On January 3 2005, Madonna was ranked #5 on the list of 100 most successful recording artists of all time in the UK. The list, published by the Guinness British Hit Singles and Albums book, ranked artists according to how many weeks they spent in the UK singles and albums charts.
Madonna was the only female act to make it into the top ten (at the time) with a score of 1,653 weeks, right behind Elvis Presley, Cliff Richard, The Beatles and Queen.
On January 2 1999, Madonna’s The Power of Good-Bye peaked at #14 on Billboard’s Adult Contemporary chart in the USA. The single remained #14 for 6 non-consecutive weeks.
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These are our Top 10 Posts for 2019 (based on page views):
#1 – September 2, 1993 – Madonna performed Bye Bye Baby at the MTV Video Music Awards. Stunning!
#2 – May 4, 2019 – the Madame X Tour was announced.
Did you get to go? Are you waiting to attend a show in 2020? Thoughts? Are residency shows the future for Madonna? Or was this an experiment she had to get out of her system and now it’s time for a classic hits arena tour?
#3 – September 24, 1992 – Madonna went topless on the runway at a Jean-Paul Gautier fashion show. Gotta love a good boob!
#4 – July 8, 1993 – Madonna began rehearsals for The Girlie Show World Tour.
A remastered release of this tour with an audio CD component is due — let’s make it happen!
#5 – November 13 1997, the Rolling Stone magazine Women of Rock issue, featuring Madonna, Tina Turner and Courtney Love on its cover was released.
Imagine how difficult it was to get these three women in the same room? LOVE the photos!
#6 – April 17 2019, Madonna issued the press release for her forthcoming album, Madame X.
There were so many different releases for this album. Was it a collector’s dream or a collector’s nightmare? Did you get the BLUE Madame X on vinyl?
#7 – January 25, 1989, Pepsi announced they signed Madonna to a year-long endorsement contract, for which they would pay her $5 million. In return, Madonna would appear in a series of television commercials and Pepsi would sponsor the Like A Prayer World Tour, tentatively slated for later that year.
Imagine the set-list for a Like A Prayer World Tour? If you had to remove all the Dick Tracy songs and Vogue from the Blond Ambition Tour, what would you add in to fill the gaps?
#8 – February 19 2015, Living For Love became Madonna’s 44th #1 Billboard Dance Club hit in the USA.
Would you support a boxset release of Madonna’s Top Dance Club hits — full-on classic remixes that took the songs to the top? Or would you want NEW remixes? This could be a cheap and cheerful digital release with a limited edition vinyl Record Store Day boxset. Who’s in?
#9 – June 11 2015, a Rick Nowels interview was featured at songwriteruniverse.com in which he spoke about how he came to collaborate with Madonna for the Ray Of Light sessions:
“I always wanted to work with Madonna. I loved her voice, her songwriting, and the great records she made with Pat Leonard, Stephen Bray and Nile Rodgers. In 1997 I was in New York for the Grammys. I was up for Album of the Year (as one of the producers) for Celine Dion’s Falling Into You. I was in Barney’s (store) getting a tie for the Grammys and I saw Madonna there. I introduced myself, and I told her that she didn’t get the credit she deserved as a songwriter. Which is true, but it’s also an awkward thing to tell a huge superstar! She was very cool and gracious. I ended up getting a meeting with her in L.A. a few weeks later. We wrote nine songs together — three made the Ray of Light album: The Power of Good-bye, Little Star and To Have and Not To Hold. The Power of Good-bye was a number one song in U.K. and Europe. It was a career-changing experience for me. Before that I had always done my co-writing with friends. But working with Madonna…it was the first time I had ever written one-on-one with a great artist/writer. After that I changed gears a little, and now I mostly collaborate directly with artists.”
Check out another one of Justin’s amazing video posts. His remixes and remastered archival footage is second to none! THANK YOU JUSTIN – we all appreciate your mixes and videos – the amount of work you pour into these is clear — no short-cuts. Brilliant!
#10 – May 30th 1987, Breakfast Club scored their biggest hit as Right On Track peaked at #7 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Madonna became a member of Breakfast Club in late 1979, first as a drummer before branching out to keyboards and guitar, all the while sharing vocal duties (and living quarters) with her boyfriend, Dan Gilroy, and his brother Ed.
It’s funny how we think of guitar as a rather new instrument for Madonna, but she was rocking the guitar back in the late 70’s, along with many other instruments. Would you want to see Madonna do a drum solo on her next tour? I can HEAR YOUR EYES ROLLING from here! LOL ..
Happy New Year!
On December 31 1999, the following Madonna videos were included in the Much Music: Top 100 Videos Of The Century includes Express Yourself #3, Ray Of Light #8 and Like A Prayer #47.
Happy New Year!
On December 30 1987, Madonna was featured on the cover of Smash Hits magazine. Before the Pet Shop Boys became famous, Neil Tennant interviewed Madonna for Smash Hits:
Neil Tennant: Where are you from?
Madonna: I come from a big Italian family. I have eight brothers and sisters. I was born in Detroit and then moved to Pontiac and then moved to another city just north of Detroit. Those are all car factory cities so everybody’s families worked in the car factories. I went to three different Catholic schools – uniforms and nuns hitting you over the head with staplers, very strict and regimented. To my superiors I seemed like a very good girl. I was very good at getting into these situations where I was the hall monitor and I reported people who weren’t behaving. And I used to torture people but in the end it came back to me.
On December 29 2005, Madonna’s Official Fan Club, ICON, published an interview with Stuart Price about his experiences working with Madonna on Confessions on a Dance Floor.
Here’s part of the interview they posted:
ICON: What’s the best part in being involved with Madonna’s new album?
STUART: Watching it take shape from a few demos done for fun into an entire spectacle with dancers, videos and nightclubs full of people!
ICON: What made you want to record this album in your home studio? Why not a big studio instead?
STUART: It wasn’t really thought about that much, we just found that we had got into several songs before we even thought about it. But that was the thing for much of the album concept; it wasn’t over-thought or analyzed. We liked the sound of my studio and so thought why go elsewhere?
ICON: How would you describe your collaboration with Madonna?
STUART: Like finding your favourite musician, comedian and friend all in one!
ICON: How is working on a Madonna project different from working with a new artist?
STUART: It’s not in many ways. She is very fresh, exciting and full of ideas the same way as someone is when they do their first record. The difference is she has the experience and integrity of someone who understands the creative process very deeply and can therefore suggest directions and ideas that can inspire greater heights.
On December 28 1987, Madonna appeared on the cover of the special year-end double issue of US Weekly magazine: The Sexiest, The Sassiest, The Boldest, The Best.
Today In Madonna History 