I can't help to think that I've been deprived. Being born in 1988 and not even able to get into music until I was 10 years old, I missed a lot of Madonna's shocking hijinks. And even when I was ten, all I knew about Madge was that she was that "crazy 80's lady who wore cones for bras," and I was almost scared of her! However, as time went on and on, I started to become interested in all types of music, and of course, the so-called "Mother of Reinvention" herself was among the music I grew to like. Starting with the Ray of Light songs, I slowly started enjoying Maddie's music as I liked just about any single she had released after Frozen.

Actually, it seems really bizarre in its own right, but I really think I have Kelly Osbourne to thank for first interesting me to go back into Madonna's history and check out her older, poppier, 80s-type tunes. Yes, it all started with that horrible rock/dance remake of Papa Don't Preach that intrigued me to go back and listen to the original. Well, you know... actually, that didn't really work so well. The song didn't really appeal to me at the time (sometime in summer 2002, my period of “new pop/rock chick” obsession), and I went on my merry ways, sticking to the new Maddie stylings such as Don’t Tell Me. But, I kept an open mind, figuring there was some reason Madonna had achieved this freaky “I-Rule-The-World Superstar” status.

Fast forward to this year. I was watching some cheesy VH1 Classic "Women in Rock" weekend marathon. It was jammed packed of amusing 80s artists such as Cyndi Lauper, Heart, and the Pretenders. Suddenly, Madonna and her Like a Prayer video came on. Not minutes later, Express Yourself followed. Finally! It was like I was transported back into the late 80s – both the songs and the videos blew me away! Those two songs alone crushed any doubt that Madonna's old music wasn't as good as her new stuff, and also kicked open the door of further exploration of the so-called “Material Girl.” I went back and checked out songs from each and every one of her fours 80s albums and loved everything I heard.

The History of Madonna
Now then, if anyone needs their history to be explained in a review of their music... Madonna certainly isn't the woman. I'm sure any Madge fan worth their salt knows the entire chronology, but since I'm pretty anal retentive, I’ll tell some of the main point of the “Madonna” story in sequential order as we go through the singles. Well, let’s start with the obvious, an introduction (as if she needs one). Madonna is probably the greatest icon of pop culture in the recent decades. She seems to be a one-woman army hell-bent on domination of the music industry, and well, the world, if you remember the American Bandstand interview. Actually, the former is pretty much true, considering.

The Overview
Since her debut 20 years ago, Madonna has proven her credibility and chameleon ability to stick with the times and trends. Starting out as much more a fluffier pop/dance star, she transformed from boy toy to material girl to controversy girl to erotic sex girl to mother and that’s just the beginning. However, she always managed to stay two steps ahead of most of the competition and stay in the spotlight by lacing her trademark pop/dance music with lyrics of substance (usually) and controversy (even more so) and pushing buttons with sex, love, religion, and other issues. Not to mention, as she’s put out no less than 15 (or at least somewhere in that ballpark) platinum albums and a shipload more of successful singles, Madge is certainly one tough artist to top as far as long-lasting popularity goes.

The Beginning
Now then, her actual background. Madonna (Louise Veronica Ciccone/Penn/Ritchie, and whatever else because it already takes 15 minutes to say her name) was born in Detroit Michigan in August, 1958 (making her 45 this August, not that her appearance would suggest that… blame the yoga). Basically, what you want to know about Madonna’s younger days is that her mom died of cancer when little Madonna was 5. This can be seen in said Oh Father video. After that, she and her seven (!) siblings were raised by dad and step-mommy. By the late 70s, she was off modeling and dancing in New York, attempting to become a ballet dancer, of all the crazy things. She apparently became a member of two bands for a while - The Breakfast Club (drummer/singer) and Emmy. Like most good little band divas, Madonna recorded some solo tracks and joined Sire Records in 1980. In 1982, she hit the club scene with her track Everybody and the rest, says the cliché, was history.

Basically, what The Immaculate Collection does is take the biggest two-four hits of Madonna’s four 80’s studo albums (Madonna, Like a Virgin, True Blue, and Like a Prayer, tosses in a few Soundtrack hits (from Vision Quest, Desperately Seeking Susan and Dick Tracy) and smoothes everything out with two new tracks, just so they could trick you into buying this little beast even if you owned all the other albums.

