Madonna's First Album example essay topic

Who is Madonna? She has played such different parts, such as the virgin, the vixen, a whore, a loving mother and wife, with all of these how do we know who Madonna really is. She has been described as a "post modern icon". But when asked she says "you say I still don't know Madonna, and good, because you will never know the real me. Ever". She is the main pop diva, the queen of controversy and a mother of reinvention.

She is far more than an average celebrity. She has established herself as a gigantic figure not only to the world of popular entertainment, but in modern culture. I walked into the Four Seasons Hotel bar in Los Angeles, California and Madonna Louise Veronica Cic cone Richie was sitting waiting for me drinking a glass of Timothy Taylor's real ale. She was exactly what I expected, she had a henna tattoo on her arm, a very non-hairdo look, minimal makeup and she was wearing a white sleeveless blouse and khaki capris. She was very welcoming to me with a big hug and friendly kiss on the cheek.

I sat down and Madonna called the waitress over so I could order a drink and we started talking. I asked her how she started drinking ale. "Not many American's drink it". I added.

"I didn't start drinking until I met Guy, he's been a wonderful influence on me". Madonna told me "I get drunk with him, I've learned to love ale, its like I'm one of those drunken English girls". She continued to tell me how nice it was actually be able to just sit down and have a drink. Guy and her life are now there children. They get up with them, eat breakfast, send Lourdes to school and plays with Rocco before he goes to daycare. One of them is always home with the kids for dinner.

Has this "Material Girl" completely turned domestic? It was such a beautiful day out, in Los Angeles, which got us talking about the weather that she doesn't miss from Michigan. Madonna was born in Bay City Michigan, but went to high school in Rochester, Michigan. She excelled in dance and drama throughout high school. "I missed the four seasons when I lived here, but now that I spend much time in England, I'm reminded of the cold weather". Guy Richie and Madonna share a home in Beverly Hills and another in Dorset, England.

She attended college at the University of Michigan, but then dropped out. "I used to copy dance from watching Shirley Temple on TV, then I used to offer dance lessons to my girlfriends. I remember the first boy I gave a lesson to, it was to the song "Honky Tonk Women" by the Stones, after that I decided that I needed to start to go pro about this" she told me. She then decided to move to New York City to study under a choreographer Alvin Ailey. "I came to New York dreaming of becoming a professional dancer and somehow I fell into music. Everything following that was like, 'Oh my God!

What's happening to my life?' You get caught up in that". We left the Four Seasons and Madonna wanted to go do a little shopping on Melrose while we continued our conversation. I told her as I was growing up she was such an influence on me and to all my friends. So I asked if there was anyone that she looked up to as an icon, which Madonna is to many people now. Her answer was "I loved Carole Lombard, Judy Holliday and Marilyn Monroe. They were all just incredibly funny, they were silly, sweet, they were girls, and they were feminine and sexy.

I just saw myself in then, my funniness and my need to boss people around and at the same time is taken care of. I remember Nancy Sinatra singing, "These Boots are Made for Walkin" and that made one hell of an impression on me. And when she said, "Are you ready boots, start walkin", it was like, yeah, give me some of those go-go boots. I want to walk on a few people".

It didn't seem to Madonna that she agreed with how the public felt about her as an icon. She said "I was never an icon, and I was also never a woman who acted in a political way", she states. "Of course, I fought against the male domination, against a world ruled by men, but I never wanted to change the world and turn the male domination into a female domination. What I did, I did for myself. To free myself. I never really planned to be an idol for millions of women all over the planet, and I never saw men in general as the enemy.

The enemies were people who tried to suppress me, oppressors in general. I'm still fighting against them. I just do it in a different way. Way back when I was loud and I guess you could say I was obscene. Today I use the power of silence. The times have changed and the sexes are almost on equal footing now.

That is another reason why I act different than 10 or 15 years ago. The times have changed and I have changed with them, obviously."What has kept you motivated throughout all these years?" I asked as we were walking into Mannequin (a clothing store on Melrose). "The biggest thing that keeps me going is continuing personal growth. With every album I release I make is new and I challenge myself more and more every time". She tells me "The parts that I play in movies, I want to show my improvements and each gets bigger. As I just said I am a very different person than I was 10 or 15 years ago and I think that is good because with every year I grow more.

