May 31, 2024 • 47 mins
In 1984, a relatively unknown 26-year old Madonna appeared at the first MTV Video Music Awards. Dressed like a rock and roll bride, Madonna sang “Like a Virgin.” The performance was considered so risque, so scandalous that many – including her own manager – predicted it would end her career. But far from stopping her, that moment changed Madonna’s life, transforming her from rising star to pop idol. In this week’s episode, Susie and Jess talk about that iconic performance, the rise of MTV and how together MTV and Madonna were a force that defined 80s pop culture.
GUESTS:
- Mary Gabriel, author of Madonna: A Rebel Life
FOR MORE:
- 60 Times Madonna Changed Our Culture (NY Times)
- Inside Madonna's Legendary Performance at the First VMAs (Rolling Stone)
- Buy Mary Gabriel’s book Madonna: A Rebel Life
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The MTV Video Music Awards were launched in nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
MTV presents Dead Waiting, Rock and Rolling ba again of
the last three thousand years the MTV.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Music It was meant to be ironic, a way to
poke fun at the seriousness of traditional award shows, but
the new music channel for teens was popular and big
stars showed up this lad story. Nick Jagger also there
a relatively unknown twenty six year old Madonna, in one
of her first performances on television, there to sing an
(00:33):
unreleased song like a Virgin. She stood atop a seventeen
foot wedding cake, dressed like a bride but wearing a
belt buckle emblazoned with the words boy toy. When she
got to the bottom of the cake, she dropped to
the ground, crawling and rolling around, simulating sex and revealing
(00:54):
her lingerie and a little bit of her butt. The
audience and the world aghast at the sheer audacity of it.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Madonna so outraged everyone in that room that her manager said,
your career is done.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
But far from ending her ascent to the top of
the charts, that performance would change Madonna's career and life forever,
transforming her from pop newcomer to superstar.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
I'm Susie Bannacaram and I'm Jessica Bennett.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
And this is in Retrospect, where each week we revisit
a cultural moment from the past that shaped us and.
Speaker 4 (01:32):
That we just can't stop thinking about.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Today, we're talking about one of Madonna's iconic early performances,
one that was so scandalous many predicted it would end
her career. But we're also talking about the rise of
MTV and how together MTV and Madonna became a force
that would define eighties pop culture.
Speaker 5 (01:51):
This is part one, Susie, I don't remember this moment
from real time, but I of course from watching clips
of it or seeing clips of it over and over
and over again because I was such a Madonna fan.
Speaker 4 (02:05):
Yeah, but there are so many Madonna moments, so why
this one?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Yeah, I mean, you would have been really young, so
it doesn't surprise me that you didn't see this in
real time. I'm a little older than you, so I
do remember it when it happened. But also I've just
always loved Madonna and I loved MTV. Like early MTV
is hard to describe to people who are used to
current MTV. But MTV was so fun and it felt
(02:30):
so free, and it was a way to discover music
and artists. So this moment felt like a good way
to talk about two things that were really big cultural
influences on me. And Madonna herself is just amazing. I
was just like this huge fan I dressed liked her,
I loved the music, and I don't know if it
(02:51):
was conscious at the time because I was still pretty little,
but she sort of represented what it meant to be free, right,
Like what it was like to be cool and to
do whatever you wanted and to not listen to other
people Like it felt very liberating to me to love her,
and so I was thinking, I really want to do
a Madonna episode. But you can't do all of Madonna,
(03:13):
you know what I mean, Like you said, such a
prolific career. There have been so many chapters, and her
influence is so broad. So I was like, what could
I do that could just encapsulate one period or one
moment in her time? And this felt like a good
example of that.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Yeah, I totally agree.
Speaker 5 (03:32):
I mean, it's really hard to explain to someone growing
up today how cool MTV was.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Yeah, it was really cool.