The Madonna Era
Now then, where were we in our little Madonna history? Oh yeah, Maddie had just hit the airwaves with Everybody. She soon hit the MTV scene with a video and single for Burning Up, which, while not becoming very big, at least got Madonna’s image out to the consumers and fans and whatnot. In the summer of 1983, her debut self-titled album Madonna was released. The album started off slow, but that’s when Holiday was released as a single - it became one of Madonna’s first big hits as well as one of her more well-known songs and finally got her widespread attention. Madonna suddenly exploded in sales and Maddie followed up on her string of hits with her next videos/singles for Borderline and Lucky Star.

Ironically, while Holiday is probably the most famous, it’s actually the track from Madonna that interests me the least. Even then, it’s not really saying much because the song is perfect 80s pop/dance tune. I really clung to this song as my mini-anthem a couple months ago while I was stressed out because of school, and it always cheered me up. Everything about the song can brighten my day. Madonna’s vocals are sweet and perky. The beat is peppy. There’s a neat layer of synth music that goes up and down in amusing fashion, and the drums in the beginning even remind me of some sort of wacky “spoon” sound (then again, it just might be because the song is a bit tinny). The harmonizing background singers are right there to make you smile. And after all, we do all need a break from daily life once and a while, right? The song itself is her trademark dance/pop with some “tropical” elements such as the underlying drums, and some synthesizers that sound, well islandy… if that’s even a word.

Lucky Star is the fastest, most upbeat song from Madonna and it’s probably one of the best early Maddie tunes to bust a groove to. A perfect high-energy pop song that’s sure to get stuck in your head, the song starts with that cool little “circle” of note sounds from the synth and it repeats throughout the song along with miscellaneous other neat blips and bloops taking residence. Yep, the song is another fine example of pure 80s dance-pop, heavy synthesizer, high danceability, catchy chorus and an infectious hook. While Madonna isn’t known for a particularly powerful voice (although it does get more fine tuned as you listen to her songs in order like this), but she certainly doesn’t make my skin crawl or anything. Actually, as long as she avoids the high notes, her earlier vocals are sweet and highly appealing and fit right in with the sound of the music. Lucky Star is a perfect example.

Borderline (which the writing of this review, specifically this song, nearly pushed me over) is one of my favorite Madonna tracks ever. While her previous songs showed she was an early 80s pop/dance/disco ruler, Borderline slows things down a smidge and also shows off a more genuine, emotional side of the “Boy Toy.” I suppose you could say this can serve as an early prototype for what would later become the Crazy for Yous and such as the song is sweet little ditty about love. Yes, you can probably guess the lyrics – Madonna is claiming to being pushed over the “borderline” by the way a lover treats her (must be one of those emotionally constipated dudes who thinks it sissy to show love) but this is before Madonna saw it fit to become Controversy Queen. The vocals are sugary sweet but very pleasurable. The ominous background singers are right there to add to the cute sound, and the production is perfect with synth bleeps and bloops detailing nice percussion beats and enjoyably sweet keyboards. It’s total ear candy, but I dare you find any better ear candy.

The Like a Virgin Era
With her self-titled album, Madonna had introduced herself to the world. But oh no, she was far from finished; in 1984, fresh off the momentum of Lucky Star, she came right back with her sophomore effort Like a Virgin. Although I consider most of the material on this album her weakest overall, the album went on to become her most successful disc, producing a whole bunch of hits (eventually five), including Maddie’s first #1single (the title track, duh). The album went 10x platinum and established that this gal was here to stay.

Everyone complains that a lot of important Like a Virgin tracks were missing (“Angel,” “Dress You Up”) but because her other albums had so many other, better songs – I’m quite happy she cropped the Virgin song count to a mere two. They are the biggest hits as well as the best selections as far as the singles went, in my opinion.

