FEATURE:
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
Madonna’s Material Girl at Forty
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THIS is one of the…
divisive songs in Madonna’s catalogue. However, I think that it is very important in terms of her legacy. It is the first song of hers that I remember hearing. Seeing its amazing video. Material Girl was included on her second studio album, Like a Virgin (1984). After the title track, Material Girl was the second single released. I am going to explore its impact. Reaching three in the U.K. and three in the U.S., it was a huge hit. Even if Madonna has been dismissive of the song, it is one of her defining tracks. I shall end by linking to a few features where Material Girl is ranked highly among Madonna’s best songs. Before that, here is a feature that talked about the beginning of filming the Material Girl video on 10th January, 1985. The single was released on 23rd January, 1985:
“On January 10 1985, Madonna began filming the Material Girl music video in Los Angeles, California. The video was directed by Mary Lambert. Madonna met Sean Penn on the set.
In a 1987 interview with New York Daily News, Madonna talked about the concept for the video:
“My favorite scene in all of Marilyn Monroe’s movies is when she does that dance sequence for ‘Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend’. And when it came time to do the video for the song Material Girl, I said, I can just redo that whole scene and it will be perfect. Marilyn was made into something not human in a way, and I can relate to that. Her sexuality was something everyone was obsessed with and that I can relate to. And there were certain things about her vulnerability that I’m curious about and attracted to.”
Reflecting on the song, Madonna told author J. Randy Taraborrelli:
“I can’t completely disdain the song and the video, because they certainly were important to my career. But talk about the media hanging on a phrase and misinterpreting the damn thing as well. I didn’t write that song, you know, and the video was about how the girl rejected diamonds and money. But God forbid irony should be understood. So when I’m ninety, I’ll still be the Material Girl. I guess it’s not so bad. Lana Turner was the Sweater Girl until the day she died”.
I am surprised more has not been written about Material Girl. Because it is almost forty years since Madonna began shooting the video for the track, I want to mark that fortieth anniversary of an iconic song. I want to start by bringing in an article from Dig! who celebrated Madonna’s richly satirical song. One that defined the 1980s but was not as it seemed:
“Nile Rodgers, the Chic genius who had recently worked with David Bowie on his commercial pinnacle, Let’s Dance, and was cannily drafted in by Madonna to work his magic on her second album, had wanted Material Girl to launch the record. Of course, his protégé – already securing a reputation for knowing her own mind – considered Like A Virgin’s title song a more certain bet. Unsurprisingly, Madonna won that battle and, once released, Like A Virgin topped the US charts for six weeks.
With Material Girl lined up for release as album’s the second single, on 30 November 1984, no expense was spared on a lavish promo video. Its iconic restaging of the Marilyn Monroe performance of Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend, from the 1953 classic Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, cast Madonna as a charismatic star unmoved by her suitor’s flashy advances. Demanding authenticity, she is ultimately seduced by a simple bouquet and a ride in an old car.
This juxtaposition of contradictory motivations, an empowering life mantra and the slickest of presentations is in many ways a metaphor for Madonna’s lasting appeal. Here, there’s a blindingly compelling hook – in this case, a bass-anchored, catchy synth-pop hit created by songwriters Peter Brown and Robert Rans – a high-energy video, directed by Mary Lambert (who had already helmed the clips for Borderline and Like A Virgin), and a whole heap of more subtle messaging going on a layer below – for those that cared to dig a bit deeper…
Inevitably, Material Girl was an enormous hit, reaching No.2 in the US and No.3 in the UK, and Madonna would perform it on many of her tours, including her inaugural The Virgin Tour, in the US, later that year. She would revisit the song on global dates for her Who’s That Girl shows, in 1987; the iconic Blond Ambition concerts of 1990; and 2004’s Re-Invention World Tour. On the Like A Virgin and Who’s That Girl dates, she even threw out fake paper Madonna money at the end of the song (good luck trying to get hold of one today without mortgaging your home). It’s classic Madonna – if only commentators had been able to keep up. Regardless, her vocal delivery should have been enough to get the joke across – Madonna sings Material Girl with real exaggeration. This song was never meant to be taken seriously.
It’s hard to imagine Madonna’s career without this critical song, whose cultural impact arguably far outreached its notable commercial success. As one of the best Madonna songs of all time, there’s no doubt Material Girl fuelled the Madonna-mania of 1985, revealing, possibly for the first time, the “Queen Of Pop” as an artist with a chameleon-like ability to build ever-more intriguing personas. The performance-art side really starts here”.
