Madonna: Like A Virgin, 1984

On its 40th anniversary

Madonna’s Like A Virgin, her sophomore album, was a definitive statement.

Start with that phenomenal Steven Meisel cover photo. Everything about it works, and tells you what you’re gonna find inside the packaging. The sepia tone gives Madonna an old Hollywood glamour feel without going full black and white (and potentially feeling old); the only color on the cover is the words “like a virgin.” Look at the severity of her eye makeup. The dress she wears is a perfect combo of sex (the lacy bustier) and innocent (the prom dress-like gauzy skirt). The way she’s holding the “BOY TOY” belt buckle, drawing your attention to it even as it’s semi-obscured by her dress. Her hair is perfectly tousled without looking perfectly tousled. And of course it’s all brought together expertly by the look Madonna gives the camera, and thus the viewer, looking straight at you yet not quite straight on. Her facial expression is come hither, but at the same time an expression of how she knew just what she was doing with her sophomore album. She clearly knew that this would make her a star, and it did.

Nile Rodgers’s production on the album is so professional, and that’s no diss; he clearly understood the assignment. I concur with my pal Alfred Soto that Like A Virgin’s tough, athletic third and fourth singles “Angel” and “Dress You Up” outdo their predecessors “Like A Virgin” and “Material Girl,” even as those two iconic smashes established her global superstardom. (The title track is expert, while “Material Girl” I’ve never much cottoned to: too intentionally campy.) “Shoo-Bee-Doo” is one of Madonna’s greatest album tracks, not just for the way it opens as a ballad and picks up 40 seconds in, but for the vulnerability in her vocal, especially the way she sings that opening portion, so willfully exposed. Those synths backing her up once the rhythm picks up sound remarkably like a record almost played at the wrong speed, almost slipping between 33 and 45; so wrong yet so correct. And “Pretender” is a fascinating fusion of downtown-NYC-nightclub and post-CBGB’s new wave — she knew both well.

Like A Virgin isn’t my favorite Madonna album; it’s probably fourth most days, behind her debut, Erotica, and Bedtime Stories. But it’s mostly great, and in many ways is the most Madonna Madonna album. I miss this version of Madonna.