Everything that I done in those years is what has made me into the person I am today". Her family is also so important to her and she wants to keep succeeding for them. "My fans are also a major motivation. Without them I couldn't be where I am today. I have done some outrageous things in my life and my fans have supported me through it all and they still do in all the ways that I have changed".

I was really interested to find out what kind of image she thinks and wants to portray to the world. "I would say that my image to people is I'm this brazen, aggressive women who has an OK voice with some pretty exciting songs, who wears what she wants and says what she wants to say and who has potential as an actress". She said. Madonna has always been someone who challenged the world, she recognized new trends and even made new trends before anybody else discovered or even thought about them. It's hard to imagine her quietly sitting back, but according to her, she has no desire to do so. "I don't make plans anymore.

I'm a mother and wife, that's future enough for me, the rest will happen by itself", she says in a few words. "However, I will always be somebody who rather acts than reacts. Maybe that's more exhausting and challenging, but it's also more satisfying. I always was, and am still hungry for changes, for everything new, for the unknown. I don't want to stagnate, but I also don't want to force changes. I realized that I don't have limits, limits are always influences that come from outside, from people who don't believe in themselves and their abilities.

I firmly believe in myself. I know that I can do whatever I want and that I'll always reach my goals!" We walked into a children's clothing store where Madonna likes to get Lourdes and Rocco cute trendy kids clothes. Today Lourdes is spending the day with her father, Carlos Leon, "she is such a daddy's girl". Madonna met Leon while she was on a walk in central park and they had a cup a coffee together. While Rocco is with his father and Madonna's "soul mate" as she puts it, Guy Richie. "It only took me 40 years to find my soul mate".

She laughs while she says it. When I asked her if she knew that he was going to be the one for her at the beginning of the relationship she said "not at the beginning, I knew he was fearsome human being, and a great talent with a brilliant mind and all that stuff. But I just felt like there were too many problems. So I thought, well great, I've just found a great friend". She finally saw beyond that because she didn't have the usual distractions of naive romance and lustful longings. The two met at a gathering hosted by Sting's wife, Trudi e Styler in 1998.

She says "The only reason that Guy came to the gathering was to meet her, so he defiantly had something on his mind". They were first seen together in 1999 since she was still in a relationship with Andy Bird, who she never really liked. She has been connected with other men during her life; she was married to Sean Penn in 1985 and ended because of his violent drinking behaviors three years later. On December 22, 2000 Guy and Madonna got married at S kibo Castle in Scotland.

"My wedding was a great day", she says. "A fairy tale". Last year Madonna and husband worked together on a remake of a 1974 Italian classic Swept Away. There are many other movies that she has been in during her life. "When I decided that I really wanted to establish myself as an actress the part of Eva Peron came about" This was a film version of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical Evita.

Madonna says "I saw myself in this part. We had so many parallels it was scary. We both were from big families; we both set off from small cities to large ones. I understood the courage it took to leave, when she left she was 15, when I left I was 17. I had two years on her. The struggle of trying to make something out of your life without help, without connections, without any real formal education or training, I can relate to those things, but if I never hear "Don't Cry for me Argentine" again, I'll be just fine".

She laughs. Her movie career began with a minor role in a film called A Certain Sacrifice. Also, in 1990, she starred with Warren Beatty in Dick Tracy. Madonna told me as a 44-year old mother of two, she attributes much of her new attitude toward life to the study of ancient Jewish mysticism called Kabbalah, which is study of ancient texts, most notably the Zohar, a 13th-century commentary on the Torah. Kabbalah holds that God is made up of 10 "emanations", which include compassion, strength, wisdom and grace.

By studying them, humans can get closer to an unknowable God. She says "It's helped me to see that we are all extensions of each other, and that everything I say and do to people, I'm doing to myself". Madonna is starting to send her daughter Lourdes at age 6 to learn the Kab allah. Her newest project is she signed a deal with a publishing company to write five children's book.

