Published on Feb 21, 2006
After Madonna’s collaboration with techno producer
William Orbit on the electronica-pop Ray Of Light, she has
taken a similar route with the follow-up Music, on which she
works with French techno man Mirwais Ahmadzai on the bulk of the
tracks.
Though Music‘s underlying style is the same as
its predecessor, it is more buoyant and brisk and far less intense.
It is a racy club record, whose main aim is to be carefree and
party hard, which is not the case with its rather contemplative
predecessor. The Ahmadzai-produced songs on Music have
distinct similarities to his own work. The vocals on most of these
seedily peppy cuts are glossed with cellophane coatings — much
like those on his solo project — that make them sound rather
robotic.
But, Ahmadzai’s actual forte lies in his cleverness
with drum-programming. The polished metallic sound of his impinging
beats, coupled with their unpredictable rhythms, yield an
excitingly hip electronic percussive sound. Take away the
electrifying beats from the singles “Music” and “Don’t Tell Me,”
and they lose all of their pizzazz.
Madonna relives the humanness of Ray Of Light
on a couple of tracks — “Runaway Lover” and “Amazing” — on which
she has collaborated with Orbit. These two cuts have the simplicity
in sophistication that her numbers with Ahmadzai don’t. The
straightforwardness of these numbers brings out Madonna’s beautiful
voice to the fore from its suppression (due to experimental vocal
amplifications) on most of the other songs.
It is surprising that on this album of frivolity and
jollification, a track like “What It Feels Like For A Girl” should
make a presence. This is possibly the most vexatious song Madonna
has ever penned. The subtlety and humbleness with which the burning
feminist rage is hidden on this cut makes its deeply felt
bitterness even more stinging. Among all the feminist numbers
Madonna has ever sung, this one gets the first prize for having the
deepest wound.
Yet all parties are cursed with party-poopers; and
Music has a couple of killjoys that dampen its high-spirited
gaiety. The high exhilaration of the album is literally shot in the
head at point-blank range with the closing numbers, “Paradise (Not
For Me)” and “Gone.” It is not the slowness of these cuts that kill
the fun; it is their absolute blandness that’s bothersome. And in
an album of such brisk enthusiasm, the flatness of these tracks
manifest quite glaringly.
Music is one heck of an adrenaline rush; this
is a party that shouldn’t be missed at any cost. Madonna will never
grow too old; at 42, this pop-diva still knew how to party right
and party hard.