Like a Virgin is basically the song everybody equates Madonna with, probably because most people remember her antics at the VMAs where she rolled around on the floor in a wedding dress. The song itself is a fine song if not a tad overrated and even slower than Borderline which is pretty weird. Even then, the chorus is quite infectious, the background music is upbeat and catchy and production is super. Just try getting the tune out of your head once it’s stuck there. It’s not easy. The lyrics try to be provocative, (even though the riskiest word in the song is “virgin,”) and for the time I suppose they were, but when you’ve grown up in the 90s/00s they’re actually pretty tame. Either way, the lyrics are pretty fluffy as Madonna croons over how a new man makes her feel “shiny and new,” even though we all know Madonna is probably the last woman in the world you’d expect to be a virgin. Or maybe I just have the image of Dita the Dominatrix’s gold tooth burned in my brain or something.

Material Girl is Madonna’s earlier look at the greedier part of the world where possessions, fame and fortune are important and how she takes pride in being such and wanting it all. (Although she’s later resolves this thread by realizing materialism isn’t important on Ray of Light and American Life.) Of course, the most memorable thing about the song is again, the video where she takes on Marilyn Monroe garb quite well, stealing gifts and smacking suitors amusingly with fans. The song itself is a bit faster than Virgin, inducing random little chimes and horns, and becoming a bit more danceable. The production and vocals are good for the most part, but a couple of things bug me about them. The first thing is the strange monotone male vocals that drone on behind Madonna, which don’t seem to serve much purpose, and then there’s that whole squeaking part she does. Actually, it sounds more like hiccups. I personally find it funny, but what’s up with that?! Other than that, the song’s a groovin’ tune.

So by this time, Madonna had put out two hit albums and a handful of successful singles. What was next on her agenda? Well, like most music stars, Maddie went to contribute to a couple soundtracks before she released her next album. Shortly after Virgin was released, she also put out Crazy for You (andGambler), made for the Vision Quest soundtrack (she also has a cameo as a nightclub singer in the film). A little bit later, Madonna started her… uh, “noteworthy,” acting career by staring in Desperately Seeking Susan (apparently everyone thinks her first acting gig was her best and it went to hell from there, except maybe for “Evita.”) and providing the soundtrack with the hit Into the Groove.

Crazy for You is one of Madonna’s sweeter songs. This is the song that proved to me, and the world, that Madonna could rule slow dancing and ballads just as well as her faster tunes. Okay, so the song is pretty sugary, but it’s such a good, genuinely emotional song that I can overlook the cheese factor (after all, this is an 80s pop album, dude). Crazy slows it down to as far as Madge was willing to go until at least the 90s, making it her first real ballad. Her voice is just lovely here. Good depth, good emotion, good everything. One of her better earlier vocal performances as she sings to her love and how much she truly cares about them. I like how heavy thumping sound the beat of the drum makes, and because of the way they slow it down, it could synchronize perfectly with a heartbeat. Aww, how romantic! *vomit* Seriously though. The fact that background music actually sounds more organic than ”Let’s play with our drum machine!” for once certainly helps the song too. The beginning line “Two by two their bodies become one,” always makes me sigh as it makes me envision a lonely person in the world while everyone else around him is paired off, which is something I can identify with. *innocent looks*

Into the Groove is another one of my favorite songs by Ms. Maddie. You see, I’m – well – a huge nerd, and I like to try and dance around my room when no one’s looking (come on now, you know like to too!) The whole “At night I lock the doors so no one else can see.” line just brings a smile to my dorkish little face. This is probably the best flat out “dance,” song on the record – yeah, synth overkill and all, but it’s catchy, brainless fun anyway – after the somewhat cute/amusing ”And you can DANCE!” part, the song speeds up into a catchy, swinging little ditty with high energy vocals and music, as well as the fastest beat and an enjoyable little keyboard intermission on the bridge. Not to mention, the song also sports the biggest cliché when it comes to dance music… lyrics about dancing! Or something like that. Apparently in Madonna’s world, dancing equals love. Well then, I guess I don’t love her enough to prove it to her in public. Damn.

