Like A Virgin 40th Anniversary - The Album that made Madonna an Icon - appreciation post

[Erotico 354]

Like A Virgin (the song) turns 40 on October 31, (The album) on November 12.

It was such an iconic moment in Madonna's career when everything suddenly happened and she became the HIT girl!

It all started at the Keith Haring birthday party (called The Party of Life) on May 16 at The Paradise Garage New York where Madonna could already showcase both the title track and Dress You Up in an advance of 6 months to the actual release of the album delayed due to the late success of Lucky Star on the US billboard charts that August 1984.

 

So what follows that May 1984 is Madonna's face becoming more and more familiar to Mtv viewers which starts playing Borderline and Lucky Star non stop and interviewing her. Up until August 84 when Madonna attends a NYC music seminar immortalized by Mtv as well...

 

Finally up to September 14 1984 when the world would get face to face to Madonna's powerful sexy performance of Like A Virgin at the very first Mtv Video Music awards (well as we know we also got face to face to her panties!)

 

The Like A Virgin album produced by Chic's Nile Rodgers would be presented at a New York City party (guest would include Jean Michel Basquiat, Warhol, Keith Haring, John Jellybean Benitez Madonna's then boyfriend etc) on November 7, 1984 at the Private Eyes nightclub.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Ckjd7I7OucJ

 

During December 1984 Madonna also took Uk by storm performing Like A Virgin on Top Of ThE Pops , but what would follow in 1985 would be a roar turning every girl on the planet into a Madonna wannabe filled with laces, bras, rubber bracelets and most of all crucifixes... the Madonna mania was just exploding taking Madonna to promote the album in Japan and in April to a North American tour (The Virgin tour).

 

as for the single ...

Chart

Peak

#1 1984/12/22 

Debut

#48 1984/11/17 

Weeks Of Chart

19

Weeks Of #1

6

Weeks Of Top10

9

Weeks Of Top20

11

Weeks Of Top40

14

The cover sleeve and album insert images were shot by Steven Meisel (who would photograph Madonna later in 1992 on her Sex book)

Feel free to add anything such as sensations, videos and lots of love and appreciation on Madonna's Iconic Like A Virgin era

 

[DiegoLCL 5,723]

I know we as a fanbase tend to almost gloss over Like a Virgin (and Material Girl) because it is so over played and over talked about but it truly is a perfect piece of pop craftsmanship.

Madonna's performance and Niles' production are amazing, I love that real instruments are used and that it isn't drowned in synths and gated drums like 99% of the pop music of time.
The song of course fits Madonna like a glove that the fact she didn't write it makes one wonder if it was sent from above because it had to happen. I love that she always twist the song inside out in every live performance giving yet a new meaning and dept to it, genius.

[A. A. Aardvark 5,108]

no filler
do u have a copy/image of the country album with a similar cover ?

[Roland Barthes 6,157]

Over and over should have been a single but there were so many already. The message is so Madonna. 

[steady75 10,301]

 A frenetic and confusing era. So much happening in the most chaotic album campaign she's ever delivered. Literally everything she touched turned to gold. I was thinking of happen Chappel Roans success with Good Luck Babe has ignited an interest in her debut album to the point where the songs from it have started charting long after the album was released and she'd moved on. Much like Madonna /The First Album especially in the UK. 

I love dick so much but Madonna in 1985 Desperately Seeking Susan is the sexiest woman I've ever seen on this planet. I love her 1986 + lean look but those puppy fat years were everything. I think the straight men would agree. Curvy, just got out of bed Madonna is pure sex. Her purest incarnation and one I wish had gone on a little longer tbh. 

[Erotico 354]

2 hours ago, Roland Barthes said:

Over and over should have been a single but there were so many already. The message is so Madonna. 

it was a single in 1985 in Italy they released both a 7 " and a 12" posterbag and as a 7" in the Philippines in 1986

 

 

 

[Celebration 1,461]

I remember when I bought this LP.  It was the reissue with Into The Groove, but my favorite song was Over And Over.

I couldn't stop listening to the album, and I still think that the cover is the most beautiful picture of a woman I've ever seen. 

The popular Swedish pop magazine OKEJ wrote in an early September issue (#18, 1984) that they had an early promo of the album, and they thought that the best songs was Material Girl, Over And Over, Dress You Up and Stay. 

They thought that the choice of Like A Virgin as the first single was a so-so move, since they thought that it was the weakest song on the album!
Dress You Up would, according to OKEJ, have been a much better choice.

One of the journalists from OKEJ was in New York in early July, 1985, and was offered the exclusive chance as the only Swede to meet and interview Madonna at Live Aid.
He had to turn it down. The Military Service was waiting for him back in Sweden, and he HAD to do it. 