Speaker 5 (03:41):
Even now, occasionally there's like weird channels or I'll find
them on Hulu that are playing just old MTV music
videos and I'm like, oh my god, oh my god,
and i feel like I'm thirteen again, because that was
how we got culture, I guess, and it was like,
I don't know what felt transgressive, and I just remember
going over to friends houses who had k and just
(04:01):
clapping down on the couch and sitting there for hours
and hours and hours, absolutely glued to the television, wanting
to memorize every little detail of every video and every song.
Speaker 4 (04:11):
The big number one last week Salt and Pepper and
Bog Water Man. Yep, and we've got two hours of
the hottest videos in the country.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Well, you know, I think another thing that's important to
note is that we didn't have YouTube, We didn't have
access to video on demand. So getting to see your
favorite video was like really special. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Yes, you had to race to the television, yes, and
you had to.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Like record it on VHS if you wanted to watch
it again. And when they debuted a video, it was
a big event.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Here is the planet's first look at smells like teen Spirit.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
It's just really different when all you have is a
few channels on the television, and only one of them
is really geared towards you and the things you're interested in.
That's like four, we're in to someone growing up now.
Speaker 5 (05:02):
Okay, so you know we're talking about this performance she
gave in nineteen eighty four, like a virgin. She's like
writhing around on the floor. It's you know, goes down
in history in many ways. And you're going to walk
us through all of that. But before we get deep
into it, who is Madonna in this year? She's not
yet a big star?
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Is that right? Yeah, she's not a big star yet.
She's sort of an up and coming star. She's released
her first single.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
The song that out on the radio right now, called Everybody.
It's about getting people could dance and lose their inhibition.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
And in nineteen eighty two, just a couple of years
before this, it charted on the dance charts, but it
wasn't super mainstream, but it did help her get her
first album deal. Right, so she does have an album.
She's released an album at this point in July of
nineteen eighty three, and it's a great album. I just
want to say, I listened to it again this morning,
just to psych myself up. And it's just full of bangers, right,
(05:56):
Lucky Star Holiday border line, Like, she comes out of
the gate with this really strong album. But it debuted
on the Billboard charts at one ninety. Oh that's so surprising, okay,
Right in the United States, it wasn't that popular, and
it didn't peak until after this performance. After this performance,
it made it to number eight on the charts, I see.
(06:16):
And that was more than a year after it was released,
So you know, this is the performance that's going to
push her into superstardom. At this point, she's still kind
of like a known entity, but not by everyone. Holiday
as a great single. I think we're going to hear
a lot more of you such license, thank you, and
thanks for doing the interview.
Speaker 6 (06:34):
You're welcome.
Speaker 5 (06:35):
So that's interesting because if she wasn't huge at that moment,
why did MTV pick her to perform or how did
they have the fourth site to know that she was
going to be huge?
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Well, Empty's audience was a little different than the mainstream
radio audience, right, That's one of the things MTV did
that was pretty unique is that they chose their artists
in a different way. Than the radio DJs did, and
Madonna was very much an MTV artist. She embraced music
videos really early, when a lot of other musicians were
(07:05):
extremely skeptical. She saw a potential in it.
Speaker 4 (07:09):
It's so funny to think about now.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
A lot of artists were really skeptical of MTV and
music videos. They felt like it was impinging on their
art in some way, Like there were like were these
lessons and like this is asking us to be actors.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
Oh god, it's like if we could go back to that, honestly,
like now everyone has to be actor anyway, Kerry.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Oh yeah. And actually, there's this amazing video you can
find on YouTube where Madonna is on a panel at
some music conference in nineteen eighty four and they're talking
about the rise of MTV and music videos and all
the other musicians are complaining about it, and Madonna is
pushing back.
Speaker 6 (07:44):
You could be reaching a lot of people that would
never be able to come and see you live, So
I think that definitely an advantage.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
She's really the least famous person on this panel, but
in true Madonna fashion, she interrupts James Brown at one points.
