2. Madonna – ‘American Life’ (2003)

“Fuck it”

Written by Madonna/Mirwais Ahmadzai

Produced by Mirwais Ahmadzai/Madonna

Taken from the album American Life

Also released on Remixed & Revisited and I’m Going To Tell You A Secret

UK #2, AUS #7, US #37

I genuinely believe ‘American Life’ has great lyrics but none of them do a better job of summing up this project than “fuck it”. This was Madonna having her Second Great Freakout, coming roughly a decade after Freakout One, which occured around the time of Erotica. Seemingly obsessed with the world’s obsession with all the wrong things, all the while being obsessed by violence and controversy herself, it was a confusing time indeed. Madonna has always, in some way, reflected the world and projected it onto herself to become the ultimate version of performance art – in 2003, following 9/11 and just before the Iraq War, the world was in a state of distress, and so was she.

You can see it in her interviews and press around the time of the album’s release – bitchier than usual, snapping at interviewers, seemingly desperate to prove herself when she was already a legend. The main problem with 2008′s Hard Candy was that Madonna seemingly didn’t care, with American Life she cared too much, to the point where it came across pushy and self-important. In the public eye, this reflected badly on her music, which is a real shame considering how strong the American Life album is. I’m well aware that the title track is a polarising piece of music, either loved completely or hated with a passion, and obviously I stand on the side of love.

It helps that American Life was the first new Madonna album released after my decision to become obsessed. I got it for my 13th birthday in June 2003 and wore out that CD. For a while there the only albums in the world that mattered were American Life, The Immaculate Collection and Michael Jackson’s HIStory. As much as the rest of American Life spoke to me, it was the electroclash mindfuck of the title track that remained my favourite.

“Do I have to change my name?
Will it get me far?
Should I lose some weight?
Am I gonna be a star?”

The harsh beeps and bleeps of ‘American Life’ take some getting used to, and the sound is made all the more jarring by the transition into acoustic guitar for the chorus. Through the lyrics, Madonna contemplates her fame and her dreams, whether she truly made it to where she wants to be and if all she sacrificed was worth it. On 1998′s ‘Drowned World’, she concluded that any adverse effects of fame were her own fault, on 2000′s ‘I Deserve It’ she decided that “all the pain” was worth it after all. But here in 2003 she seems to be so consumed by confusion and scorn for the celebrity life that she turns it around on all of us. In the video, all the idiots in the audience are supposed to be us - we’re the ones sitting at home dissecting the every move of a celebrity, tweeting about them, arguing about which dress is better looking, writing extended blog posts about pop songs. Madonna might want us to take a look at ourselves but she created this celebrity culture by pimping herself out, she made us this way, dammit! All the contradictions and messy politics of ‘American Life’ make it all the more delicious, all the more interesting.

“I’m drinking a soy latte
I get a double shot-ay
It goes right through my body and you know I’m satisfied
I drive my Mini-Cooper
And I’m feeling super duper
Yo, they tell me I’m a trooper and you know I’m satisfied”

I fucking love the rap. I love it so much, that I want the whole extended verse tattooed on my face. In bright red. A forty-five year old white woman rapping like this shouldn’t sound so amazing but it just does – because it’s Madonna, because she’s gone absolutely mad, and because we’ve all been invited along to watch. I never dreamt the words “this metaphysic shit is dope” would come out of Madonna’s mouth. Even after the shock value wears away, it fits the whole theme of the song and the entire campaign perfectly. ‘American Life’ is the death of pop, it’s most famous woman in the world rallying against the concept of celebrity, ripping herself apart and screaming at us not to sew her back together.

“I tried to stay ahead, I tried to stay on top
I tried to play the part, but somehow I forgot
Just what I did it for, and why I wanted more
This type of modern life – it is for me?”

The song itself is so frantic, and so very “2003″, that it is impossible to forget there was a gigantic shitstorm that surrounded ‘American Life’s release, including an imminent war and a post-9/11 backlash on anything and everything even slightly controversial. If the Dixie Chicks, once America’s sweethearts, can become Public Enemy Number One, what chance did Madonna have, considering she has always hovered in the Public Enemy Top Ten? As the storm continued to rise, Madonna went and did the most un-Madonna thing she’s ever done: she withdrew the ‘American Life’ video just days before wide release, citing that she didn’t want to “risk offending anyone”. I suppose looking back, it was inevitable in such a political climate, but that doesn’t mean it was artistically right: ‘American Life’ is Madonna’s greatest video, a supreme and triumphant statement, and a seamless marriage of audio and visuals. Thankfully the video is still widely available thanks to the internet, but the fact that it hasn’t yet been released officially is a travesty.

“I’d like to express my extreme point of view
I’m not a Christian and I’m not a Jew
I’m just living out the American dream
And I just realised that nothing is what it seems”

There was a significant downturn in Madonna’s career after ‘American Life’, one that she has never really recovered from. But I know she was proud of the song – the album title and campaign artwork was based around it, and it was a huge centrepiece of her Re-Invention Tour (with a tremendous, mindblowing live remix). When it wasn’t included on last year’s hits collection Celebration, it was disappointing, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do. And on the flipside of that argument, sometimes an artist has to put something out there that might offend and might divide listeners. Madonna built her fanbase and her legend on freedom and expression and honesty, and ‘American Life’ is the most extreme example of her desperate need to maintain all three.

Music video:

Re-Invention Tour Live 2004: