Can You Spot the Difference?

I'll Remember...1985

I'll Remember...1991

Strike a Pose....1984

Healthy Swimmer

Paparazzi...1984

I'll Remember...1984

Strike a Pose...1984

I'll Remember...1984

For Inspiration...

I'll Remember...1984

Madonna in 1984 at age 26. This interview was done just before she released ‘Like A Virgin’ so she was still a newbie to the music scene and on the brink on international super stardom. This woman has NOT changed. Madonna’s still articulate, intelligent, confident, stylish, brutally honest, cutting edge, assertive, determined, with balls of steel. She knew exactly what she wanted and has accomplished everything she set her mind to. 30 years later she’s still the reigning Queen of Pop. I lover her earlier interviews, I always felt like she was flirting with them using body language. Nowadays she just condescends them. There will never be another Madonna. Love this chick!

I'll Remember...1984

Madonna - Like a What?

Madonna in the mid-'80s — The ''Material Girl'''s hits topped the pop charts and silenced skeptics.  
Throughout her career, Madonna has been a risk taker, flirting on the edge, and no wonder: Her first career gamble paid off big time. After waiting for ''Lucky Star,'' the final single from her 1983 debut album, Madonna, to straggle down the charts, the 26-year-old singer released her sophomore effort on Nov. 12, 1984. The gamble: a sexy photo and three little words, Like a Virgin, on the cover. Six weeks later, as preteens around the country pulled cassettes out of their Christmas stockings and asked, ''What's a virgin?'' a nation of Madonna wannabes was born.

Days before the album's release, the New York Post reported the title of her new video as ''I'm No Virgin,'' and the gaffe would prove closer to the truth than the real thing. The album contained such been-there-done-that lyrics as '' 'Cause the boy with the cold hard cash is always Mr. Right,'' a line delivered, like many others over the next 11 years, partly tongue in cheek.

The reviews ranged from mildly positive to indifferent (Peoplecalled the album ''a tolerable bit of fluff''), while Mick Jagger later opined that Madonna's tunes were characterized by ''a central dumbness.'' But something clicked. ''Like a Virgin'' spent six weeks at No. 1 on the singles chart. Other album singles, ''Material Girl,'' ''Angel,'' and ''Dress You Up,'' all hit the top five. By spring, Madonna Madness was in full swing, and girls were raiding stores for anything that accentuated their belly buttons.

Their new role model strutted her stuff with the aplomb of a woman who had dreamed of fame for years.Billboard editor Paul Grein predicted that ''Cyndi Lauper will be around for a long time; Madonna will be out of the business in six months,'' but the Material Girl stuck around, and Like a Virgin eventually sold 15 million worldwide, a feat none of her other collections has matched.

Today, Like a Virgin comes off as a bit repetitious and immature. Even its producer, Nile Rodgers, confesses, ''As a fan, it wouldn't be what I consider my favorite Madonna album compositionally.'' But it was perfect for the mid-'80s, when the country was searching for a pop queen to accompany the pop kings Michael Jackson and Prince. Already dressed for the party, the star announced in her press biography: ''1985 is going to be my year. You watch.'' It was our pleasure.

SOURCE

Madonna Tribe: Fact of the Day

Today's fact of the day is devoted to one of Madonna's signature songs:Like A Virgin. Virgin is one of the few Madonna's big hit she hasn't penned in any way herself, but it was written by Billy Steingberg and Tom Kelly.
Steinberg, who wrote the lyrics in 1983 has shared some nice tidbits about the song with us and here they are:
 In 1983, when I wrote the lyrics for "Like A Virgin", I was very happy because I had extricated myself from a very difficult relationship and was enjoying a new one. I felt like a virgin. I wrote the first verse lyric first, starting with "I made it through the wilderness." I didn't start with the title. But after I wrote the line, "you made me feel shiny and new", the title "Like A Virgin" popped into my head. Right away, I knew it could make a startling song and I was excited about working on it with Tom.
 There are some alternate lyrics that we didn't use in the end. Mostly junk. For example, "Ask my friends and they'll tell you it's true. Nobody's had what I'm giving to you."
 The song wasn't intended as a ballad. I had no pre-conceived idea about the music. It's just that when Tom read the first verse, it sounded romantic and serious and his first instinct was to approach the music as a ballad. But I knew that that was the wrong approach. When I told him so, he tried something else. After doing this numerous times, he became frustrated and started playing the "Like A Virgin" bass line and singing in falsetto. I yelled, "That's it!" After that, the song was written quickly.
 Sometimes a song will only "fit" one artist. "Like A Virgin" is one. When we submitted it for other artists, we were told that "no one will sing a song with that title." One A&R guy suggested I re-write the lyric. Michael Ostin, a Warner Brothers record executive, came to our studio to hear what Tom and I were writing. He loved "Like A Virgin" and said he would play it for Madonna.
 The bass line to "Like A Virgin" was inspired by "I Can't Help Myself". And, as I said before, when Tom started singing, he sang in a falsetto that was inspired by Smokey Robinson's vocal style. Songwriters are always influenced by the things they love.

Thanks Madonna Tribe!

I'll Remember...1984

I'll Remember...1984

How Madonna’s 1984 VMAs Wedding Dress Wed Her To Pop Culture Forever

For MTV's Video Music Awards, it's really been downhill ever since the very first telecast in 1984. That was the awards show that basically presided over Madonna's shotgun marriage to pop culture, thanks to a performance that eliminated any long-standing associations between "white" and "purity" and forever made the phrases "wedding dress" and "writhing" seem perfectly appropriate together in the same sentence.

After that '84 unveiling (ahem) of "Like A Virgin," nothing the VMAs have done since could really compare—not Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley making out, not Pee Wee Herman's post-scandal comeback...not even Madonna reprising the moment years later at a sapphic mock-wedding with Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera.

But much about that shocking performance was inadvertent or last-minute, and if Madonna had gotten things her way, she might not be the superstar she quickly became.

I'll Remember...1984

Strike a Pose...1984

Francesco Scavullo

Words can not descibe.  Ok maybe one.  FIERCE!

I'll Remember...1984

MTV Interview