Released: 2000
Or how the Queen of reinvention – the mama who made the game – changed everything again. Hardly stuck in a rut, Madonna had won four Grammys for 1998’s William Orbit produced Ray of Light, a record that had arguably leapfrogged her again to pole position when it came to solo female artists, a remarkable feat for someone who had debuted fifteen years earlier.
But it was a market that never rested, and along came the Christinas and the Brittneys in a bid to make age reverse thrust against beauty once more. And once more when the chips were down the ultimate survivor chose her next step based on an intuition which was light years beyond the capability of her teen competitors.
The singer’s introduction to producer Mirwais Ahmadzaï came through her then husband Guy Ritchie, with Orbit sidelined for her next album, Music. In came a sleazier, R&B orientated sound swamped with what was dubbed acid bass, and the single of the same name was a catch me if you can token for the rest, a stripper friendly backing track that sounded intense both on radio and in a subterranean club with somebody’s tongue in your ear. It had happened again – and there wasn’t a damn thing the rest could do about it.
The Voice Of Unreason 