity. I stuck to that narrative throughout the subsequent years of resurgence and renaissance via COADF and grew to love that version of Madonna; the spiritually political mother and wife. When she then reemerged with Hard Candy I had to readapt again, but this time I was excited to see Madonna's defiance regarding her age. She was so physically powerful...It didn't matter that my private conversations with fellow fans and friends revolved around "did she/didn't she?' plastic surgery analysis and circumspection. I didn't take to the music on Hard Candy in the same way I had to her previous albums. I, like many other fans, had enjoyed the increasing creative influence of Stuart Price, and had hoped for Eurocentric Madonna to prevail. But Hard Candy was Madonna's clapback to Guy Ritchie's English fantasy/nightmare, and I accepted that I was essentially two steps behind, something I have always assumed whenever Madonna has made me uncomfortable or when my devotion has faltered...I know for a fact with hindsight that Madonna and Ritchie had split long before their relationship was publicly dissolved. It made sense that the entire HC era was an act of implicit rebellion. I have reassessed my experience of that period of her career and my life in accordance with that understanding! 
And that is where I was going with all of this...Thanks for being patient enough to get this far! When I was growing up and Madonna was ubiquitous and omnipotent, the channels that delivered her message and her vision targeted the masses. Everyone was exposed to the mainstream. There were fewer choices, and therefore there was more opportunity for an established act to have a huge cultural impact. Madonna was hyperaware of that rare opportunity and she made it work for her no matter the consequences. That hasn't been true for a good while - for her and any other artist for that matter - and so I think it is impossible to have the same experience of Madonna as we were lucky enough to experience twenty or thirty years ago. Madonna has produced music that I find exquisite and deeply moving in the last ten years that will never reach the ears that heard Material Girl or Vogue or Into The Groove. It doesn't make it lesser in quality in my opinion, but I know the lack of cultural impact of a song like Masterpiece makes it seem a diminished work in many people's minds. That's how I perceive things in any case.
 
I love this debate by the way! Please keep it going! 

Understood! I can't pretend to know what makes one person see improvement where another sees otherwise; there's personal taste at the forefront of the debate, and that being totally subjective makes for a weak argument, and so I won't try to elaborate, but I appreciate your point of view.
What I can say is that I have struggled with my own perception of Madonna and my admiration for her over the past decade, and so I know how to contextualize the perception of diminishing returns. I have spent many hours in potential disillusionment upon experiencing various new Madonna projects. That said, I grew up very aware that everything Madonna did was reviled or dismissed by at least some faction of society, and I learned to become one of her fiercest advocates in my youth. Eventually, at around the time of the emergence of Kabbalah in Madonna's creative vernacular I became more questioning and cynical myself. I became more private in my experience of Madonna. I wasn't the targeted demographic of the children's books, and I didn't enjoy her GAP jeans ITG, or her discomfort with the worth of her own music at times...Fortunately, there was always something much meatier and more intense and dense to keep me interested; American Life was the first time that I saw Madonna universally dismissed for something that I found profoundly futuristic and thoroughly enthralling; a subtler monument to her power, but one that matched her evolving maturity. I stuck to that narrative throughout the subsequent years of resurgence and renaissance via COADF and grew to love that version of Madonna; the spiritually political mother and wife. When she then reemerged with Hard Candy I had to readapt again, but this time I was excited to see Madonna's defiance regarding her age. She was so physically powerful...It didn't matter that my private conversations with fellow fans and friends revolved around "did she/didn't she?' plastic surgery analysis and circumspection. I didn't take to the music on Hard Candy in the same way I had to her previous albums. I, like many other fans, had enjoyed the increasing creative influence of Stuart Price, and had hoped for Eurocentric Madonna to prevail. But Hard Candy was Madonna's clapback to Guy Ritchie's English fantasy/nightmare, and I accepted that I was essentially two steps behind, something I have always assumed whenever Madonna has made me uncomfortable or when my devotion has faltered...I know for a fact with hindsight that Madonna and Ritchie had split long before their relationship was publicly dissolved. It made sense that the entire HC era was an act of implicit rebellion. I have reassessed my experience of that period of her career and my life in accordance with that understanding! 
And that is where I was going with all of this...Thanks for being patient enough to get this far! When I was growing up and Madonna was ubiquitous and omnipotent, the channels that delivered her message and her vision targeted the masses. Everyone was exposed to the mainstream. There were fewer choices, and therefore there was more opportunity for an established act to have a huge cultural impact. Madonna was hyperaware of that rare opportunity and she made it work for her no matter the consequences. That hasn't been true for a good while - for her and any other artist for that matter - and so I think it is impossible to have the same experience of Madonna as we were lucky enough to experience twenty or thirty years ago. Madonna has produced music that I find exquisite and deeply moving in the last ten years that will never reach the ears that heard Material Girl or Vogue or Into The Groove. It doesn't make it lesser in quality in my opinion, but I know the lack of cultural impact of a song like Masterpiece makes it seem a diminished work in many people's minds. That's how I perceive things in any case.
 
