Skip to content
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • TikTok
  • YouTube
PopHits News

PopHits News

Pop Music

  • Home
  • Login
  • Music Services
    • Playlists
    • Our Services
    • Artists Association
    • Publish An Article
  • Music News Network
    • Indie Music News Portals
    • FREE Guide: Get On News!
    • FREE Guide: Be Interviewed!
    • PopHits.Co Indie Music Charts
  • About Us
    • About Us
    • Contact Us
    • Social Projects
    • Casting Network
Watch Online
  • Home
  • Life style
  • Madonna’s ‘MDNA’ Turns 10, But It’s No Lost Classic
  • Artists
  • Life style
  • Music
  • News

Madonna’s ‘MDNA’ Turns 10, But It’s No Lost Classic

Will Lisil 24 March 2022

The Queen of Pop delivered her most disappointing album in 2012 despite a record-breaking Super Bowl halftime show.

Madonna looked set for another exciting rebirth ten years ago when she announced her 12th studio album, MDNA. Four years after Hard Candy, the master of reinvention left Warner Bros. for Interscope and divorced second husband Guy Ritchie. She was firmly expected to bring her A-game with Lady Gaga launching the most credible challenge to her Queen of the Pop throne in 30 years. Instead, Madge delivered the most regressive and disappointing record of her career.  

  • Mrberdo’s “P.A.P” Album: A New Side in Hardcore and Electronic Pop
  • Abe Shaw Sings Soft R&B Sounds with New Song “Bonnet”
  • Misha Mandy’s Empowering Anthem “Fading Out” Redefines Indie Pop
  • Terra Renae’s Soulful Pop Sounds of Self-Discovery in Debut Album “All I Have”
  • Why Them: Catlea’s Bold Assertion of Independence

Statistical evidence supports this, as well. The 359,000 first-week sales of MDNA were Madonna’s highest since Music, but half of those sales came from an album-tour bundle, a by-product of her other major new partnership with LiveNation. Following its fall to No. 8, it posted the then-largest percentage sales drop for a No. 1 in the Nielsen Soundscan era, and within 13 weeks, it was gone from the Billboard 200. 

Her new label might have anticipated a commercial nosedive after her third official hits comp, Celebration. She confounded pop fans with her deeply provocative hip-hop, R&B, and house of Erotica after 1990’s The Immaculate Collection. GHV2 was followed by American Life, a chilly concept album that analyzed the American Dream. In spite of their underperformance in the charts, their sense of ambition and originality couldn’t be faulted.

Contrary to this, there is little on MDNA that would even qualify as second-tier Madonna. In her second feature-length directorial effort W.E., “Masterpiece” is a genuinely lovely ballad that ensured that the royal biopic got some attention (but not a Razzie). Still, along with similarly restrained closer “Falling Free,” it seems to have wandered in from a totally different album.  

Despite its faults, MDNA does not subscribe to the theory that all breakup albums must be characterized by seven-minute dirges of gloom and doom. Madonna sings, “I just need to dance,” on the gurgling electro-house of “I’m Addicted,” an expression of determination far removed from breakup albums designed to leave you weeping in the shower. It’s just a shame that she chose to head back into the clubs with the wrong company.

It was already evident on its predecessor that Madonna had lost some of her seemingly magical collaborative spirit. While people like William Orbit, Mirwais and Stuart Price were plucked from the fringes of mainstream music, Timbaland and Pharrell Williams had been making huge hits for decades. Hard Candy is an excellent contemporary R&B record, but it could have been recorded by Britney Spears, Nelly Furtado, or any number of pop stars who grew up listening to the Material Girl.  

MDNA, however, saw the once switched-on Madonna fall further behind the curve. Back in the early ’00s, Solveig’s brand of electro-pop was considered generic, so it is not surprising that his three albums are more nightclub chain than an underground warehouse. “Turn Up the Radio” is particularly guilty of making the most dominant female artist in pop history sound like she’s channelling Heidi Montag.

A feeble attempt at a Mickey for the EDM generation, “Give Me Your Luvin'” essentially reduces Madonna to a bit player on her own comeback single, thanks to cameo appearances from M.I.A. and Nicki Minaj. The middle finger gesture at the Super Bowl remains more memorable than the track that accompanied it.  

As the man jointly responsible for “Ray of Light,” “Nothing Really Matters” and “Runaway Lover,” you’d have expected Orbit to steer Madonna into more interesting dancefloor territory. Even his uptempo contributions border on the inane. Dubstep breakdowns that seemed mandatory back in the early 2010s immediately date the awfully titled “Gang Bang,” while hardstyle formula “Some Girls” spends four minutes searching for a melody, to little avail. Only “I’m A Sinner,” with its swirling psychedelic organs reminiscent of “Beautiful Stranger,” comes close to recapturing the group’s turn-of-the-century glory days.