Speaker 6 (07:58):
I'm sorry, but you know, kids today worship the television,
So I think it's a great way to reach them.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Honestly. The funniest part is that she gets into it
with John Oates of Holland Oates. They would, by the way,
go on to completely embrace music videos and performed at
the same VMAs where Madonna performed like a Virgin. But
here John Oates is very against the idea of music
videos because he is a serious musician as far as
I'm concerned. You know, I always wanted to be a musician,
(08:28):
and you know, to me, that's still my purpose.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (08:33):
But listen, when you perform on stage, you're acting. I mean,
that's a performance. So what's I mean if someone puts
a cam on you, what's the difference?
Speaker 1 (08:41):
So she really saw the potential, right, And that's partially
because a lot of her early career was tied to
the culture in New York in those early years that
she got here, and there were a ton of filmmakers
around her and artists, and so she was just really
comfortable with the medium. She was comfortable being on camera. Yeah,
and I'm going to tell you about all of that,
(09:02):
but I want to finish telling you about the performance first.
Speaker 4 (09:05):
Yes, Okay, So back to the performance.
Speaker 5 (09:07):
You know, you said in the intro that like a
Virgin hadn't actually been released yet, so it's interesting or
I guess is it interesting?
Speaker 4 (09:15):
Tell me that she chose to perform that song on stage.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
It is interesting, and I think it's really unusual. I'm
not sure that MTV or your label would let.
Speaker 5 (09:25):
You do that now because it's like a debut, right
She's debuting it on stage kind of.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
Yeah, and she debuts a song and people are obsessed
with it, but they can't buy it. That's why her
album goes back on the charts, because they're like, this
is an amazing song, and when they go to record stores,
I need more. You can download it, so it's not
available right away. She chose to sing this, I think
because she was really anxious to release it. You know,
(09:53):
this performance was in September. The song itself isn't released
until the end of October, and she knew knew it
was going to be a big hit. She suspected that
it was going to really resonate, and she was anxious
to get it out and she was saying to people,
I'm anxious to get it out, but her record label
didn't want her to release it until the previous album
(10:15):
had kind of peaked and valleyed, because they wanted to
take as much advantage of that as possible. So it
kind of makes sense that they wanted her to wait
and that she didn't, And I think she just convinced
MTV to let her do it. And at the time,
the labels didn't think of MTV as that important, so yeah,
they wouldn't have argued with her about it. They would
be like, yeah, perform whatever you want on that like
(10:36):
silly thing on that channel that like teens watch.
Speaker 4 (10:40):
You know, that's so interesting.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
So I want to tell you a couple other things
about the song, which I think are fascinating and I
learned through this process. The song was actually written by
two men. One of them had recently started a new
relationship and he wanted to like describe how amazing it
felt to be in a relationship again after a rough patch.
So all of the double entendres that you hear when
Madonna sings it, they weren't really intended in the song,
(11:07):
and it was written for a man to sing. They
thought a man would likely sing it. They just happened
to play it for a record executive and then that
record executive happened the next day to me meeting with Madonna,
so he has this idea that it might work for her.
He plays her the demo and she immediately gets it.
She's immediately like, this song will be amazing. I want
(11:29):
to record it.
Speaker 5 (11:30):
It's so perfect because it's you think that she has
written and I mean, I didn't know it was written
by two men, but like you, it's the it is her,
like that song is her.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Yeah, it's interesting because she's gotten to writing credit on
almost every song, or maybe every song she's ever sung.
And I think it's because even when other people write
music for her, she's very involved in the process of
making it her own. So I think all her music
sounds like she's written it, even though you know she's herself.
Would admit she's not a musician in that way. She
(12:01):
doesn't write the music, but she has a very clear
sense of what she likes and what she thinks is
going to work for her and her point of view.
It's not even really just about the music. It's like
about the story she wants to tell at any given time.
Speaker 5 (12:16):
I mean, that's a perfect entree into the performance itself.
I haven't watched it in a while, and I assume
listeners haven't either.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
Can you describe it for us?
