On January 30 1993, the second single from Madonna’s Erotica album, Deeper and Deeper, hit #7 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the USA.
Slant Magazine ranked Deeper and Deeper at number 33 on their list of 100 Best Singles of the 1990s:
“Among Madonna’s finest achievements, the angsty pop anthem Deeper and Deeper is both an acute distillation of Erotica ’s smut-glam decadence and the singer’s lifelong blond ambition.”
On November 20 1993, Madonna – Live Down Under: The Girlie Show was broadcast on HBO. Live Down Under was the channel’s most watched original program of the year.
The November 20 show was to be filmed at the Sydney Cricket Ground and aired on HBO, however, severe weather conditions forced the cancellation of the show, so the November 19 show (which had been taped at the same venue the night before as a “safety show”) was aired instead.
The broadcast included the following songs:
The Girlie Show Theme
Erotica
Fever
Vogue
Rain / Just My Imagination / Singing in the Rain
Express Yourself
Deeper and Deeper
Why’s It So Hard
The Beast Within
Like A Virgin
Bye Bye Baby
I’m Going Bananas
La Isla Bonita
Holiday
Justify My Love
Everybody is a Star / Everybody
On November 17 1993, Madonna arrived in Sydney, for the start of the Australian leg of her Girlie Show World Tour and it didn’t take long before she was making stirring up controversy over a gift she received.
Here’s a snippet of what ran in the Chicago Tribune the day after she arrived:
The didgeridoo is a long, tube-like wind instrument that is traditional among the Aborigines. Only men are allowed to play it.
Madonna, who offended some fans in Puerto Rico when she rubbed the island’s flag against her crotch, received a five-foot didgeridoo on her arrival in Sydney on Wednesday. It was a gift from the promoter of the Australian leg of her tour.
“The fact Madonna is a Westerner and the didgeridoo as a gift does not change the fact she should not be carrying it around,” said Badangthun Munmunyarrun, an Aboriginal elder.
On November 6 1993, Madonna performed The Girlie Show to a sold-out crowd of 120,000 fans at the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
The Girlie Show Rio show ranks as one of the highest-attended single-artist’s ticketed concerts (excluding festivals) of all-time.
On October 26 1993, Madonna performed at the Juan Ramon Loubriel Stadium, in Bayamon, Puerto Rico and caused a stir when she wiped a Puerto Rican flag on her crotch in front of 26,000 fans. The Puerto Rican House of Representatives charged Madonna with desecration of the flag and passed a resolution to condemn her.
The following (poor quality) video shows Madonna wiping her crotch with the flag:
There are no good photos of the event, so we decided to celebrate with some awesome photos of Deeper and Deeper from The Girlie Show.
On October 21 1993, Madonna performed The Girlie Show for a sold-out crowd of 15,000 fans at The Palace of Auburn Hills in Auburn Hills, Michigan.
On October 14 1993, Madonna performed the first of three sold out concerts at New York’s Madison Square Garden during her Girlie Show Tour.
Today In Madonna History 