Madonna should have put more trust in the Benassi brothers, Benny and Alle. The strobe-lit electronica of opener “Girl Gone Wild,” which throws in nods to everything from her one-time closest rival Cyndi Lauper to Like a Prayer cut “Act of Contrition,” briefly suggests we’re in for a journey back to her New York club roots similar to Confessions on a Dance Floor. Despite its love-is-a-drug metaphor, “I’m Addicted” and its chants of “MDMA” provide the most addictive moment of the song. 

There is a saving grace in this sense of playfulness. MDMA’s music may often sound like it’s been designed by committee, yet Madonna’s lyrics, no matter how clunky (see “You’re like James Dean driving a fast car” on “Superstar”), ensure that the cookie-cutter tunes at least have some semblance of personality.

‘Love Spent’ took aim at Ritchie’s apparent gold-digging tendencies (“If we opened up a joint account/Would it put an end to all your doubts”); the second Minaj track, “I Don’t Give A”, demonstrated a fragile male ego (“I tried to be a good girl/I tried to be your wife/Diminish myself and swallow my light”). But Madonna has the most fun envisioning a violent demise in “Gang Bang,” repeatedly shouting “Die bitch” in a vengeful tale apparently inspired by Quentin Tarantino (the director Ritchie has often been accused of aping just to throw some extra shade). Obviously, hell hath no fury like a 12-time Hot 100 chart-topper scorned.

Since then, she has released Rebel Heart and Madame X. While both were inconsistent, they had the touches that made Madonna so popular. Meanwhile, MDNA remains a deeply uninspiring listen that hasn’t improved with time.

About Author

Will Lisil

Director & Digital Creator at MW3.biz Ltd, United Kingdom.

See author's posts

Tags: Classic Madonna Music

Continue Reading

Previous: Bad Bunny, Wisin, And More Are Nominated For 2022 Heat Latin Music Awards: Complete List
Next: During Her 16th ‘Hannah-Versary’, Miley Cyrus Reveals The Lyrics To ‘Hoedown Throwdown’

Related Stories

Mrberdo’s “P.A.P” Album: A New Side in Hardcore and Electronic Pop MrBerdo releasing P.A.P
  • Article

Mrberdo’s “P.A.P” Album: A New Side in Hardcore and Electronic Pop

1 April 2025
Abe Shaw Sings Soft R&B Sounds with New Song “Bonnet” Abe Shaw releasing Bonnet
  • Article

Abe Shaw Sings Soft R&B Sounds with New Song “Bonnet”

31 March 2025
Misha Mandy’s Empowering Anthem “Fading Out” Redefines Indie Pop Misha Mandy releasing Fading Out
  • Article

Misha Mandy’s Empowering Anthem “Fading Out” Redefines Indie Pop

22 March 2025



About Us

PopHits.News

We mainly focus on Pop music, independent artist industry, showbiz and events. Powered by PopHits.Co Music Charts & Distribution Platform

Recent Posts

  • Mrberdo’s “P.A.P” Album: A New Side in Hardcore and Electronic Pop
  • Abe Shaw Sings Soft R&B Sounds with New Song “Bonnet”
  • Misha Mandy’s Empowering Anthem “Fading Out” Redefines Indie Pop
  • Terra Renae’s Soulful Pop Sounds of Self-Discovery in Debut Album “All I Have”
  • Why Them: Catlea’s Bold Assertion of Independence
  • KARMA Releases a New Single “ANTHEM” That Stirs a Feeling Inside
  • Crawford Mack’s New Single, “Think About It,” Offers a Direct Look at the Media
  • Nissu’s “Memories”: A Pop Journey Through Time and Love
  • Annu’s New Album EXPERIENCE: A Sound Trip Through Becoming a Mother
  • GIANFRANCO GFN’s “My Sunday Morning”: A Jazzy Nod to Happiness

Categories


Powered by

PopHits.Co Independent Music Charts & Distribution

Music Distribution for Music Labels & Independent Artists - Pophits.Co sends your songs to all music stores and social networks, and automatically distribute them to new stores when available.

  • Home
  • Login
  • Music Services
  • Music News Network
  • About Us
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • TikTok
  • YouTube
Copyright © PopHits.News Portal - All rights reserved. | DarkNews by AF themes.
PopHits News
Manage Consent
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes. The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
View preferences
{title} {title} {title}