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Oh yeah, I'd be happy too, because I've watched it
like ninety times in the last three weeks. I just
keep watching it over and over again.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Welcome back to the first annual MTV Video Music Awards Show.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
So the performance starts and Madonna is dressed kind of
like a rock and roll bride, right, And she's standing
on top of this seventeen foot three layer wedding cake.
And there's a mannequin next to her dressed as a groom,
So it's like a bride and groom on top of
a cake. And she has on a veil and she's
(12:59):
holding a bouquet and she starts singing, and it starts
with a real close up of her and it sort
of pulls out and as she sings, she kicks off
her heels and they land in front of the cake.
This will matter later, and she starts walking down the
cake using the layers as steps, okay, And she pulls
(13:23):
back her veil and you see that she's wearing all
these necklaces, one of which is a cross, right, and
she has on this white belt.
Speaker 4 (13:31):
Oh yeah, it's like I can see it.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I can see it, And the belt buckle says boy toy, which, incidentally,
I learned in my research was her graffiti tag because
when she was living in New York, graffiti had become
a big art form and she was dating Bascyat and
she was really close to Keith Herring, who were both
really into graffiti. So she had her own graffiti tag
and it was ironically boy toy.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Wow.
Speaker 5 (13:55):
So it's like every little detail of that outfit is
so meticulously thought her.
Speaker 1 (13:59):
Yes, and also just tells you a story about Madonna
and where she was at that time. So she's an
all white lace and there's like Cooca dot tool in
her dress, and she's wearing a bustille with spaghetti straps,
and she's wearing the fingerless gloves. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (14:14):
I mean we all had a pair of those, right,
Like everyone did. It became that classic look.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Yeah, it was the very classic Madonna look that all
the little girls emulated. And when most people dress up
as Madonna for Halloween, they put on right. I've definitely
done that. And you can see in the performance that
she already knows how to work a camera. At times,
she looks straight into it in a way that can
only be described as extremely seductive. Like I can't think
(14:38):
of another way to describe it. But she's working the camera,
which a lot of people just didn't know how to
do yet. Right, she's conscious of where it is. She
knows how to move in a way that it's going
to capture her in the ways that are most flattering.
And as she starts to walk down the cake, she
takes off the veil and she takes down her hair.
(15:00):
Her hair's up and she sort of like takes out
the thing that's holding it and she shakes it out
the way you do when you're getting ready for bed.
And even that a scene at the time is a
little risque, right, Like she's.
Speaker 4 (15:13):
It's not progressed. It's not how you shake your hair
when you're going to bed.
Speaker 5 (15:17):
Yeah, I mean, of course, it's like when you're getting
ready to jump into bed with someone.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Maybe I know. It's also that like classic librarian thing
whenever they want to make a librarian hot. She like
takes down her hair and she shakes it.
Speaker 5 (15:28):
There is a name, by the way, I forget what
it is, but there is a name for that shaking
down of the butt.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Oh, really oh amazing.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
Yeah, yeah, it was like a trope name for it. Anyway,
carry amazing.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
And so when she gets to the bottom of the cake,
she drops to the floor and she lays on her
back for a second, and you see that she's grabbing
her white stiletto heels and putting them on, sort of
off camera.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Oh so she's like putting them back on because she's
thrown them off.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Yeah, she threw them off to be able to walk
down this like really kind of precarious cake, to be honest.
And so now she's putting them on and the camera's
focused on her face. So the next time you see her,
the shoes are back on her feet and she throws
the bouquet into the crowd. And when she went down
for the heels, she did lie down for a second.
She sort of like laid down, so when she was
putting them on, it wasn't so noticeable that she was
(16:14):
putting them back on. But now she's on her feet,
and she's on her feet for some amount of time,
and then she decides to go back down to the
floor and she throws her veil onto the stage and
she gets down and she does what I think can
only be described as writhing or rolling around on the floor.
