Madonna Album: Like a Virgin (1984)

Madonna
Like a Virgin

Release: November 13, 1984

1. Material Girl
2. Angel
3. Like a Virgin
4. Over and Over
5. Love Don’t Live Here Anymore
6. Dress You Up
7. Shoo-Bee-Doo
8. Pretender
9. Stay

Producer: Nile Rodgers
Writers: Madonna and Steve Bray (“Angel,” “Over and Over,” “Pretender,” and “Stay”), Madonna (“Shoo Bee Doo”), Peter Brown and Robert Rans (“Material Girl”), Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly (“Like a Virgin”), and Miles Greggory (“Love Don’t Live Here Anymore”)

Billboard 200: #1 (3 weeks) UK Albums Chart: #1 (2 weeks)

Like a Virgin is clearly the album that made Madonna a megastar. She had made a name for herself with Madonna, her debut club-oriented disc that saw the singer transition from the club world to the pop world, but that album’s reach and popularity pales in comparison to the phenomenal impact of her second album. Like a Virgin quickly climbed the Billboard albums chart, hitting #1 by February 1985. The album is RIAA-certified diamond for 10 million units shipped, making Like a Virgin Madonna’s second best-selling album next to The Immaculate Collection. With a wink, Madonna dedicated the album to “the virgins of the world.”

Nile Rodgers, who had worked with Chic and David Bowie, produced every track on the album, giving the disc a unified dance/pop sound. The album’s production is a crisp mix of electronic and acoustic instruments. Bass synthesizers are featured prominently throughout and used as a staccato effect in songs like “Angel,” “Like a Virgin,” and “Over and Over.” The tracks also feature a mix of live drums and drum programming. Madonna’s vocals are also varied on the disc. On Madonna, she sang pretty much exclusively in her higher nasal register. On Like a Virgin, she began to experiment with singing in a lower, fuller register, which she would later hone to be her primary vocal style. Such contrast is evident in tracks like “Angel” where she begins the first verse in the higher range and shifts to the lower range for the second verse and chorus.

Steve Bray makes an official return as a Madonna collaborator for this album, co-writing with Madonna four of the album’s more dance-oriented cuts. The two had worked together on her original four-track demo, but Bray had been passed over for producing any of those cuts for her first album in favor of more experienced producers. Photographer Steven Meisel shot the provocative cover photo of Madonna wearing a bridal dress, similar to the one she had worn for the “Like a Virgin” performance on MTV 2 months prior to the album’s release.

Like a Virgin is a solid collection of pop cuts that showcased Madonna as a growing pop music force. Two tracks—“Like a Virgin” and “Material Girl”—would go on to become ‘80s pop classics that, for better or worse, would come to define Madonna’s public image for remainder of the decade. “Material Girl” in particular would become a label the media would use to describe the singer to this day. “Angel” and “Dress You Up” also became top 10 hits. Even non-single cuts like “Over and Over” and “Stay” are still fresh. The album’s only downside are its ballads, “Love Don’t Live Here Anymore” and “Shoo-Bee-Doo,” which sound stale. Madonna had stuck to only fast cuts on her first LP, so the inclusion of slower songs on Like a Virgin was surely an attempt to broaden her reach. Still, next to so many brilliantly executed dance pop cuts, they lack the impact that later Madonna ballads would achieve. I’d rate Like a Virgin a 4.5 out of 5.