Somehow, in the shower today, of all places, I got to thinking about how much I loathed Madonna. I blame this conversation I had with a friend late this morning. Anyway, I don't care about that Kabbalah, or the issue with her adopted kid. In fact, I'd say those controversies are a symptom of her overall problem. She's old, crotchety, and hasn't got a clue.
She used to create reasonably intelligent and interesting controversy. Her tensions with the roman catholic church back in the 80's veered from straight up derision to tacit agreement - Papa Don't Preach, anyone? It was kind of exciting, from what I read of it. (in full disclosure, I was too young to experience that) Now when she dances on a cross it seems tired, because she adds nothing new and even after twenty years could that theme be freshened up? What really bothered me though, was when she got all paranoid about her failed disc American Life leaking, and personally helped poison peer to peer networks with fake files.
Now, I give any artist the right to be mad over losing control over your music, however, when you respond in such a vitriolic way it shows that you haven't been keeping up with the trends, and are ignorant over what goes on nowadays. And stubborn ignorance is the first step on the path to irrelevance. I didn't care about her CD, but I personally downloaded one of her fake files, just cause I could. She says the f word, so be warned, but also the short clip is copyrighted, so don't steal it kids! And god forbid, don't sample it!
So I thought it was quaint when she sampled ABBA for her single, Hung Up. It was okay for her, since she's Madonna and has no trouble getting permission, but the song and album basically revealed that her and her producers were out of ideas. Let's make a modern 70/80's dance record! Lady, you've lived through the eighties. You've done that. It's bad enough when people half your age succumb to that sort of fetishism, but I think you're getting to the point where you're creatively done. Now, in her defense, the record was well produced and did sound contemporary, but this is from the lady that did great songs in the past that needed no retro point of reference. I may loathe you, but I acknowledge your past achievements. And if you're going to sample a relatively well known clip, you might as well do it well.
Now this is where mashup artists come in. By taking sampling to another level, they can take the most dated tunes and flip them inside out and stop them together to make something new. And if that sounds like another form of retro fetishism, some truly great mashups have been made with the latest chart hits, often surpassing the quality of the originals. Everything is fair game these days. This mashup, by DjMonsterMo, is kind of old but still a favorite of mine. He took the backing track of Hung Up and threw it together with the vocal from M.I.A.'s URAQT. It gets a bit of bite with M.I.A.'s almost obnoxious attitude, a little spice that Mrs. Richie's been missing from her music lately. And I think that after listening to this mash up and comparing it to the original, the original seems weak, since it also goes on for an interminable five minutes, the song's weakness, an overreliance on the sampled hook, becomes apparent. The mashup, while a little silly, is quite refreshing, and yes, it has no problem with brevity.
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