(16:35):
She sort of similates sex by thrusting her hips and
at the end she's crawling around and the skirt rides
up to her waist and the camera gets a picture
of essentially her legs and her garter belts and her butt.
But I don't know how else to say this. It's
sort of just like under butt, Like it's not her
full butt, even though that's what everyone would say after.
Speaker 4 (16:57):
This, because she's wearing underwear.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Yeah, she's wearing underwear, so you're just seeing her long ray. Okay,
I mean you can't really see the underwear. It's just
like I think it's just white lace underwear. But she
has these garter belts on and you see your hose,
so it's not that crazy. But at the time it's
considered wildly inappropriate. And as she's lying there on the
ground on her back, the camera cuts to black.
Speaker 4 (17:26):
So are people like going wild? Is the audience screaming?
Speaker 7 (17:31):
Like?
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Are what's the reaction?
Speaker 6 (17:33):
Like?
Speaker 5 (17:33):
Is it actually as scandalous as I don't know, you
made it sound like it doesn't sound that scandalous, But
was it considered scandless?
Speaker 1 (17:41):
In nineteen eighty four, it was considered scandalless. So, I mean,
the audience just claps like normal. They're not like on
their feet and freaking out there. It's a regular sort
of clapping. And then I mean, who are these people?
Get on your feet? I don't know, but you know,
and then immediately it goes to commercial. But you're right
that it wouldn't be considered a wild performance today. It
was seen as extremely controversial. But people have come out
(18:05):
in much less clothing since this, Right, there's like the
Brittany with the snake, and Madonna herself has done performances
that have been far more risque since this. But you
have to think about that. Even at that time, the
fact that the song used the word virgin was seen
as a provocation. So then suddenly pairing it with a
wedding dress and a cross and showing some skin is
(18:28):
considered just beyond what is acceptable. And in the video
that's available now, you don't see the crowd reaction shots, right,
You just see them clapping and then it goes to
the commercial. But reporting at the time said that people
were literally aghast. Her longtime publicist Liz Rosenberg, said that
people were gasping in the audience. Oh really, okay, and
(18:50):
that Madonna took it so much further than anyone knew
she was capable of.
Speaker 4 (18:54):
Oh interesting, okay, So maybe they were a guess, we
just didn't see it.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
You just don't see it because unlike now where they
have made a point to like go to the audience
and show your reaction, they just weren't that sophisticated at
the time.
Speaker 5 (19:05):
Yeah, that's a good point too. It's like this is
a different kind of camera work.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yeah, than we would expect now, because now they would
be prepared, they would wanted to assume a shot in
a house. So and so reacted exactly. And another example,
just so you get a sense of what the reaction was.
A cultural critic at the Philly Inquirer wrote at the
time that despite the fact that people think rock musicians
and rock industry people are you know, jaded and decadent
(19:30):
and nothing can shock them, that in fact, the crowd
looked absolutely shocked, and that you know, co host Bet Midler,
who herself was seen as you know, a little provocative,
was moved afterwards to roll her eyes and make a
few a few remarks about Madonna's virginity.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
Oh interesting. Yeah, I wish we knew what those were,
but I'm sure they're not.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
I tried to find them, honestly, because I thought it
would be really funny to play them. But I haven't
been able to uncover that particular of the award show.
But you know, this Philly Inquirer critic basically makes the
point that the rock business must now be conservative because
look how they responded to this, which is kind of
a funny idea, right.
Speaker 5 (20:11):
Yeah, I mean it's worth noting or contextualizing a little
bit what was happening in the eighties. This is the
Reagan era, the whole like traditional family values thing.
Speaker 8 (20:21):
Family life has changed much down through the years. The
days when we could expect to live in only one
home and hold only one job or probably gone forever.
Perhaps we will not go back to the old family ways,
but I think we can and should preserve family values.