The first is due out this September. When asked what started this decision to write these books, she says, "It is defiantly stemmed from having two children, Lourdes and Rocco, these are magical stories for children of all ages". The title of the first book will be "The English Roses". I was reminded that this is not her first venture to be an author in 1992; she published "Sex" which was accompanied by great controversy because it featured X-rated photos of her and became a bestseller. "After the book came out there was a time when I could not open up a newspaper or magazine and not read something incredibly wounding about myself", she recalled Madonna has obviously accomplished so much in her life and so many entertainers can only dream of doing what she has done and it is amazing to me that she isn't burned out or has decided to be done. She still has more that she wants to accomplish.

She said, "Whenever I'm around great works of art, whether that's a movie or a painting or some music just blows my mind, it just makes me want to do more. It fills me, and that is what we should all be doing for each other". She continued with other accomplishments that she wants to concur which are things such as directing, painting, doing more movies and never stop making music. "I'm gonna get it all done. Believe me". She starting telling me about her yoga obsession she says she finally easing up on her famed yoga intensity.

"I really pushed myself", she says of her seven-day-a-week "obsession". (She now practices four days a week.) "I could " ve been a member of Cirque du Soleil. It got to the point where I didn't have a glass of wine and I had to go to bed early because everything was around my yoga". Which isn't to say that the she follows a macrobiotic diet, is any less disciplined. "Toast is a splurge on a macrobiotic diet", she says. Since she at a guest appearance on NBC's Will and Grace this past April I was wondering what other TV shows she watches.

"I never turned the show on before I agreed to appear on it. I don't have time for TV and surprise I have never seen American Idol". She surprised me with that, but even more surprising she told me that she is a fan of Eminem and Missy Elliot. Speaking of music, Madonna has had eleven number 1's in the United States and she is still going.

We stopped at The Coffee Bean on Melrose and Madonna got iced blended chai tea and we began to talk about her music. "How do you write your music? Do you sit in a studio or do you do it at home?" I asked. "I keep a pillow book, I jot things down, and dreams or poems or things I've read in books. Or kind of diary-like entries, or I'll cut out articles from newspapers, anything that I want to remember. So, I keep this scrapbook, and a lot of times I'll go back and draw from an idea that I've kept for a song.

But generally, it's music that kicks me into thinking a certain way or feeling a certain thing, and I rely heavily on the people that I collaborate with to inspire me lyrically. Believe it or not, I'm at my most creative when I'm standing at a microphone and the pressure's on". Madonna's first album was released in July of 1983. She wasn't extremely happy with this album at first, she says "it seemed to be a rebound project for the producer Reggie Lucas, but in the end I was proud since I co-wrote five of the eight tracks on the album". The next album was "Like a virgin" which was released November 12, 1984.

She performed the song at the MTV music awards in 1984 and this was everyone's first taste of who Madonna was. "I remember I wore a knee length, white wedding dress, veil, bustier, a garter belt and plenty of clunky jewelry". She remembers "it was so fun, I crawled all over the stage seductively, playing right to the camera". This album became her first number 1 album. "At the beginning I was called everything from disco dolly to a one hit wonder". She said, "Everyone agreed that I was sexy, but no one would agree that I had talent, which really irritated me".

I guess she really showed all those people. Her personal fortune is estimated at more than $300 million, she has changed her tune since her "Material Girl" years. "Don't get me wrong. It's fabulous I have these beautiful homes and paintings", she says. "But the most important thing in life is love. I know it sounds corny, but everybody knows it's true".

Her newest video for her song "American Life" was suppose to be released and was delayed since "people saw the video as an anti-war statement and due to the volatile state of the world and out of sensitivity and respect to the armed forces, who I support and pray for, I do not want to risk offending anyone who might misinterpret the meaning of this video. It contained a strong anti-war theme and a finale showing me lobbing an explosive into the lap of a President Bush look-alike. She told me "I talked about the ideas for this video last November and had no idea we'd be in the position we " re in right now. People have a bad habit of reviewing my work before they " ve seen it, they also often misinterpret what I say and do". She believes that this is her most truthful record to day "I could say life put me on that path. I think I have had a number of revelations in the past few years.

