Madonna's new album, Confessions II, is a celebration of the dancefloor and its healing properties, marking her best work since the original Confessions LP. The Queen of Pop barely comes up for air on this club-friendly epic, which is mixed as one continuous track.
A Continuous Dance Journey
The 16-track mixtape features a lot of spoken word and breathy vocal riffs over beats that nod to past clubbing greats. Madonna revisits her higher pop vocal register to freestyle over One Step Away, then interpolates Inner City's Good Life with a dash of Express Yourself during Bring Your Love. She delivers a mean Debbie Harry rap impersonation for the encyclopedic Danceteria, which gets misty-eyed about her clubbing origins and the music that inspired her, name-checking DJs and nightspots.
Classic Madonna Moments
There are all-time classic Madonna moments like Everything, which could have been a Leftfield tune in the 1990s, while the uplifting Love Sensation channels the sunshine of another 90s classic dance troupe, Deee-lite. Bizarre sounds reminiscent of Eurythmics appear as she sings about a "movie star with deep blue eyes," and Love Without Words is an electronic symphony with huge breakdowns.
Tributes and Reflections
Towards the end, things get even more fascinating with a tribute to her late brother Chris (Fragile). She then dips into jazzy textures on Betrayal to hit back at former lovers and offers a Beatles-esque pop moment reflecting on her early career called LES. Any anger she feels reaches its peak on the Hispanic-flavored Read My Lips about somebody who "cut me with your lies" before she hollers "shut your mouth."
Family Collaboration
There is no Kylie Minogue collaboration as previously teased, but her duet with daughter Lourdes on the psychedelic ballad The Test is a beautiful apology for "putting you on a pedestal." It shows the musical family jewels are in good hands. In fact, Lourdes has an incredible tone that puts her mother's in the shade. Nevertheless, this mama does preach, and we are here for it.
Daily Star rating: ****