The True Blue Era
Between Like a Virgin, her Virgin Tour and her next album in 1986, Madonna ran off to marry Sean Penn. This would make her name Madonna Penn, c’mon now, that’s amusing! This seemed to have changed Madonna as she ditched some of the fluff and went for a more “Artist” style route with her career. Madonna came back yet again. She starred in some more bad movies (Shanghai Surprise), cut off all her hair, started wearing pointy bras, fought off controversy over her earlier naked pictures and soft-core porn films and then released her third album, one of her more overlooked sets entitled True Blue. However, out was the fluffy Virgin lyrical material – Madge had officially set out to start pushing some buttons!

Live to Tell is the only song that really challenged me while trying to describe it. Well, it’s like this. It’s a ballad, similar to Oh Father and Live Don’t Live Here Anymore. The material is strong, as it was used in soundtrack of a movie (At Close Range, starring Mr. Madonna, not surprisingly) . The lyrics tell the story of love, secrets, lies, and how men suck. Sigh, more anti-male songs. Live to Tell, like her other earlier ballads, showed that, yes, Madonna can sing if she really tries. Okay, so her vocals are a little rough around the corners still, but I like her voice gets a bit more of deeper, breathier tone on her ballads. Musically, it starts with a little set of chilly synth notes that repeat themselves throughout the song. The beat is a bit louder and acts more as the center of the song like on Crazy for You. There’s also a couple more layers of synthesizers that do a great job at adding to “coldness” of the song. I could almost pick out a real-live guitar riff too! Nifty.

Papa Don’t Preach starts out with a interesting little classical piece, and then jumps right into a more refined version of the pop/dance sound Madonna was known for. What’s different is that the lyrics of controversy have finally shown up – Madonna writes this song in the point of view of a teenage girl who has become pregnant. Gasp! She’s supporting teenage pregnancy! However, the thoughts of the girl are fairly realistic. She wants to keep her baby (after all, a song about abortion might have been too much at this point), but she also wants to be accepted by her father at the same time while avoiding the annoying “I told you so” lecture. And yes, this is the song Kelly Osbourne did an atrocious rock cover of, but Maddie’s version is a slowed down mid-tempo piece that is glossed over production-wise to appeal to the masses and get the point of the song across to listeners. There’s a lot of chime-y synths spread around the song. It’s cute.

Open Your Heart continued the light tread in the water of controversy as in the video, Madonna portrays an exotic dancer (Oh no, scantily clad-ness!) Again, the video fits the song because the music is highly danceable and infectious, even though the dance I envision is a more cheesy kind of can-can line because of her kicking and showing off her legs throughout the video (and that whole “Watch out!” line at the beginning of the song. Nice touch. Makes her seem like she’ll actually chase the guy down for rejecting her) This is one of the more fun songs. I dig the scratchy underlying layer of guitar-like music and the hard drum beats, as well as the chirpy synths. A good thing about early Madonna is while most of her songs are upbeat dance tunes, she manages to make each sound different in their own special way. This one is no exception. And I’m sure whenever the hell I start dating I’ll absolutely positively love this song even more – the lyrics are of being rejected by the someone you love and begging and pleading them to come around.

La Isla Bonita, cheap Spanish lyrical blips and all, is probably the weakest song on the album lyrically (“Hey look! I dreamt about San Pedro! I want to go to the pretty island! Haha, I’m so bilingual! No, I don’t know what that has to do with anything, your point?”) and while it’s one of those somewhat artificial Latin-sounding tunes complete with opening bongo-type drums, cheesy acoustic guitars and that darn islandy type synth-music like Holiday, Madonna again shows off her ability to make a song work for her. Seriously, if you can like this song and all it’s faults, you have to be an uber Madonna fan. But past all the cliches, the song sounds pretty interesting. I like the dreamy, summery “Aaaah”s played behind the vocals throughout the song, and I find her voice interesting for some reason. It seems saddened and lovesick. Yes, actual emotion. I can relate, girl. Then again, prolonging the pronunciation of “La Isla Bonita” is a good touch, and remind me of my gal Alanis.

After True Blue was finished, things got thrown off a bit in Madonna Land. Although the world tour in the same name was successful, in 1987, she went off and starred in an infamously bad movie called Who’s That Girl? and contributed two hits to the soundtrack - Who’s That Girl? and Causing a Commotion, two weaker singles and both thankfully absent from this disc. By the end of the year, she put out a remix album called You Can Dance complete with moderate hit-single Spotlight - both of these albums went platinum but are considered her weaker moments.

