Madonna

Madonna, shot by Steven Klein for her new album "Reverie"

### Occupation

Singer, Songwriter, Actress, Businesswoman, Author, Director, Record Producer, Dancer

### Spouse(s)

Sean Penn (m. 1985, d. 1989)Guy Ritchie (m. 2000, d. 2008)

## Musical Career

### Music Corp.

Independent

**Madonna Louise Ciccone** (born August 16, 1958) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, author, entrepreneur, dancer, and director. She found fame through her envelope-pushing music, live performance, and fashion. In the 80's she became a near-permanent fixture on MTV, finding incredible success in the then young music video market. Madonna has received acclaim from critics and audiences alike for her music and world tours. She has been a controversial figure in the industry due to her outspoken nature, expression of sexuality, and her display of taboo material. Madonna has been called the "Queen of Pop" due to her immeasurable influence and impact on the industry.

Madonna is the best selling female recording artist of all time with an excess of over 300 million record sales. She is also recognized as the highest-grossing solo touring artist of all time with three of her concert tours occupying spots in the top 15 highest-grossing concert tours in music history. She was ranked at number one on VH1's list of 100 Greatest Women in Music and was ranked second (behind only The Beatles) in Billboard's Hot 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.

## Music Career

### **2017: "*MAPS" & "Comatose"***

In early January 2017, Madonna announced the release of her first major EP, "***MAPS**'*. The EP was released on January 9th. The EP spawned two singles thus far, "Chasing Rainbows" and "Blinded". The EP was supported by a special club show on January 11th. Madonna described the EP as her most personal work to date. The songs covered topics such as self-discovery, drug usage, substance abuse, self-harm, and suicide. Madonna launched a large radio campaign to support the album. At this point, no major concert support has been announced.

The EP ended up being a commercial failure in all aspects. Only selling 14K copies around the world. Madonna and WILD Records moved on to her first studio album under the label, "**Comatose**". It was also a commercial failure, with it peaking at #10 on the Billboard 200 chart and selling, overall, 31K copies. The album had two singles, "**Bottom of the Ocean**" and "**Electric**" featuring Brendon Urie. Both songs, as the album, marked another commercial failure for Madonna and WILD Records with both failing to reach any kind of certification around the world. The lead single, "**Bottom of the Ocean**", debuted at #50 on the Hot 100 and sold 60,1K. The second single, "**Electric**", debuted at #54 and sold more than 87K copies. The song had a resurgence on the charts after the infamous Hotel Plaza attack where both Madonna and Brendon Urie were the major victims, with it reaching a new peak at #29 (Madonna's second top 40 hit).

#### ***Plaza Hotel Attack (ANL), "No More Tears"***

In the middle of the "Comatose" campaign, Madonna and her team decided to celebrate her 59th birthday with a lavish party at the Plaza Hotel, in New York City. Madonna's guest list included A-List celebrities and singers like Lorde, Ariana Grande, Halsey, Brendon Urie, and more who were interviewed on the red carpet by then sane Popstar Maxence. The party was interrupted abruptly by the appearance of Fergie and Ali Ali, who started shooting the guests leaving 27 deaths and many injured. The list of injured artists includes Madonna, Brendon Urie, Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga. Brendon, Halsey, and Madonna were hospitalized with only Brendon being in a coma due to the many shots he received while protecting Ariana Grande. As soon as Madonna was out of the hospital, she recorded an EP for charity called "No More Tears" where many stars joined her in songs that included The Beatles covers. It ended up selling 11K units. The only single from the EP, "**All You Need is Love**", sold over 55,5K copies.

Madonna released various singles after this, "**ONE**" with Troye Sivan that peaked at #11 on the Hot 100 and sold over 300K units making it Madonna's biggest single at the time. "**Shot in the Dark**" that after being performed at the 2017 EMAs debuted and peaked at #54 and sold 7,1K units around the world.

#### ***"Blow" + music video controversy, 2018 GRAMMYs and "Reverie"***

In 2018, Madonna was invited to perform at the GRAMMYs® as a special appearance on Brendon Urie and Ariana Grande's performance of "Preacher", which also stirred controversy due to the religious imagery used on the stage and because of Madonna's opening monologue where she would be heard praying to God before the song began. The singer would take to Twitter to announce that a new single was going to be dropped but it was ultimately canceled.

After quite some time with WILD Records and being dropped from Warner Music Group, Madonna decided to part ways with them and move to Republic Records. She would then begin the recording sessions of what would be her first release as an independent artist, "**Reverie**", which also showcased a re-invention of Madonna's sound and image. Madonna met in the studio with Maluma and DJ-Producer, Gesaffelstein who at that time was in early talks to work on Maluma's album "**Overnight Apathy"** and they started to work together, and that's how "**Blow**" was created. Republic Records decided to release the song as a promotional single, to get Madonna's name out there before beginning an album cycle and it was an instant success. It became Republic Records' 16th #1 hit single and Madonna's first. As of now, "Blow" is Madonna's only multi-platinum single with it being certified 4 times platinum by RIAA.

The song's success was surprising. After Madonna's back to back commercial failure, the label decided to take on the newfound success and got Madonna and Steven Klein together to make the music video for the single, and Gesaffelstein's name was removed from the title of the song as well. The music video sparked controversy for the singer, Madonna was accused of being a satanist for using the Devil on her video as a representation of her lover. Many people compared this video with Britney Spears' controversial music video for "Flowin' (Are You Nasty?)" calling it a "more tame version" of it thanks to the dark imagery it carried through-out the video. Spears went on to Twitter to discuss it and defended Madonna. The video ended up being Madonna's biggest on Caltube with over 26 million views. It also gave her, her biggest hit on Encore with it standing at 191 million streams as of now.

Maluma and Madonna decided to work together once again but this some on the track "**Rubicon**", produced by Gesaffelstein, Maluma, and Madonna herself. The song will also be a part of her new studio album, "Reverie", after it being postponed for a while due to Madonna having some indifference with Republic Records during 2019. Right now, Madonna is still working on Reverie and is set to release it very soon. The album will include "Blow" on it's tracklist, even though it was scrapped on the earlier sessions of the album but due to the sound changing, it was added back again on it.

## Discography

* *MAPS (EP) (2017)*
* *Comatose (2017)*
* *No More Tears (EP) (2017)*
* *Reverie (2020 - 2021)*