I think a lot of it has to do with studying of Kabbalah, which is essentially like cracking the codes of the universe it has to do with having family and growing up seeing life for what it is". At 26 she was asked how she wants to see herself in thirty years and her answer was "Hopefully I'll be incredibly mellow and wise with age. Not mellow, but very wise and still just as mischievous and childlike and wondering as I am now" and I was wondering if she feels the that she is like that almost twenty years later. Her response was "I feel I have learned a lot throughout the years. I have defiantly mellowed out.

I still try to be mischievous and childlike, but much of that comes out with my children". As she said before there is still more that she wants to do and that she will get it all done so what is in store for us to see Madonna doing in the future? "There's a completely original musical I want to do, a bit of an extravaganza" she told me "I still have more and more ideas for albums and we will see what else."How about more children?" I asked since there has been a rumor that she is pregnant. Madonna has kept both her pregnancies till the sixth month. "I think that we both want another, but we have to see what is happening in our lives and what projects we are doing. We don't want to be to busy so we can't give another child the time that we get to give Lourdes and Rocco".

Madonna has changed so much since she started her career. We went into Tower records and were looking at some of her old album covers and they defiantly show these changes. "I often look back at old photographs and think someone should have arrested me, someone should have stopped me from doing my hair that way". So I asked her if she had any regrets and her answer was "Je ne regretted rien!" Translation: I regret nothing. "In the beginning of my career, I just did whatever I wanted to do and if it made me feel good, if it was fun, that was cool. Now I feel like everything we do affects society in a potent way.

I feel a sense of responsibility because my consciousness has been raised". Madonna had her driver pick us up and we went back to the Four Seasons so I could be dropped off. We said goodbye and I told her I look forward to see what she will be doing next. "Don't worry I'm sure there will be something big in the news about me soon".

She said laughing. Madonna has accomplished the near impossible. For the past 20 years, she has managed to remain consistently compelling to her community. More than any other diva to which we have ever pledged loyalty, she has earned our unyielding affection and not merely because she wears hot clothes or has a larger-than-life presence.

We connect with her apparent constant bravery as well as the fact that she openly infused happy sensibilities into her work long before it became a trendy or savvy mainstream move. We may occasionally crave for the familiarity and simplicity of early hits like "Like a Virgin" or "Express Yourself", but we have a wanting for everything that she offer. We cannot wait to see where she will go next. A GEO Exclusive Interview with Madonna Carly Leipsitz News & Public Affairs (444) Department of Communication 1903 W. Michigan Ave.

Western Michigan University Kalamazoo, MI 49008

Bibliography

Taraborrelli, Randy J. (2002).
Madonna: A Intimate Biography. New York. Simon and Schuster Inc. Morton, Andrew. (2001).
Madonna. New York. St. Martin's Press. Faith, K arlene. (1997).
Madonna, Bawdy & Soul. Toronto. University of Toronto Press. Sisch y, Ingrid. (2001, March).
Madonna Exclusive. Interview Magazine. P. 155 Wilkinson, Peter. (1997, January).
Madonna on Life Before and After Motherhood. Redbook. P. 58. Walters, Barry. (1998, July / August).
Madonna. Not so material anymore. Grammy Magazine. P. 42-47. Tauber, Michelle. (2003, April 28).
Madonna's real life: The pop icon has turned into a Doting mom and devoted wife. But she's still making waves. People Weekly. P. 94 Flick, Larry. (2003, April 15).
All- American girl: Madonna's latest CD makes a Fascinating exploration of her own complicated American Life. The Advocate. P. 62 Tucker, Ken. (2003, April 25).
Truth and Daring: It's not everyone's American Life, but Madonna's latest does offer compelling insights into living in a material world. Entertainment Weekly. P. 147 Tyrangiel, Josh. (2003, April 28).
This American Life; On her new CD, Madonna Lectures on the crises of modern life. Her personal crisis is more compelling. Time, P. 72 The Study of Madonna. (2003) web [Retrieved on May 27, 2003] Madonna's Official Website.
2003) web [Retrieved on May 27, 2003].