The Absolutely Kickass Like a Prayer Era
But on a good note, it was also around this era in time that Madonna decided to kick things into high gear. In 1989, she released Like a Prayer, which blew away the world because of the controversy-filled video of the title track and the fact that Pepsi had a coronary over the song and yanked it from their ads. Like a Prayer went platinum four times and is also considered by fans one of Maddie’s best overall albums as the songs are lyrically strong, personal and intelligent while still maintaining the appealing sound Madonna was famous for (pop and dance while tossing in a slightly more “rock” sound).

Begin long-winded rant of what PT feels is Maddie’s best song, Like a Prayer. And yes, this is even the dreaded “dance” rendition. It still blows away my entire world. So there.

Of course, Like a Prayer is probably one of Maddie’s most famous and “shocking,” songs. If you haven’t seen the video (and I’m sure you have), it’s basically Madge establishing herself as the (as Maddie fanatic Kristina called it) “Push-Your-Buttons Girl,” by dancing around burning crosses, portraying Jesus as a black man, having sex with said Jesus, causing stigmata in her palms, among other things that are still pretty over-the-top by today’s standards.

As I mentioned, Like a Prayer is the reason I suddenly became so obsessed with Madge and it’s quite possibly my favorite song by her or anyone else, which is ironic because I’m far from religious. But there’s a reason this is one of her best ever… she just makes the song work to me. Everything ties together for a hell of a tune. I think it’s the old Madonna magic, you know?

There’s just so many different things going on that add up to make this one of those epic, historic tunes. It begins with Madonna saying ”God?”. A pause. A hauntingly beautiful gospel choir comes in, and stay behind her like a ghost for the rest of the song. Madonna starts singing in sweet, somber vocals. The sounds of organs trail behind. And that’s just the first few seconds. Some percussion comes in, followed by a medium-type electronic beat and some more mature sounding dance-synth music. There’s something really different about her voice in this song… it’s well, matured. She can actually sing now. Her voice is not as thin and wispy as her previous albums - it’s more refined, deeper. It meshes so well with the choir and the music. I love it.

Toward the middle-bridge part of the song, Madonna forcefully says ”Let the choir sing.” This is right after she cuts herself in the palms with the knife in the video. It’s really dramatic, because then she recalls that memory where the police find the man with the murdered woman in his arms, and she starts dancing around the crosses. Then the choir comes in to carry the tune with enthusiasm. PT sits in awe. At this point, then there’s a drum solo of sorts, and person saying “Yeah” over and over. The drums stutter for a few seconds, and another synth piece comes in, fitting the song by going up and down and around. Madonna comes back in says her parting words, and the choir leads out. Amazing.

Yes, the lyrics are equally splendid. While Papa Don’t Preach tries to shock you into paying attention but doesn’t have much to back it up, this is probably the first of her songs that proved, yes world, she does have brain! She doesn’t need to sing fluff about feeling like a virgin! I love the similes to “dreams” that she uses in this song to whoever she’s singing it to - It’s like a dream, no end and no beginning, and Just like a dream, you are not what you seem. It’s oh so true. I also just love Life is a mystery – everyone must stand alone. I hear you call my name and feels like… (dramatic pause) home.. Wow! Madge must have gotten some song writing lessons after True Blue, because these lyrics blow her old ones out of the water.

If there was a better song to introduce one to early Madonna than Like a Prayer, please show me it. I don’t think there is one. :)
End rant.

Express Yourself is my little gay loser theme song (c’mon, this song is so the type of thing gay guys love). It’s basically one of those slightly cheesy Empowering Female Anthems but basically anyone could “get” the song – you shouldn’t settle for less than the best, especially when it comes to love. Starting with a little piece of synth notes and Madonna’s altered “Baby!”s, the song is highly danceable and splashed with a funky style, and it’s probably one of the catchiest Madonna songs as well as my favorites ever. I love the perky little synth opening, the “Come on girls, do you believe in love?!” bit, the empowering tone in Maddie’s vocals, the “Hey, hey, hey, HEY!”s, the stuttering Vogue-like background synth music dancing around the song, I basically love everything about the tune. And yeah, I’m reminded of the video once again. It’s Madonna in a business suit, grabbing her crotch and crawling around like a cat. See, I swear I missed all the good stuff! Notice my male intimidation, damnit.

