Madonna 2020 Palladium Residency

In fairness, I’m not entirely convinced that is her excuse.

Sorry but you're clutching quite badly here. I was a fan for many many years, but the moment she lost me for good (and frankly it was after years of having doubts because of her terrible behaviour) was when she did Grahame Norton and treated the fans who gave her the dolls in such a horrible way and that was while she was still with Guy.

Everything you have written is heresy and frankly it's pathetic she is even talking about this stuff in public. She is just a nasty person it's as simple as that. She's always has been, it is nothing new. She treats people like dirt and her relationship with her fans is like Stockholm syndrome. The difference is that as younger fans we used to laugh it off or think YAY what a strong woman, but as adults you just can't ignore it. Yes the woman has made some great music and is a fantastic live performer. But she has always treated her fans with distain no matter what faux niceties she added to her act after going to a couple of Kylie concerts, where she sat texting on her phone the whole show and now has the gaul to take people's phones off them and make them sit waiting for 3-4 hours without them at hers.

A problem she has is that she doesn’t have anywhere to go after the music career. Unless she’s struck by lightning and wakes up a great actor or director I’m afraid pop music and her back catalogue is her lot for the rest of her life. If these residencies are an indication that she’s tired of the huge arena tours (and who could blame her for finding that exhausting at 60) then seriously where does she go next? 

MGM have hired her to direct a movie based on Michaela DePrince, and Madonna has been working on her own adaptation of ‘The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells’ by Andrew Sean Greer. Madonna also had an Instagram meltdown last year about Universal buying a script based on her early career, stating only she can tell her story, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s readying herself for this to eventually happen.

She has never performed an official greatest hits tour, and never toured without promoting or performing more than half of her latest album. There has been speculation about her announcing a world tour next year celebrating the 30th anniversary of The Immaculate a Collection, but personally I don’t see it, not yet.

She bloody better not.

New music. Always new music. She is my favourite artist and I listen to her all the time (my Last FM tells me I’ve recently hit 14,000 plays since January 2018). I’d like to see her reach at least 20 studio albums, but I’m not convinced she will at this point.

Madonna has never done an official greatest hits tour, always touring in support of her latest albums and never just for the sake of performing her hits. Something like that would surely be worth the effort and sell hugely. In terms of performing, she’s never headlines a big festival either. Her name keeps popping up for Glastonbury, but I’m not sure she would. She’d never do the legends slot, I know that much.

None of her albums have ever been remastered or expanded (excluding dodgy remasters of her first 3 albums back in 2001). Only twice in 37 years has she officially released 2 songs from her vault: the first in 1986 when her scrapped debut single was the b-side to Papa Don’t Preach and then in 2003 when she included an unreleased song from Bedtime Stories on a remix EP.

She was signed to the same label from 1982 to 2009 and basically her record deal with them means they only own the music submitted to them (and not unreleased songs) and they are not allowed to release any new bodies of work (eg random greatest hits albums) or existing body of work with alterations (eg expanded versions) without permission.

There’s a rumour that she’s in the process of buying her catalogue back under some clause in old record contracts that allows a popstar to buy back their actual recordings after 35 years, so there is possibly something in the works there.

She’s said once or twice that she’s kept all of her costumes and outfits from the very start and would like to do a multimedia exhibition, combining video and costume - which I think would work very well as a touring exhibit.

I’d also like an autobiography too - something she’s also said she’d like to do eventually. Throw in a movie biop and musical then we can talk retirement.

The Remixed and Revisited EP has a song called ‘Your Honesty’ from the Bedtime Stories sessions. Her manager had announced plans for a huge career retrospective boxset in 2003 to celebrate 20 years since her first album, but her label basically refused to release it because it would have cost too much. So we got an EP instead.

I do think the fact she’s never done an official greatest hits tour is deliberate and an attempt to stop herself becoming a legacy act. It’s a bold move to keep focusing primarily on new material, but once you’re seen as a legacy act then that’s all you ever are.

Half the reason she left Warner (her label) was because they forced through the release of GHV2 (Greatest Hits Volume 2) before she wanted it released. So what did she do? She refused to shoot cover art, do any promotion or record any new material.

I’ve always thought a greatest hits tour would be her final lap, a bookend to her career. But I think after nearly 40 years of refusing to look backwards would offer you some room to do it once or twice without it being a contraction.





Most people dropped out after hearing MDNA - most call that one the unlistenable album! She said recently that Hard Candy, MDNA and Rebel Heart were made because she had to make an album: there wasn’t anything that necessarily made her feel inspired to make music. I suppose that’s the curse of selling your soul and having deadlines on your creativity.

As much as I want new music constantly, I do think she’s at that legacy act stage and should just embrace it. I’d rather she settle things on her terms, rather than having the opportunity stolen from her (like MJ, Prince, Whitney etc).

Still, she just scored her 50th #1 single on the US dance chart - the most #1s by any act on any US chart. Not bad when you’re in your 60s.

What’s she doing in that half hour? A sudoku?

The Reinvention tour was Greatest Hits by another name wasn’t it?

She thinks she’s still too edgy and too cool to blatantly do a greatest hits tour. She’s neither these days I’m afraid, and evidence of that is her need to collaborate with people who are.

Yes. But unofficially of course.

On the one hand American Life had flopped a bit, US radio had blacklisted her for speaking about about the Iraq war and the world thought she was a bit weird because of the whole Kabbalah and childrens books thing. But on the other, she performed over half of the songs from American Life, sung hits that she hadn’t performed in over a decade (some twenty years) and doubled her ticket price from her previous tour 3 years earlier (£75 up to £150 I believe).

More than anything it was damage control and a way to re-engage her audience. 2003 spooked the life out of her. She’d had media storms before when she released the SEX book etc, but that was to be expected. But a backlash for speaking out about war, not releasing a dance album and talking about her faith? It caught her off guard. It took Re-invention Tour, Live 8, falling off her horse and Hung Up to get things back on track.

But her career never recovered in the US because radio refused to play her, and as a result she’s only had 3 US top 10 singles this side of 2002.

The other problem with Madonna now is that she has not looked after her voice. She was never a gifted vocalist but she did what she could with her voice.

She clearly does not do regular vocal training and she sounds awful as a result these days. It’s one of the other things that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Minimum effort from her but maximum prices for the shows. The only thing she makes an effort with is her fitness. Do her live shows still look like aerobics classes?