Speaker 5 (20:36):
So it's not shocking in some way to think people
would be scandalized by this in nineteen eighty four, whereas
had this performance occurred in nineteen sixty nine, it would
stock or something like.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
Maybe that wouldn't have been the case.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Yeah, I mean, I think, yes, very much. The Reagan era,
which starts in eighty one when he's elected president, and
he remains in office until eighty nine, so he's really
president for all of the eighties. And you think about it,
and that era was very much a reaction to the
civil rights and feminist movements, and he was an extremely
popular president, probably the most popular Republican president. And some
(21:13):
could argue whether or not Trump is as popular as Reagan.
I think there's a lot of evidence he is not,
because Reagan really appealed even to moderates, right They felt
like he was this kind of goofy actor turned politician.
Speaker 8 (21:25):
Tomorrow is my birthday, and I prefer to think of
it as the thirty sixth anniversary of my thirty ninth,
but I'll be just about due for a midlife crisis.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
He exudes this very wholesome americanism, and what he's sort
of reassuring Americans of is that we're going to go
back to family values, traditional family values, whatever that means.
Speaker 5 (21:47):
So Madonna with her cross and the virginal yes, the
virginal whore on top of the wedding cake with her
cross strutting down onto the stage is not considered traditional
family value.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
Is not considered traditional family values. And actually, to prepare
for this episode, I read this great new book about
Madonna from the renowned biographer Mary Gabriel. The book is
called Madonna, a Rebel Life, and she's written a lot
of books about remarkable women. I highly recommend it. It's
an excellent book, and in it she actually talked a
little bit about what this era was like.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Oh great for young people who don't understand that time.
It was a time of extreme reaction, conservative reaction. It
was a time when the conservative movement really gained leverage
within the Reagan administration to turn back the clock on
reforms legislatively and politically and socially. So any social advances
(22:44):
that had been made that freed people and made actually
post war freedoms, whether it's financial equality, the labor union's
sexual equality, racial equality, whatever had been achieved up to
let's say the seventies, all came under attack by conservatives.
I mean, they really, you know, we know this phrase,
they played the long game. That phrase wasn't used in
(23:06):
but that's what they were doing.
Speaker 5 (23:08):
So it's interesting because it almost feels significant that Madonna
is perhaps I mean, I think, knowing what we know
of her now this probably becomes true challenging that with
this performance, Reagan was very much focused on preserving the
sanctity of the traditional family. And I'm sure Madonna, who
had you know, was like gallivanting around New York City
(23:30):
in the late seventies and early eighties in this like
very specific time of artists and free love is pushing
against that.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Yeah, very much. And interestingly, her initial idea for this
performance was also out there, but probably wouldn't have been
so challenging to that worldview. The wedding cake was actually
her second choice for our prop. She initially wanted to
sing the song to a tiger, but the producers obviously
were like, no, be serious, we can't have it like time,
(23:59):
like a live tiger, like a giant. And she's like,
singing the song to the tiger, yes, like if the
tiger was the one who was making her feel like
a version, oh.
Speaker 5 (24:08):
Okay, And so that that's so interesting because that weill
wild and dangerous and whatever like wouldn't have actually been
as controversial.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
So it wouldn't have been but obviously the producers are like,
it's too dangerous, like the tiger could kill.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
Someone pre Britney Snake era, Yes, pre Britney snak era, Right, they.
Speaker 4 (24:25):
Don't want to get mauled by a tiger.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
And so just five days before the performance, she goes
back to them and says, how about this seventeen foot cake?
She had recently done something like this at a party
and it had been this big success, and so the
producer say that they built the cake for her, even
though it put them over budget.
Speaker 5 (24:43):
Okay, that is such an important detail. And also that
made me remember, isn't there some sort of maybe a
lion or like some other large cat in the music
video for the Yes?
Speaker 1 (24:54):
In the music video she does get her wild cat.
She gets a lion and she sings to it. But
you know, it's still sort of like tied a little
bit to this performance. And in fact what happens is
a lot of times MTV actually just runs this performance
as the music video because it's such a popular moment.
Speaker 4 (25:13):
But why the cake? Like, what did this cake represent
to her?
