Madonna: Confessions on a Dance Floor

We’ve all seen Madonna in many visages: faux virgin, uber-Kabbalist, Evita, and more subtle variants than we can speak of. But this album shows her in an avatar we are more familiar with: Dance Hall Queen. And with every bump and grind on ‘Confessions on a Dance Floor’, Madonna claims that title with zest. But the problem with ‘Confessions…’ is that Madonna seems to be reclaiming territory. The Madonna we know and love has always been voraciously breaking her own ground, from burning crosses to textural electronic excursions like Ray of Light. But this kinder, gentler Madonna seems to be quoting from the past, making less of a radical manifesto than an incumbent allusion to past glory.

This fact is clearest in the synth sample from Abba’s “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)” that kicks off the disco psychedelia of her first single “Hung Up”. It is ironic that the sample drives the track forward, and not the other way around. How many kids bustin’ a move in the club will sit up and recognise the ’70s Swedes? Probably none. But undoubtedly, all of them will be grooving. The album is produced with lush, textural orchestrations that are pieced together extremely well, with the tracks snaking into each other much like a dance floor DJ’s set. But for all its lushness, there is little to empathise with melodically. This is cut, dry and sterile beat surgery. The waxing and waning of each track seem to be premeditated, and less spontaneous than I would have hoped. A few tracks into the album, the swells become horribly predictable. It is only towards the end of the album, with numbers like “Push” and “Like it or Not”, that the rhythms move around more.

Lyrically, Madonna doesn’t get very far either. Her efforts are less provocative, and less cohesive than before. “I Love New York” has some lame efforts to rhyme ‘I don’t like cities, but I like New York’ with ‘Other places make me feel like a dork’. Except for the odd religious chant, there is little evidence of the spiritually resurgent Madonna, or the angular lyricism that comes with age. And sadly, we must all now agree, that Madonna is old. Her Peter Pan existence is done with, and her time in Neverland is up. But Madonna seems to face the inevitable with a certain grace. “Let It Will Be” declares, ‘Now, I can tell you about success, about fame / Now, I can see things for what they really are’.

But the word is out, the news is read: Madonna has ’settled down’. She has found her favoured ground, her niche. There is no doubt that ‘Confessions…’ is fun, sexy, groovy, and all the things we know Madonna to be. But there isn’t much on this album that can assuage the fear that we are witnessing the death of the pioneering artist, and the birth of the contented legend.