 Madonna The seminal debut album from pop superstar Madonna is a watershed in dance music history, containing classic singles that defined a decade. *Choke* Ouch, that was so sarcastic I nearly suffocated. Not that it's a bad album, but the fact that reviewers still hold on to Madonna as such a timeless listen – come on, Madonna or not, this is still 1983 dance pop. A Love Supreme it ain't. Of course, it is Madonna. And it is way above average for its genre. And it does hold up well. But the frequency with which anyone ought to sit down and actually listen to this album is maybe once every two years. To its credit, it only has two filler tracks ("I Know It" and "Think Of Me" – and I couldn't tell you how either of them goes despite having heard them many times, and most recently about 15 minutes ago). The singles are stellar: "Lucky Star," "Everybody," "Burning Up," "Holiday," the perfect "Borderline," the not-as-good-as-you-remember "Physical Attraction." Stellar though they are, they are still incredibly dated, with those bendy white-funk guitar patterns and accented synth tornadoes that scream "Look, we have a synthesizer!!!!" And the electro-claps everywhere you turn that make you feel like you're being applauded by robots. Madonna's voice is weak, but suited to these songs. The session background singers do most of the real work. Even so, it's hard to deny that Madonna deserved her coolness factor and her fame, right out of the starting gate. In some respects, it's incredible that this album holds up at all, much less as well as it does. But "great" as it is, listening to it mostly makes you feel like you're stuck in a trying-on-expensive-outfits montage.
Review by Frida Callow |