Madonna
I’m Going to Tell You a Secret
Warner Bros. Records
Four out of five stars
Madonna, the Queen of Pop, lives-all because of current technology.
That’s right: For the first time in more than 20 years, Madonna has produced and released a live album. Sounds fishy to wait so long, right? It is, but she had to wait.
Madonna is a robot, you see.
At first, her vocals led the public to believe she was African-American, and they weren’t wrong: Madonna’s original voice was that of an African-American woman. To fix this problem, different timbres from animals, such as the goat and kangaroo, were added to create her unique voice-eventually, even Peter Frampton’s speaking guitar’s books on tape (never released) became a staple for Madonna’s tonality.
Need further evidence? She looks exactly the same as she did in the ’80s.
Well, not exactly.
Warner Bros. comes out with a new model every couple years-today’s Madonna is version H&MCT3Ho, which is quite a breakthrough.
Madonna’s album, I’m Going to Tell You a Secret, showcases what today’s technology is capable of. The set list is missing about 10 songs from the original Reinvention Tour but maintains a good mix of old and new songs, such as “Vogue,” “American Life,” “Like a Prayer” and “Music.” The production is great, so the songs basically sound like studio tracks.
There is no human error because Madonna’s not human.
What makes I’m Going to Tell You a Secret more marketable than her other recordings is that it includes a remix, a traditional Scottish jig and a cover of John Lennon’s “Imagine.”
Otherwise, the best part of I’m Going to Tell You a Secret is the 2-hour documentary of the tour. The content feels a little like propaganda, but it otherwise remains objective. The DVD also highlights segments of certain concerts and, most compellingly, the life behind the stage-and not only of Madonna (the director needed filler because Madonna’s battery takes 16 hours per day to recharge).
Of course, Kabbalah plays a big part.
Thank you, electronics and big business, for giving us pop music-but there’s no fooling the public any longer: Madonna is not a real person. Generations ago, this might have caused problems (think Milli Vanilli vs. Ashlee Simpson), but in these synthetic times, everyone’s a fake, and society says, “That’s OK.”