Cherish is another favorite of mine (basically, anything that comes from the Like a Prayer album is golden in my eyes). A light and breezy summer pop tune, sporting a video of Madge dancing around a beach while mermen wander around the shores, it’s a little less “I am woman in your face, hear my roar!” than the previous two songs, but it’s as equally catchy and memorable as any of her material. Madonna’s vocals are again more appealing than the earlier tracks as they are sweet, light and airy, fitting the whimsical background synth-music and the way the beat is kept by an ever-famous “finger snapping” sound. The lyrics aren’t setting out to blow away the world, but instead, they’re just a simple, cute confession of the love Madonna receives by a man and how she… well, cherishes it. The “Romeo & Juliet” line always makes me smile, mainly because I was reading the play in school when I first discovered the song. Ah, memories of a forgotten time of all three months ago. Then again, American Life could be described like that too.

After Cherish was released, Madonna and Penn were divorced at the end of 1989. However, Madonna kept moving right along (as it was never her policy to “look back at the past”). She started a second world tour in 1990 (“Blonde Ambition”) and she also snatched the role of Breathless Mahoney in Dick Tracy because of a romance with the star Warren Beatty. Or so I’ve heard. She then also put out another album in 1990 called I’m Breathless (Music appearing in and blahblahblah from Dick Tracy).

The only Breathless track is the closer Vogue, which was actually the first pre-Ray of Light song from Madonna that I really enjoyed. I love the whole “retro,” feel Madonna added in not only the song, but the video (where she “vogues,” a gay dance that looks bizarrely cool), while splashing it with her signature modern dance pop sound (and that snapping thing from Cherish as well as music similar to the IC remix of Express Yourself, it’d fit perfectly on Like a Prayer) for a winning combination. The music is highly danceable, keyboard and synth-heavy and sounds perfectly suitable to play during a fashion show. And again, Madonna’s theory to keep things amusing shows up again – I could never stop laughing every time she said “What are you looking at?! or “Strike a pose!” when I first heard the song. Meanwhile, the lyrics are also witty, amusing and cute as during the bridge, Madonna pays a little tribute to the posh stars of the past such as Garbo, Monroe and others. Also during the bridge is a neat little keyboard piece, which is my favorite part.

The Justify My Love Era
After Vogue and I’m Breathless, Madonna had five albums of original material out as well as all of her soundtrack projects, so she did what most artists would - release a Greatest Hits collection, which is, well, the Immaculate Collection. Or at least it nearly is, because she decided to tack on two newer songs at the end. While strong in their own right, Justify My Love and Rescue Me are the songs that interest me the least on this album compared the absolutely amazing amount of material that otherwise occupies this disc. It many due to the fact the choruses are repeated more often and more grating to begin with. Although they blueprint her direction for Erotica and Bedtime Stories (flashy & trashy sex/love tunes), I prefer later variations (Erotica, Deeper and Deeper) over these.

Justify My Love was the controversial hit from this album. It also got a hand in songwriting and producing from Lenny Kravtiz, although it’s way different from his material – it could best be described as “porn music,” as it’s full of erotic moans and Madge speaks out the chorus in a hot-for-you way. It’s pretty obvious she’s wanting some sex in this song. (There’s also these strange male voices – Lenny’s – moaning or something in the background, which I find kinda weird) And yeah, the video is pretty much appropriate imagery to companion the music – it was sold as a separate video because it was “Too hot” for MTV even though it looks incredibly tame today. However, the song is pretty fun to listen to, with it’s seductively dark dance sound and bass line, even though the blaring “horn” type thing found around the song annoys the hell out me. It’s interesting, just less so than the other songs.

