“I hallucinate when you call my name,” Dua Lipa sings in 2020. “When you call my name, it’s like a little prayer,” Madonna immortalized in 1989. And it seems that she’s answered Lipa’s call of her own name of late as the parallels between the two continue to escalate with Lipa’s remixed version of Future Nostalgia, christened, what else, Club Future Nostalgia. In conjunction with The Blessed Madonna (formerly known as The Black Madonna), Lipa has revived an album genre that has always been deemed risky, particularly when the trail was first blazed for it with 1987’s You Can Dance, a remix album of some of Madonna’s then biggest hits to date, as well as an unreleased track from True Blue called “Spotlight.” Yet the label was pleased with the idea of making more money off the same batch of songs with half the production cost. And, considering that Madonna’s legion of devoted fans would buy just about anything she put her face on, the success of the record was already pretty much in the bag. In fact, You Can Dance remains the second-highest selling remix album ever. Though Dua Lipa could be poised to join the ranks with this stunning and thorough addition to her discography.
Its reworking must give its fair share of credit to The Blessed Madonna, who seems to possess a similar philosophy and approach as Patrick Leonard, Madonna’s longtime producer that worked with her on You Can Dance, and would note of the project, “Remixing is a form of secondary creativity. Dance music elevates the DJ and the mixer to being almost on a level with the musician. In my opinion this is false. Manipulation of pre-recorded sound sources may be creative in a secondary sense, and may be valid in its own field, but it is pseudo musicianship. That’s why we tried to have a fresh approach to the songs for You Can Dance, as if we were developing and composing them for the first time.”
While Madonna might have relied solely on her own vocals for the remix effect, Dua Lipa isn’t taking chances on being accused that these songs aren’t “remixed enough,” bringing in the likes of Gwen Stefani, Blackpink, Missy Elliott and the remix queen herself, Madonna, on board to bolster her club stylings. And it does very much feel like Lipa’s aim is to give listeners their own Club Quarantine option as they continue to do their best to stay at home as much as possible. So it is that, as on the original record, it opens with “Future Nostalgia,” remixed by Joe Goddard, and Lipa announcing, “Hey, this is Dua Lipa and you’re listening to Club Future Nostalgia with The Blessed Madonna.” The chronological order of the songs stops there, with Lipa then transitioning into “Cool (Jayda G Remix).” Only two songs in and it’s as though we’ve been seamlessly transported back to the glory days of The Sound Factory in the early and mid-90s, when house music was king, and where Junior Vasquez (one of Madonna’s go-to remixers) would spin regularly.
One song in particular that received a much needed revamp is “Good in Bed (Zach Witness and Gen Hoshino Remixes).” Previously too grating to listen to with Lipa’s superfluous repetition of “really bad bad bad” and “drive each other mad mad mad” lyrics, the track gets more listenable life breathed into it here while still maintaining the original and familiar piano composition.
Following are the “Pretty Please” remixes–among the shortest in length, perhaps because, with each one being under two minutes, they rather blend into one entity. The “Midland Refix” version is a jubilant, uptempo track that slowly incorporates Lipa’s voice with subtle interpolations of the lyrics at the beginning. Fading into the “Masters at Work Remix,” Louie Vega (also a former Sound Factory regular) reminds, “You’re listening to Club Future Nostalgia with Dua Lipa and The Blessed Madonna.” At the end of this second remix, Lipa also iterates that “you’re locked into Club Future Nostalgia.” That we are. For all of our heads are a locked room more than ever at this particular moment in time.
“Boys Will Be Boys (Zach Witness Remix)” is an appropriately cheeky rendering of this female empowerment anthem as we’re given a party-ified chant of “Boys will be boys/But girls will be women.” Incorporating Rob Base & DJ EZ Rock’s “It Takes Two” at one point, the song subtly seems to suggest that the path toward gender equality does, indeed, take two. Concluding with a salsa-infused dance flavor, we then transition to “Love Again (Horse Meat Disco Remix).” Dreamier and more slowed down than the preceding track, there’s an ambient R&B groove to it that easily reminds one of a “Secret” remix (for again, in 1994, Madonna achieved dance chart gold with the Junior Vasquez remixes of this single).
