Madonna - Madame X

The Quietus

Less than two minutes into Madame X’s second track ‘Dark Ballet’ – six minutes into the album as a whole – the song fully collapses into piano flourishes and then a ridiculous synth solo take on Tchaikovsky’s ‘Dance Of The Reed Flutes’ (yeah, from The Nutcracker Suite). There’s vocoder and Madonna doing spoken word on top. "The storm isn’t in the air," she proclaims, "It’s inside of us."

And instead of feeling like ‘Whoah! What crazy off-piste shit is this from the Queen of Pop?!’ as one might’ve responded if it was 1996 and the tunes were one iota as glorious as Ray Of Light, instead one sort of goes, ‘Oh, right. Hmm.’

Kate Tempest this is not, never mind Cupcakke. ‘God Control’ follows with its expensive blend of choirs, frantic arpeggios and swizz like: "People think that I’m insane, the only gun inside my brain," that we’re meant to sway between identifying with and being shocked by. "I don’t smoke, it’s true." The soca, Latin feel and melodic simplicity places Madame X perhaps closest to Rihanna, without her vocal strength or (still, many albums into Fenty’s career) her vivid, raw spirit.

‘Batuka’ is hypnotic in a good way and ‘Crazy’ has a decent slow grinding half-lascivious half-heartbreak chorus (and Madonna’s best singing on the record). But then ‘Extreme Occident’ and its casual phoney equivalences of east and west, left and right – othering dressed up as empathy – is some of the most stupid faux-politicking bollocks I’ve heard in song, even as a neat Indian tabla groove fights to rescue it. ‘Killers Who Are Partying’ preens like Sting. "I’ll be a child if children are exploited… I’ll be Islam if Islam is hated" Oh, fuck off Madge, no you really won’t. Even simple acoustic’n’beats ballad ‘Crave’, with Swae Lee from Rae Sremmurd sounding more bored than horny, has an icky aftertaste, when it ought to be beautiful.

Overall, Madonna’s fourteenth album Madame X feels as if Mirwais had mostly completed a decent run-of-the-mill modern pop record, albeit with a cool hotch-potch global feel; hip nods in place to fado, dub and other micro-genres dunked amongst the trap and retro disco. But then just before sign-off, Herself went through the top-lines with a sharpie. Every so often, she said "Here, let’s put something bonkers here!" And then again, a few minutes later, "Here too!" And so on. Because none of these carefully curated flourishes feel as if they truly live inside the ‘whole’ of this music. Instead it all feels plonked on top of a template.

In theory, I like Madonna when she’s wacko. But it can’t be mistaken for musical innovation and especially not for courage, which she seriously seems to be claiming. As Madame X unfolds I’m not charmed; I’m more and more irritated and, later on, just tired. Set against today’s diaspora – wealth and legacy banked – Madonna simply isn’t wayward. It doesn’t matter if she says she is. Yes, huge achievements for subsequent generations of artists and an important pioneer of self-expression. But that all happened. Madame X is like Becky With The Good Hair got the same budget as Lemonade to compose her white, centrist response.

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The Guardian 80

(Live Nation/Interscope/Maverick)
The lows, featuring white-saviour narratives and witless lyrics, are really low. But by embracing Latin pop, Madonna sounds more natural than she has in years

We all get old, but never at the same age. Some of us are old when we’re children, bringing briefcases to school and talking to adults at family parties; others leave uni with the thrill that they never have to go clubbing again. Most of us think we’re doing pretty well, then we find ourselves nodding appreciatively at something in a Boden catalogue and suddenly death is real.

For years, Madonna outpaced all of this. In 1996, Evita looked like ushering in her middle age, but she did an about turn, delivering convincing, idiosyncratic trip-hop on Ray of Light (1998) and convincing, idiosyncratic electro on Music (2000). Confessions on a Dancefloor (2005) was even better, its Abba samples and smooth deep house a way for her to stay out past 4am with dignity, rather than trying to score ketamine off teenage fashion influencers at the afters, musically speaking.

Related: Every one of Madonna's 78 singles – ranked!

Pitchfork 48

Madonna’s 14th album feels stretched thin all over the globe, layered with an ambitious concept that ends up muddled and convoluted.

The Guardian 0

(Interscope)
Madonna’s 14th studio album is an engrossing mix of Latinate beats, political allusion – and Joan of Arc

Madonna is in her fourth decade of what we now somewhat suspiciously call appropriation, a pick-and-mix skill set that has previously laid the singer open to accusations of unoriginality or, worse, cultural hijacking.

But when the patented Ciccone filtration system gets it right, the process is just shy of alchemy. Sexualised Catholicism, at the dawn of MTV, was Madonna’s first stroke of kismet. The last time Madonna was indisputably on point, she had hooked up with French producer Mirwais for Music (2000) and the sensuous possibilities of club culture. Her latterday output has stuttered somewhat, but for Madame X the stars have aligned with Madonna’s Pinterest mood board once again. There are hot climates and a piratical eye-patch; shape-shifting to the sounds of the Portuguese diaspora, trap-pop and reggeaton.

This is an album whose most memorable songs are definitely its strangest

Related: Madonna makes call for Israel-Palestine unity at Eurovision