I love this debate by the way! Please keep it going! 

To a degree that's true, especially during this album cycle, I think Madame X is a great album with a great concept but since it didn't do well commercially some people judged it harshly. However I do think that many people lost interest in her for a reason, and it's not just age. 
As a person, I know that she's a bit narcissistic, but I do miss the kabbalah days of a bit more kindness and introspection, and a message that came more from the heart rather than ego. To me her ego has exploded again in recent years, and while I'm not trying to tell a woman what to do or how to be, as a human being i do think that narcissism is the problem not the solution. I hope that I will still see a kinder, more open version of herself in the future, and more joyful too. 

I honestly don't feel that way about Madonna's music at all. I think her music and her voice have only improved with time. She cannot help that a large majority of her fanbase and the general public associate the hits of the first 15-20 years of her career with an idealized version of her iconic legacy. At the end of the day, her fans want her to be loved, and it seems evident that when she isn't given accolades and adulation she is seen as a diminished version of her former self. I'm not stating this to be your perspective, but I do feel this is often the case for other fans, and in turn this becomes the collective narrative.  

I get you but when has that ever worked? How are you meant to come up with something "fresh" when working with people from almost 40 years ago? Have you heard recent productions by Nile Rodgers or Giorgio Moroder for example? Nothing groundbreaking there, truly. I actually think Madame X was fresh, new and exciting - it's her most interesting - and in my option best - album since American Life. I can't actually believe she's still got it in her creatively so far into her career.
To come back to the main topic - maybe the problem isn't Madonna but our expectations of her. We all seem to have a different idea of what she SHOULD be at this stage of her career/life and it doesn't always correspond with reality. I'm chill about it personally, her boyfriends are none of my business and neither are her face and body. People's obsession with it is genuinely baffling to me. She's still being super creative and actually seems happy - let her be. I won't be having her over for dinner anytime soon so whether she's a total bitch in person or not also doesn't preoccupy me terribly. I don't cook macrobiotic anyway . 

I believe the boxer theme was rejected because, from a commercial point of view, they didn't want her to launch combattively. This hasn't traditionally served Madonna well on a commercial level.
 
It's a great album. It was just the dawn of a new era in which her fans were challenged to accept her as a maturing singer breaking from the confines of the trendsetting popstar she was expected to be with each release through Confessions. They knew she wouldn't continue to sell like the hottest new singers anymore imho, and so they tried something different. At the end of the day, it was a return to roots record, more like the first album than any other. As with everything she has done post-50, she was dismissed for it rather than praised for the context of nostalgia. Madonna can never really win in that sense. As an underdog, there is always a faction that is determined to declare her a failure.

This is so funny! For years her fans were begging for her to revisit her 80s music. She does and now it's all about the 90s and 00s. Contrarianism is built into the Madonna fan equation. 

This is so funny! For years her fans were begging for her to revisit her 80s music. She does and now it's all about the 90s and 00s. Contrarianism is built into the Madonna fan equation. 

This is so funny! For years her fans were begging for her to revisit her 80s music. She does and now it's all about the 90s and 00s. Contrarianism is built into the Madonna fan equation. 

Shouldn't blame the director or the sound engineers. Madonna's concert videos are the one thing she has absolute final approval of. She is responsible, and frankly, the vocals that we have had on recent tour releases are testament to her insecurities. Again, just an opinion, but if her soundboard vocals were properly mixed, they might not sound perfect as she is often a bit flat live, but they would certainly make the live performances captured on film seem much more authentic. When I was a kid I thought the WTG tour vocals were an abomination. Sounded like she had an apple in her mouth and throat all the time. Now they sound classic, and her voice was never as athletic again, and so things should be delivered as close to authenticity as possible. Time takes care of the rest. Probably why our culture in general is so stupid and grotesque now. It's all so homogenized. 

Shouldn't blame the director or the sound engineers. Madonna's concert videos are the one thing she has absolute final approval of. She is responsible, and frankly, the vocals that we have had on recent tour releases are testament to her insecurities. Again, just an opinion, but if her soundboard vocals were properly mixed, they might not sound perfect as she is often a bit flat live, but they would certainly make the live performances captured on film seem much more authentic. When I was a kid I thought the WTG tour vocals were an abomination. Sounded like she had an apple in her mouth and throat all the time. Now they sound classic, and her voice was never as athletic again, and so things should be delivered as close to authenticity as possible. Time takes care of the rest. Probably why our culture in general is so stupid and grotesque now. It's all so homogenized. 

