Madonna has long been orbiting the world of Migos (not one entity as most white people would think, but composed of Quavo, Offset and Takeoff) and Cardi B. Starting with her photo op post-Oscars party with Cardi and Migos back in March, Madonna then segued into a social media repartee with Migos after they were caught being photographed outside of her Miami residence. When Madonna was later seen at the Wireless Festival in London over the summer, it was fairly certain that she was laying some sort of groundwork for a collaboration. It’s just that one thought it might be for her own forthcoming album, not Quavo’s debut solo album, Quavo Huncho.
In ceding this power by playing second fiddle to someone “more current,” Madonna will likely garner her usual shade. And yet collaborating with relevant artists has long been Madonna’s game (in addition to champagne rosé)–e.g. 2Pac, Ricky Martin, Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake, Kanye West and Nicki Minaj (who is likely blanching that M has gone to the dark side with Cardi). So yes, Madonna is not “clinging” to anyone who can keep her in the mainstream. She has simply always been a key player in the music industry as a result of her ability to adapt.
While some would say she isn’t maintaining the integrity of her voice with so many vocal manipulations to her repetitive verse, “Please drink me up, champagne rosé” (pronounced in both the correct French way and a now iconic way as only M could make it: “champan-yuh”), one could actually argue she is going back to her roots. For who could forget the helium-based intonations of “Holiday, “Lucky Star,” “Borderline” and “Like A Virgin”? And isn’t everyone always begging her to go back to the start? Well, now she has, while also doing what she usually does best: repurposing the past for the present. For Madonna is not just a master reinventor, but a skilled repackager, able to reuse things she’s done in the earlier days of her career to the benefit of her progression.
In choosing to take what she likely knew would be a risk in terms of the requisite flak she would receive for “latching on,” she has showed once again that the further into her fame journey she gets, the less she gives a fuck, making her more open to ideas and partnerships that other people would not be. What’s more, rappers like Quavo and Cardi B benefit just as much as Madonna from casting a wider net into a more variable audience (and we all know Madonna’s fans have a lot of money to burn as they are usually childless gay men and errant straight women who don’t mind paying premium for a skin care device that doubles as a vibrator).
With the autotuned vocals seamlessly yet jarringly blending in with Quavo’s as he chimes in, “One bottle, two bottles, three bottles, four bottles, five bottles,” one can feel Madonna propelling herself into the future of music for at least another decade, whether or not listeners and generally ageist naysayers like it or not. And eerily, as though to reiterate her one true purpose in life as an unchecked and unmatched cultural phenomenon, she insists, “It’s my game/Please let me entertain you/Get inside your vein, too/Intoxicate your brain, ooh/Crazy, what I’ll make you/I’ll take you for a ride/Turn you up inside/There’s nothing you can hide.” And it’s true, we’ve been able to hide less from Madonna than the government in terms of her ability to reflect our wants and desires back to us all these years. Strangely, it’s Cardi who chimes in with the lyric, “They say my time is tickin'”–she who has been in the jeu far less time than Madonna.
One of Madonna’s backup singers, Niki Harris, cruelly joked in 1991’s Truth or Dare that Madonna would be singing “Like A Virgin” on a world tour in the year 2025. It won’t be far from the truth. Except, in conjunction with these old favorites, she will have continued to build on her canon in such a way so as to have kept her material au courant. And all while sipping champagne rosé. It’s her game.
She’s just letting other people play in it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1G6gSS-g9Y
