Don't go for second best, baby
Starting my trip back through the 1990 album charts.
30/12/90 : The Immaculate Collection - Madonna
There was me hoping for a "normal" (whatever that means) year from '90 and I go and start by breaking one of my cardinal rules immediately and picking a compilation album. Now why would I go and do that?!? Partly it was because of the fear of having to start the year with Michael Bolton, but I've suffered worse for my art - mostly, it just "felt" like an album that warranted inclusion but I wasn't sure why.
Comparing this with George Michael's Ladies & Gentlemen which is probably one of the best best-ofs out there and I steadfastly refused to consider it when I met it, I think the difference is that there is a very strong argument that this is Madonna's best album. Whilst fans don't agree which is George's best album, they are likely to argue that you should listen to his top X albums and enjoy the best-of as an accompaniment. But that argument just doesn't wash with Madonna - even the most loyal follower would probably admit you should just skip to the best-of. So here we are - and it's one we bought, so we start the year at 100% ownership.
And having got here, I don't really think I need to tell you much about it. It's pretty much all solid pop gold - there aren't too many compilations that I know every single track without having to listen to them. I think there's a reasonable argument that "Justify My Love" and "Rescue Me" don't warrant their place on the album but they were the new tracks added in to make people buy the thing and both made the top ten in the UK and the US so they retrospectively fit at least. Overall, it's really just a case of pick your favourites - personally I'd go for "Borderline", "Material Girl", "Live To Tell", "Cherish" and "Vogue" but they're all classics. Yes, you may not like the music and/or her but it's hard to argue with the impact she's had on the landscape - it's weird now to remember how much of a fuss there was over her wearing a funny shaped bra. And the album title has to be admired for bothering the US religious nutters as well.
This week we're at #1 in the charts on her seventh week of an initial 73 week run, of which the first nine were at #1. All in all, it's spent 363 weeks on the charts with it last being seen for a couple of weeks in August last year - it will be interesting to see if it pops back in as a result of the greatest hits tour she's on at the minute. The rest of the top five are a very Xmas present looking list of compilations or live albums from Elton John, Phil Collins, Jimmy Somerville and The Three Tenors and unsurprisingly there are no new entries in the top ten - there aren't any in the whole chart (which was 75 albums at this point) and there are some really rubbish albums in there, which makes me worry for the year.
Wikipedia has the expected huge amount (328 milliPeppers) on the album, most of which covers how successful it was, but there are some interesting snippets in there. "Justify My Love" (co-written with Lenny Kravitz) is the most successful video single of all time because MTV banned it because of its "overt sexual imagery" (which wouldn't get a moment's consideration these days) so they just released it on VHS (she needed the cash, poor dear). All the tracks on the album were reworked to incorporate QSound technology (a method of providing 3D sound from a stereo source which was big in the early 90s) - this was the first album to use it.
The critics were unanimous in their praise (which is very rare) both at the time and with legacy reviews and I guess it's done OK commercially, having sold over 30 million copies globally. But it never made #1 in the US, kept off the top by the infinitely less deserving Ice To The Extreme by Vanilla Ice (I just hope he's pleased with himself).
"Customers also listened to" Paula Abdul, Cyndi Lauper, Culture Club and The Bangles - the presence of Boy George in that list seems a little peculiar. I'm pleased I broke my rules to include this though - it's a fine album which is a worthy record of the cultural impact she's had over the years (although I do think she maybe it's time for her to stop trying to be relevant - just let it go, Madge).
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