Shouldn't blame the director or the sound engineers. Madonna's concert videos are the one thing she has absolute final approval of. She is responsible, and frankly, the vocals that we have had on recent tour releases are testament to her insecurities. Again, just an opinion, but if her soundboard vocals were properly mixed, they might not sound perfect as she is often a bit flat live, but they would certainly make the live performances captured on film seem much more authentic. When I was a kid I thought the WTG tour vocals were an abomination. Sounded like she had an apple in her mouth and throat all the time. Now they sound classic, and her voice was never as athletic again, and so things should be delivered as close to authenticity as possible. Time takes care of the rest. Probably why our culture in general is so stupid and grotesque now. It's all so homogenized. 

Shouldn't blame the director or the sound engineers. Madonna's concert videos are the one thing she has absolute final approval of. She is responsible, and frankly, the vocals that we have had on recent tour releases are testament to her insecurities. Again, just an opinion, but if her soundboard vocals were properly mixed, they might not sound perfect as she is often a bit flat live, but they would certainly make the live performances captured on film seem much more authentic. When I was a kid I thought the WTG tour vocals were an abomination. Sounded like she had an apple in her mouth and throat all the time. Now they sound classic, and her voice was never as athletic again, and so things should be delivered as close to authenticity as possible. Time takes care of the rest. Probably why our culture in general is so stupid and grotesque now. It's all so homogenized. 

Shouldn't blame the director or the sound engineers. Madonna's concert videos are the one thing she has absolute final approval of. She is responsible, and frankly, the vocals that we have had on recent tour releases are testament to her insecurities. Again, just an opinion, but if her soundboard vocals were properly mixed, they might not sound perfect as she is often a bit flat live, but they would certainly make the live performances captured on film seem much more authentic. When I was a kid I thought the WTG tour vocals were an abomination. Sounded like she had an apple in her mouth and throat all the time. Now they sound classic, and her voice was never as athletic again, and so things should be delivered as close to authenticity as possible. Time takes care of the rest. Probably why our culture in general is so stupid and grotesque now. It's all so homogenized. 

After the last round, 1 more album - Bedtime Stories album was eliminated!!!
 
Album Tally
In Red = Eliminated
In Brown = 1 More track to Elimination
Track in Green = Remaining Tracks
 
8 Eliminated Albums: [17]Who’s That Girl; [16]Madonna; [15]Hard Candy; [14]MDNA; [13] Evita; [12]Something to Remember; [11] Rebel Heart; [10]Bedtime Stories;
 
Album Rank / Album Title / # of Eliminated Tracks [% Eliminated] / Total Tracks / Eliminated Tracks
 
1. True Blue: 7/9[77.8%]: Love Makes the World Go Round[248] / Jimmy Jimmy[263] / True Blue[149] / White Heat[145]/ Where's The Party?[ 123]/ La Isla Bonita[21]/Open Your Heart[15]/Papa Don't Preach[?]/Live To Tell[?]
 
2. Ray of Light: 11/14[78.6%]: Little Star[180] / Candy Perfume Girl[167] / Shanti/Ashtangi[168] / To Have and Not To Hold[153]/ Mer Girl[132]/ Has To Be[96]/ Skin[60]/ Swim[52]/ Sky Fits Heaven[47]/ Nothing Really Matters[38]/ The Power of Good-Bye[18]/Drowned World - Substitute For Love[?]/Ray of Light[?]/Frozen[?]
 
3. COADF: 13/15[86.7%]: Superpop[240] / Fighting Spirit[209] / History[155] / Push[147]/ Isaac[137]/ I Love New York[125]/ Like It Or Not[95]/How High[93]/ Future Lovers[69]/Forbidden Love[62]/ Sorry[39]/Let It Will Be[34]/ Jump[27]/Hung Up[?]/Get Together[?]
 
4. Like a Virgin: 9/10[90%]: Pretender[238]; Stay[243]; Shoo-Bee-Doo[256]; Over and Over[191] / Love Don't Live Here Anymore[144]/ Angel[122]/ Material Girl[107]/ Like A Virgin[59]/Dress You Up[51]/ Into The Groove[?]
 
5. Like a Prayer: 10/11[90.9%]: Act of Contrition [239]; Love Song (with Prince)[ 214] / Dear Jessie[162]/ Till Death Do Us Part[115]/ Cherish[83]/ Keep It Together[68]/ Spanish Eyes[36]/Promise to Try[31]/ Express Yourself[26]/Oh Father[19]/Like a Prayer[?]
5. American Life: 10/11[90.9%]: I'm So Stupid[134]/ Intervention[120]/ Hollywood[105] /American Life[104] /Love Profusion[98] /X-Static Process[92]/ Mother and Father[80]/ Nobody Knows Me[56]/ Easy Ride[42]/ Nothing Fails[33]/Die Another Day[?]
 
