Just before she released this album, Madonna released and then took back a video for peace, a video that opposed the war with Iraq but which she felt might be "taken the wrong way." As many commentators pointed out, Madonna always does something outrageous before releasing an album.
In the video, Madonna dresses as a revolutionary militant. Similar images perhaps stealing somewhat from Che appear in CD cover art.
The whole question here now given Madonna's history is whether this is a mockery of revolution, a marketing ploy because Madonna has simply exhausted other subjects in previous albums. The alternative is to believe the lyrics that Madonna is going through a period of confusion and change.
Another possibility is that both are true. Even a Madonna with perfectly good proletarian intentions may not know how to carry off a pro-peace video for example. Yet Ms. Big Business Madonna inevitably has an impact, and the ineptitude could end up in mockery, whatever her intentions.
On the plus side, the album cover with images of Madonna wearing guerrilla chic black pajamas and toting a machine-gun could be seen as mockery, but the letters on the cover say "Madonna: American Life" dripping in blood. Both Madonna and "American Life" are dripping with blood in the cover art. We like that as self-criticism and criticism.
A number of critics ripped this album, one asking "what happened to the material girl?" Although "Love Profusion" and "Nothing Fails" are love songs, where she uses her most girly voice, the album has no overload of sexual seduction that used to define Madonna. "Nothing Fails" even has a positive side to it in explicitly rejecting worship of god while feeling love among people. (USA Today however said that the whole album was prayerful, something we do not see. We believe the USA Today reviewer mistook concerns other than sex and money for prayer.)
The highly danceable title track "American Life" also rejects religion. It's a description of the pressures that we can imagine Madonna facing, especially the question whether she should lose weight for her image. She says, "I'm just living out the American dream/And I just realised that nothing/ Is what it seems."
In "I'm So Stupid," Madonna says, "Cause I use to live/ In a fuzzy dream/And I wanted to be/Like all the pretty people/ I'm so stupid." She also mentions her greed.
In fact, Madonna also says, in "Easy Ride," "I want the good life/ But I don't want an easy ride/ What I want is to work for it/ Feel the blood and sweat on my fingertips/ That's what I want for me/ I want to know everything/ Maybe someday I will." Hopefully that means she knows that she and others have made their living in a parasitic way at the expense of the toiling workers and peasants of the Third World.
Some of the lyrics in the album give us reason to believe not to expect much from Madonna in the future. Perhaps she is just exhausted as in the song "X-Static Process": "Jesus Christ will you look at me/ Don't know who I'm supposed to be/ Don't really know if I should give a damn." This sort of attitude often comes out when someone is changing, when the old way of life is going out the window but a new one has not taken hold. In the imperialist countries, people have the option of copping out without really changing. It is only the starving, homeless and otherwise oppressed of the Third World who are going to fight for change because they have to.
In "Hollywood," Madonna adds to our guess about her paralysis when she says, "I'm bored with the concept of right and wrong." We hope that she is bored because she has already decided what is right and is now setting about to the interesting part--the science and art of how to achieve it.
Artistically, the album does have its number of danceable tracks. Many of the tracks also emphasize her vocals and cut back on the synthetic sound, so it sounds more like she is talking to her audience. In another classic move for direct access to the brain, she briefly breaks out the acoustic guitar.
Madonna has our attention now. We hope for something good out of her life yet. We give this album a cautious thumbs up.
If you're gonna buy Madonna's "American Life," Go to Amazon.
Note: A good place for lyrics http://www.absolutemadonna.com/lyrics/
Capitalism moves fast. Take Madonna, whom Forbes magazine recently called "The Canniest Businesswoman in America." Even some MIM cadres, armed with the correct line, were fooled into arguing that Madonna professed liberation of women. Wrong. Here's a sample of Madonna's latest, called "Vote!" and sung to the tune of her hit song "Vogue": Dr King, Malcolm X, Freedom of speech is as good as sex. Abe Lincoln, Jefferson Tom, They didn't need the atomic bomb. We need beauty, we need art, We need government with a heart. Don't give up your freedom of speech, Power to the people is in our reach.
Ever the ambiguity-lover, Madonna comes out draped in Old Glory. Is it desecration? The Veterans of Foreign Wars think so, and they've complained about the spot, which is being aired on MTV. But they really don't need to worry. Madonna sure isn't burning the Amerikan flag, much less challenging the system it represents, with her confused medley of personages and concepts that have no business together in one song. According to the New York Times' description (10/20/90 p. 9), "Madonna raps in the 60-second message as two flag-waving male dancers spank her from behind. 'And if you don't vote, you're going to get a spankie.'" If you're reading this paper you've probably long since given up on Amerikan electoral politics, a sham system that offers two choices so evil neither could be called "lesser." Madonna and MTV have targetted a more vulnerable audience, expecting "millions of young people" to register to vote before November's elections. These millions are already champion consumers; and with Madonna's help they're learning to laugh at and enjoy violence against women; now get 'em voting: hook, line, and sinker. Nothing ambiguous about that. --MC89