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| Madonna |
Last year, I embarked on a journey to listen to every album that Tom Waits had released in a column that I called The Tom Waits Project. The plan was to see what made him a singular voice in the world of music by exploring his attributes as well as his varying styles. While it was indeed one of the more involved columns that I ran, it gave me a deeper appreciation for what he gave to the world as his style (and voice) changed. With that said, it was a fun time and left a lot of curiosity. Would I dare do another musician and create an annual tradition? There are after all many with a substantial body of work who deserve to be explored. With that said, I wanted to try someone who was just as diverse as Waits, but whose career was even more impactful on the zeitgeist. That is why, starting next Wednesday, I am going to start the 2020 series known simply as The Madonna Project.
On one hand, it's the simplest choice for a project like this. Madonna over course of almost 40 years now has revolutionized and defined what it means to be a pop star. With 2019's "Madame X" proving that she still has some cultural cache, one has to wonder what makes her so special. Considering that the "Project" series is an attempt to make sense of these figures, it makes sense to dive in and explore personally what each of her albums means.
The rules will mostly be the same for what they were during The Tom Waits Project. For starters, this will be a dissection of the highs and lows of each album as well as various information regarding chart success and singles. The bigger difference this time around is that I will not be tackling live albums (or remixes, since Madonna has several to her name). Soundtracks will be included but will center specifically on work that she contributed (see: "Who's That Girl?") I will also not be doing a track-by-track breakdown, as it was too time-consuming during the previous Project. I want to instead focus on what the singles meant in greater context while highlighting what makes the album special or relevant. There will be rankings as well in an attempt to find the best Madonna album, though it may be interesting to see how her later work falls.
I chose Madonna for a variety of reasons. The ones that go beyond cultural importance are ones that are shared with Tom Waits: I simply haven't heard a lot from her. Yes, I have theoretically heard all of "The Immaculate Collection" on the radio, but I can't tell you what the tracklist for "Like a Virgin" is or how it differs from "Like a Prayer." To me, this is as much understanding as it is expanding my knowledge of pop music history. Yes, it will come at the cost of listening to questionable albums like "American Life," but that should hopefully be interesting in connection to her body of work by that point.
By the end, the goal is to have an appreciation or knowledge of what has made Madonna a pop icon for several decades by exploring her music. The series will run every three weeks and focus on 17 of her albums (provided that another doesn't come out during this time). I don't necessarily set out to like these musicians, but one can hope it's a convenient side effect. After all, Madonna has knowingly defined pop music in ways that are both explicit in her music but also in just how performers are allowed to behave. The goal, in a sense, is to understand the trajectory of pop music of the latter half of the 21st century through one artist. Hopefully that will pan out.
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