There is always that debate as to whether Material Girl empowers or belittles women. Whether it is about materialism and its fakeness or it is a satire and tongue-in-cheek song. I think it is fiction and Madonna is portraying a fictional version of herself. Someone who was never materialistic, perhaps she is inhabiting a character. It is interesting to have the conversation and go into depth. I found this website and an interesting take on one of Madonna’s defining tracks:
“Something that always caught my attention was the fact that the video made for Material Girl totally contradicted the original lyrics of the song. As we all know in the video, although Madonna is shown obsessed with material things and money, we later realize that all this was only in appearance since in real life she was a woman who valued simple things and romance ( although I can't imagine someone in real life who prefers an insignificant bouquet of roses to an elegant and expensive jewel as seen in the video)
This "happy ending" is not mentioned in the original lyrics of the song, which rather talks about a woman who prefers to relate to men with money, always speaking of them in the plural, implying that she is not looking for a formal relationship (marrying a millionaire ) but relationships as brief and fleeting as possible (hinted further by the final phrase “Experience has made me rich…” where I think “Experience” refers to multiple relationships with several different men.
That is why I see that it goes against the empowerment of women since it contradicts the ideal that women should not depend on men and fend for themselves without the need to use their bodies or their beauty to seduce rich men and get material things or economic stability, thus becoming sexual objects.
On the other hand, I also feel that the song empowers them in a certain way by showing that in the end it is they, the material girls, who have the power to decide whether or not to be with someone despite having a lot of money and these men will have to submit to the final decision of the woman who, thanks to her beauty, has power in her hands. Two opposite thoughts to each other but that are found in an apparently simple song but whose lyrics contain a lot of complexity. Perhaps it was for this reason that Madonna decided to make a video that changed the original and controversial meaning of the song for something more digestible and romantic, although this would not prevent the public from identifying her as a material and ambitious girl, an image that apparently will follow her until the end of her days”.
When placing Madonna’s songs and singles, Material Girl features quite high in some. It is a track that is very important and has a lot of weight to it. When The Guardian ranked her singles in 2018, Material Girl placed in twenty-fifth (“Credit and interest are reappropriated playfully as metaphors in Madonna’s career-changing hit. Till-ringing pop hooks were never so much fun to play with again”). In 2016, Rolling Stone named Madonna’s fifty-best songs. Material Girl came in thirteenth (“Madonna didn’t write the song and in time didn’t feel it represented her (“I am not a materialistic person…[things] are not mandatory for my happiness,” she told Rolling Stone in 2009). But she liked its gawky swagger, which, combined with producer Nile Rodgers’ clipped, New Wave robo-funk sheen, equaled another major chart hit. “I didn’t think ‘Like a Virgin’ was going to be the song that did it for us,” recalled Rodgers. “I thought it was going to be ‘Material Girl.’ ‘Material Girl’ to me was cool, and to this day what do people call Madonna? They call her the Material Girl. They don’t call her the Virgin”). Billboard ranked Madonna’s forty-biggest Billboard hits earlier this year. Material Girl came fifteenth. At the end of 2023, BBC Radio 2 listeners decided which Madonna song was her ultimate moment. Even if Like a Prayer was the winner, Material Girl came in tenth. In 2023, The Standard placed Material Girl fourth in their list of best fifteen Madonna songs (“The song that spawned a thousand lazy headlines. Not long after Madonna released this song in 1985, ‘Material Girl’ had become her go-to moniker in many parts of the press. It’s ironic, really, seeing as Madonna claimed to be anything but. She later said in an interview that she decided to present this version of herself, unbothered by true romance but obsessed with anything diamond-encrusted, as a provocation — it’s a tactic that has rarely been left out of the Madonna playbook, so you’d be inclined to believe her. Whether the song is a deceptively simple satire or simply a reflection of the world she saw around her is up for debate, but one thing is for sure: it’s a ridiculously catchy tune. That chorus lands with one of the best known hooks of the Eighties, and Nile Rodgers’ production is pneumatically bouncy. JE”). In 2022, Entertainment Weekly decided on the best sixty Madonna best singles. Material Girl came fifteenth. It is clear that, despite some reservations from Madonna and those who feel it is not representative of her, it is loved and respected. One of her most popular songs. On 10th January, 1985, filming began for the video. I wanted to mark that anniversary. The single’s fortieth anniversary occurs on 23rd January. My introduction to the Queen of Pop, I will always have so much respect and affection…
FOR the brilliant Material Girl.