Rescue Me is the song I prefer between the two “new” tracks – the song has high energy (starting with a heartbeat and ending with the sound of a thunderstorm are nice touches) and also recalls the retro feel of Vogue right down to the stuttering synths and finger snapping (must be a pattern) complete with some sort of flute-y instrument that I enjoy. Madonna again talks out the verses, but I like the strength of her voice when she sings the verses. She sings in this really deep, more soulful voice that she never really uses anywhere else but this song. There’s some more harmonizing than a typical Madonna song and she and her background singers work well singing together in the middle of the song. I also dig the part where she goes “Aah” like she just drank a Coke in the middle of summer. Sounds funny. Lyrically, the song is predictable (“If you love me, I will be rescued! Yay!”) but she sprinkled it with enough amusing lyrics (“You see that I am silly and pretentious and a freak,”) to make it work.

Track listing with personal ratings:
Holiday - *****
Lucky Star - *****
Borderline - *****
Like a Virgin - *****
Material Girl - *****
Crazy for You - *****
Into the Groove - *****
Papa Don’t Preach - *****
Open Your Heart - *****
Live to Tell - *****
La Isla Bonita - *****
Like a Prayer - *****
Express Yourself - *****
Cherish - *****
Vogue - *****
Justify My Love - ****
Rescue Me - ****.5

The End
The only thing I could really ask for from the Immaculate Collection was the addition of the fourth Like a Prayer single, Oh Father, one of her best ballads ever – however, it wasn’t as big a hit as the others from Like a Prayer so I can understand it’s omission. However, something I really didn’t mind or notice was the problem that major fans might have with the album. This is, to save some time, many of the songs are edited, faded out early, remixed or in radio versions. This really doesn’t bother me, because these edits are very fine and strong on their own and they were actually the first versions of the songs I heard, but it might bother you if you wanted album duplicates.

I really wish I could tell you more, but I’ve only heard four of the “original” tracks - Like a Prayer and Express Yourself sound more rock-inclined in their album forms but I prefer the remixes actually heard here. Also, Cherish is edited by about a minute here and while the songs sound the same, I prefer the uncut album version. I also prefer the album version of Live to Tell because this rendition fades out about 40 seconds early, which doesn’t makes sense because there was actually enough time left over to fit the entire thing on. At least they chose an appropriate time to fade it out. But outside of these four songs, that’s really all I know as how to compare the album versions and what ended up on Immaculate. Maybe you can mix and match the versions you prefer on your own disc, huh? That’s what I plan on doing when I hunt down Maddie’s other studio albums.

But seriously, if there is a better choice for a Madonna album than The Immaculate Collection, I’d really like you to point it out to me. All of the songs, even the new songs, even the seemingly needless dance remixes, are extremely solid, likable and appealing. Another that I enjoy about the disc is that it’s living proof of how Madonna has morphed over the years (all though GHV2 might work better to clinch this point) and her most aspects of her music have only improved over time. However, If you really want evidence of Madonna’s credibility as an artist – well – some of these songs are up to 20 years old, and they really don’t seem all that dated at all (save maybe the Like a Virgin tunes). I seriously think that’s saying something.

Of course, Madonna was far from finished at this point in her career – she continued on through the 90s and 00s, releasing no less than five more full-length studio albums - Erotica, Bedtime Stories, Ray of Light, Music, and American Life as well as some lesser projects like Evita, Something to Remember and the sister set to this album, GHV2. Of course, terrible movies such as Swept Away also littered her more recent works.

If you like what you hear on the Immaculate Collection, you’ll probably want to pick up Like a Prayer or her best 90s disc Ray of Light

Thanks for putting up with my inane, lengthy rambling once more. I salute you and your killer attention span! -PT.

Great Music to Play While:
Taking a holiday. Wishing on your lucky star. Dancing on the borderline.

Feeling like a virgin. Confessing you’re a material girl. Going crazy on someone. Getting into the groove.

Telling your damn father to not give you a lecture. Opening your heart to a love. Living to tell secrets and lies. Longing for the pretty island.

Dancing around burning crosses. Expressing Yourself. Cherishing your love. Vogueing. Justifying somebody’s love. Being rescued.

Reinventing yourself and your image while shocking everyone around you.

And finally, conquering the world, baby.

Recommended: Yes