7. I’m Breathless: 11/12[91.7%]: I'm Going Bananas[242] / Cry Baby[264]; He's a Man[195] / More[183] / What Can You Lose[173] / Now I'm Following You (Part II) [170] / Now I'm Following You (Part 1)[ 150]/ Something to Remember[139]/Back In Business[135]/ Hanky Panky[116]/ Sooner or Later[91]/ Vogue[?]
 
8. Music: 12/13[92.3%]: Cyberraga[184] / Lo Que Siente La Mujer[176] / Nobody's Perfect [172] / Runaway Lover[158] / Amazing[154]/ American Pie[133]/ I Deserve It[119]/ Gone[97]/ What it Feels Like for a Girl[77]/ Paradise (Not For Me)[ 53]/ Impressive Instant[48]/ Don't Tell Me[23]/Music[?]
 
9. Erotica: 13/14[92.6%]: Did You Do It?[268] / In This Life[166] / Secret Garden[157] / Bye Bye Baby[152] / Fever[151] / Thief of Hearts[146]/ Words[127]/ Where Life Begins[111]/ Why's It So Hard?[ 103]/ Waiting[101]/ Deeper and Deeper[37]/Bad Girl[32]/Erotica[16]/Rain[?]
 
10. Bedtime Stories: 11/11[100%]: Don't Stop[220] / Survival[174] / I'd Rather Be Your Lover[163]/ Forbidden Love[136]/ Love Tried To Welcome Me[131]/Inside of Me[130]/ Sanctuary[88]/ Human Nature[64]/Secret[22]/Take a Bow[20]/Bedtime Story[17]
 
11. Rebel Heart: 25/25[100%]: Autotune Baby[249] / Holy Water[203] / Body Shop[187] / Graffiti Heart[189]/S.E.X.[188] / Illuminati[175] /Queen[142]/ Bitch I'm Madonna (feat. Nicki Minaj)[ 140]/ Veni Vidi Vici (feat. Nas)[ 138]/ Unapologetic Bitch[128]/ Beautiful Scars[117]/Hold Tight[114]/ Borrowed Time[106]/ Best Night[100]/Joan of Arc[99]/Rebel Heart[90]/ Messiah[89]/Iconic (feat. Chance the Rapper & Mike Tyson)[ 85]/ Wash All Over Me[74]/ Inside Out[65]/ Addicted[44]/HeartBreakCity[41]/Devil Pray[40]/Living For Love[28]/Ghosttown[24]
 
12. Something to Remember: 8/8[100%]: One More Chance[224]; Veras[219]/Love Don't Live Here Anymore (Remix)[ 194]/ I'll Remember[118]/ I Want You (Orchestral)[ 86]/ This Used To Be My Playground[63]/ I Want You (with Massive Attack)[ 46]/ You'll See[30]
 
13. Evita: 4/4[100%]: Another Suitcase in Another Hall[79]/Lament[71] /Don't Cry For Me Argentina[45]/ You Must Love Me[35]
 
14. MDNA: 18/18[100%]: Best Friend[247] / Superstar[259] / B-Day Song[267] / Give Me All Your Luvin' (Party Rock Remix)[262] / Some Girls[221] / Give Me All Your Luvin' (feat. Nicki Minaj and M.I.A.)[ 227] / I Fucked Up[181] / Turn Up the Radio[186] / I Don't Give A (feat. Nicki Minaj) [177] / I'm A Sinner[164]/ Love Spent (Acoustic)[ 110]/ Girl Gone Wild[102]/ I'm Addicted[84]/ Beautiful Killer[81]/ Love Spent[73]/ Gang Bang[57]/Falling Free[55]/ Masterpiece[43]
 
15. Hard Candy: 13/13[100%]: Incredible[246] / Spanish Lesson[265] / Ring My Bell[225] / Dance 2Night[202] / Candy Shop[185] / Heartbeat[179] / Beat Goes On (feat. Kanye West)[ 141]/ Voices[113] / She's Not Me[112]/ 4 Minutes[109]/ Give It 2 Me[70]/ Miles Away[54]/ Devil Wouldn't Recognize You[49]
 
16.  Madonna: 8/8[100%]: I Know It [231]; Think of Me[213]/ Physical Attraction[126]/ Everybody[87]/ Borderline[82]/ Lucky Star[72]/ Burning Up[66]/ Holiday[58]