What would any dance homage to the 90s be without a nod to Jamiroquai? Not much of one. Thus, we’re gifted “Break My Heart/Cosmic Girl (Dimitri From Paris Edit).” Given the requisite suffusion of funk from a DJ like Dimitri, the blending of these two songs is a match truly made in the Dance God heavens (ergo the Jamiroquai lyric, “I must have died and gone to heaven”). It is, undeniably, the song most comfortable being plopped right into the 70s and totally passing on the dance floors of that era.
Another pièce de résistance (arguably the pièce de résistance) of the record is “Levitating (The Blessed Madonna Remix).” Accompanied by a lunar (and MDMA)-inspired video–that sadly does not include Madonna–the “good vibes only” aura of this cut radiates both sonically and visually. Because a collaboration such as this is hard to follow, “Hallucinate” pulls a “Pretty Please” maneuver by offering two remixes under two minutes back to back (“Mr Fingers deep stripped remix” and “Paul Woolford Remix”), the first of which is sure to include another pop icon: Gwen Stefani, who chants her signature “Hollaback Girl” declaration, “All the girls stomp your feet like this/Few times I been around that track/So it’s not just gonna happen like that, ‘cause I ain’t no hollaback girl.” A whispering Lipa repeats, “Breathe you in till I hallucinate,” bringing us to the second remix of the song whose video echoes “Dear Jessie.” On this one, the house sound ramps up again as Lipa repeats, “Call my name” before she gives us the full chorus.
This is abruptly cut off with the “Holiday” tinged intro to “Love Is Religion (The Blessed Madonna Remix),” a previously unreleased song whose lyrics more than occasionally borrow from the longstanding Catholic imagery wielded by Madonna. As such, Lipa accordingly sings, “Tell me you believe, get down on your knees/They say love is religion, so say a prayer with me/I don’t wanna preach, but I’m all that you need.” The butterflies and heart bursting out of one’s chest sentiments of this are slightly contrasted by “Don’t Start Now (Yaeji Remix).” As one of the most jarringly remixed offerings, it’s a notable standout as Lipa’s voice is manipulated and distorted for all the classic effects of remix cachet.
The echoes of Lipa’s lyrics blend into “Physical (Mark Ronson Remix)” featuring Gwen Stefani. Suspending the original pace of the tempo, we’re still bequeathed with an ultra 80s sound as Stefani seamlessly coalesces her own voice with the verse once limited solely to Lipa. Unlike the rest of the songs, “Physical” is one of the few with an audible break in between the next, “Kiss and Make Up (Remix)” featuring Blackpink–perhaps as a means to show deference to the evermore clout-laden K-pop quartet (who also released a single with Selena Gomez on the same day Club Future Nostalgia arrived). Or maybe it was just to emphasize the use of Notorious B.I.G.’s “Hypnotize” beat (which itself sampled from Herb Alpert’s 1979 masterpiece, “Rise”). This song, in addition to Dimitri From Paris’ “Break My Heart” remix, is among the most funk-laden of the record, therefore an extreme departure from what we’re usually accustomed to hearing from Blackpink.
Again building on the nods to Madonna that have come in spades on this album, Jacques Lu Cont a.k.a. Stuart Price (who produced M’s 2005 Confessions on a Dance Floor) appears to present “That Kind of Woman (Jacques Lu Cont Remix).” We also have Stevie Nicks as an influence here, whose forever glittering vocals on “Stand Back” show up at the beginning.
Bringing the house down with its final cut, at which point you surely must have dabbed at your forehead with a towel from breaking a sweat, is “Break My Heart (Moodymann Remix).” Grouped separately from the Dimitri From Paris Edit (in other words, not given the dyad treatment like “Pretty Please” and “Hallucinate”), this remix definitely deserves the “individualness” it gets. Designed to slow the rhythm down in its role as the “cool down” track, it is also the longest song at six minutes and eleven seconds (compared to the average length of every remix on You Can Dance being about six and a half minutes). This gives plenty of time for listeners to make peace with the fact that it’s over. And, in turn, start the party again. One supposes that’s the beauty of “at-home clubs.” The closing time is arbitrary.