[Veronica-Electronica 352]

The styling for this shoot is so on point. The virginal white wedding dress contrasted with the “Boy Toy” belt buckle.  Even the dress itself, reminiscent of tradition but with the sex factor turned all the way up… it’s just screams Madonna. 

[NRMX 5,654]

I don’t understand why people dislike and disrespect this album, it’s amazing. I don’t go back to it often, but it’s amazing

I love the alternate cover as well 

 

[MikeyK 972]

What a moment. What a breakthrough. Obviously not her most artistically accomplished but such a pinnacle in her career, in 80s music, in pop culture in general. 

In many ways this album & era will always be thee quintessential M, especially here in the US. The cover art itself still holds such power whenever I see it. Such brilliant iconography.

Agree w/above about how great it sounds w/primarily live instruments vs mostly synths & programming. Nile’s production is great. The four singles will always be brilliant 80s pop classics. LDLHA is better than many give it credit for. Even the filler is enjoyable enough. 

I really came back around to it over the last year or two. Listening to it still makes me feel like I’m sitting w/the cool girls at school for a period.

At this point it’s my favorite of her first 3. I get why many fans & critics have favored the rawness of the debut or the more polished, mature True Blue. For me part of what makes it work is being right in between the extremes of former which can be a little too raw at times vocally, while still having more of an edge than most of the latter.

Happy anniversary you sexy, stratospheric tramp. 💋

[MikeyK 972]

11 hours ago, Celebration said:

I still think that the cover is the most beautiful picture of a woman I've ever seen. 

Agree, and also I feel the Like A Virgin video is one of her sexiest visuals. Mary Lambert really knew how to shoot her in general, but that clip in particular is something else. The hazy, soft focus, her sultry, slightly mysterious coquettishness are just otherworldly.

[Roland Barthes 6,157]

15 hours ago, Erotico said:

it was a single in 1985 in Italy they released both a 7 " and a 12" posterbag and as a 7" in the Philippines in 1986

 

 

 

I meant a worldwide release with a video. It's better than Dress You Up and it's written by her, the lyrics are empowering.

She tried to serve it again with GMAYL but with bad production and lyrics 😈

[Anapausis 6,651]

@Roland Barthes as the informed fan you are you must be aware of how Over and Over had started at all - long before Like a Virgin album...

OT: cute album - the zeitgeist of yuppie/Reagan's resistence times...

[Erotico 354]

2 hours ago, Anapausis said:

@Roland Barthes as the informed fan you are you must be aware of how Over and Over had started at all - long before Like a Virgin album...

OT: cute album - the zeitgeist of yuppie/Reagan's resistence times...

Correct, might date back to 1979 with the breakfast club. although instead of saying "I get up again", it goes "Again and again over and over"

 

Beginning 10 Sep 1984, the film Desperately Seeking Susan was shot over a period of nine weeks in the New York City area, and was Orion’s “eighth production of 1984,” as stated in a 4 Sep 1984 HR news item.

Funny she was already shooting the film even before the Like a virgin performance at the Mtv music awards 84.

A 30 Sep 1984 LAT brief reported that the budget was $4.5 million.

Madonna, an up-and-coming singer whose self-titled debut album was released in Jul 1983, was cast as the eccentric "Susan" in her first major feature film role. It was during the making of Desperately Seeking Susan that Madonna’s second album, Like a Virgin, went triple platinum, skyrocketing her to music superstardom. As a result, Desperately Seeking Susan came to be known as “The Madonna Movie,” and on the first day of filming, Arquette was approached for an autograph by a police officer who mistook her for Madonna, according to a NYT article from 14 Apr 1985. This reversal of power between the star and the supporting actress created tension on the set, and Arquette admitted in an interview “that she wouldn’t have made the film if she had foreseen Madonna’s meteoric rise and [resulting] truncated shooting schedule,” implemented so that Orion could take advantage of Madonna’s newfound fame. 

 

[Agent Cooper 1,421]

A very nice new upscale of 2003 VMAs performance in its original 4:3 format:

[Blue Jean 17,144]

Yes Over and Over could have been a single. I believe it would have been if there was no ITG and Crazy for You. She just had so many singles out there’s no way they could have had another one.

I do feel it’s a crime Angel had no video.

[Alexei 178]

A wonderful album, which unfortunately seems a bit overlooked these days, given such strong albums that have followed over the years. 

I adore Shoo Bee Doo and Over And Over, the only filler for me is Pretender, but it's inoffensive. 

Imagine how much higher this album would be regarded if Crazy For You, Into The Groove (I know this track was on a reissue) and Gambler were officially part of this album, rather than just a part of the era.

 

[Tudors 683]

On 9/13/2024 at 4:28 PM, Erotico said:

it was a single in 1985 in Italy they released both a 7 " and a 12" posterbag and as a 7" in the Philippines in 1986

 

 

 

Song without music videos doubt count as singles 🤷🏻