Kabbalah’s Material Girl Madonna has released her 11th album “Hard Candy,” which has her reinventing herself once again with her urban meets dance sound.
The disc’s lead track “Candy Shop,” produced by the Neptunes, finds the children’s book author singing of her “candy” as she willingly welcomes customers to “come on into my store I’ve got candy galore; don’t pretend you’re not hungry I’ve seen it before.”
One of “Hard Candy’s” flaws would be the fact that Madonna only worked with two groups of writers and producers on this CD; Timbaland and the Neptunes.
When you are listening to the music done by Madonna, Timbaland and his team that consists of Justin Timberlake and the up and comer Nate “Danja” Hills, it can sound over produced. In typical Timbaland fashion, all of his tracks are heavily driven by big horns, drums and synthesizers, which can easily drown out the artist, making it a difficult to listen to at times.
The single “4 Minutes” is a perfect example of this. After the first few listens, it becomes a little easier to find your way around the song for some enjoyment. A milder version of this problem appears on the song “Voices.”
When the Neptunes are in charge (they produced seven of the album’s songs) the beats sound similar to something pre-programmed into a keyboard that required only minor tweaking. “Beat Goes On” showcases the basic instrumentation of the song.
Madonna is known as one of those artists who jumps on the latest trends in music, only to leave it lying in the dust when she goes back into the studio to work on her next album. On “Hard Candy” the only thing that is offered up is lots of dancing, relationships and sex.
In the past Madonna has been notorious for her politically charged music that pushes the envelope but surprisingly this album is void of any references of today’s issues such as war, gas prices, or the upcoming presidential election.
Despite the fact that her 50th birthday is only a few months away, the leotard wearing mother of three (two biological and one adopted from an African village) begs you to “see my booty get down” repeatedly in the song “Heartbeat,” which features Pharrell Williams.
Absolutely ridiculous is how Madonna sounds half-way through the song “Give it to Me” as she chants “get stupid,” hopefully this is not a reference to the Bay Area’s hyphy music that is known for encouraging the audience to “get stupid” and “go dumb,” if it is then it would have definitely have been at the direction of Williams.
This album has its moments but does not really give fans anything new from Madonna or her production team.