Speaker 8 (25:17):
Do we know?
Speaker 1 (25:17):
Yeah, we do know, and in fact we know because
of Mary Gabriel. She wrote a lot about this performance
in the book I mentioned, and she discovered something interesting
in her research.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Her idea was that she was going to make a
comment on marriage about how when you're on the top
of the cake, in other words, just getting married, everything
is so wonderful and rosy and dreamlike and gauzy and pure.
But as she came down the cake, it was like
Dante's Inferno. You know, she went through the various layers
of marriage, you know, and by the time she got
(25:48):
to the floor, it was, you know, she was well
acquainted with what marriage really was, and so she started
rolling around on the floor and you know, kind of
writhing mock masturbation, and you know, it was classic Madonna.
Speaker 5 (26:02):
I love hearing how deliberate her choices are and how
she's always focused on telling a story. Like these are
things that I think we assume about Madonna. But Mary
Gabriel really.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Uncovered this, yes, because this had never been published before.
It was part of the reporter's notes that she got
access to for her book. So I love this detail.
It's one that's never really been discussed. And I do
think at the time people thought Madonna was manufactured in
some way, like they felt like, you know, she was
a pop star. Maybe the record labels were making her decisions,
maybe this or that, But the reality is she always
(26:34):
had real intention behind the choices she made, and they
were her choices, right, And it really speaks to that
when you think about this, right, this is a really
complex setup for this what seems like just an off
the cuff performance.
Speaker 5 (26:48):
There's a lot of messages, yeah, wrapped into this one performance. Okay,
(27:09):
so we know that people are apparently aghast in the audience,
although we don't see it on their faces if you
watch the video back now. But has Madonna ever talked
about what immediately happens after that performance.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
She has talked about it, and in fact, she talked
about it recently in twenty twenty one. She was on
Howard Stern's show, and here's what she said.
Speaker 9 (27:27):
After I got off stage during that performance, my manager
was white as a ghost, and he looked at me
and said, do you know what you just did? And
I said, yeah, I sang a song and I lost
my shoe on stage and he's like, no, your butt
was showing for the entire song.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
Your career is over. Wow.
Speaker 5 (27:43):
So I wonder if she freaked out that he says that,
or is she like, I'm Madonna, I'll do anything, you know.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
She says she wasn't even then, even that early in
her career. She says, you know, I wasn't that apologetic.
I was just like, well, fuck it, I made a mistake.
Speaker 4 (27:56):
You don't go somewhere and crying say I just lost
my career. No that, but also interesting that she did
consider it a mistake, at least it first.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
It doesn't seem like she really ever questioned her choices, right,
She comes into this with so much confidence. She has
sort of this inherent confidence that she's making the right
decisions even if men, you know, and it's usually men
can't see her vision. And that's I think something about
her I really admire, Like I feel like I have
so many doubts.
Speaker 5 (28:24):
Well, as you're saying this, I'm like, god, I need
to like put a Madonna slogan up on my computer
screen to be like, no, actually, you know what the
fuck you're doing?
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Yeah, truly, because I feel like I spent all of
my life second guessing myself. Like it's amazing that she
doesn't have that quality. What a gift in her life.
But either way, her team obviously realizes that she's pushed
the envelope maybe too far this time, and they come
up with this explanation for how she ended up on
the ground with her skirt around her waist. And I
(28:51):
have to tell you that I've heard her tell the
story in many different arenas over the course of many years,
and she told it as recently is twenty twenty two
on Jimmy fallon and she must believe it at this
point here she is talking about what happened when she
got to the bottom of the giant wedding cake.
Speaker 7 (29:09):
My white still little pumps fell off and I was
trying to do like the smooth move, like dive for
the shoe and make it look like it was choreography. Yeah,
and my dress flipped up and my butt was showing.
Can't imagine happened by accident. I didn't even know my
butt was showing.
Speaker 4 (29:25):
Wait, okay, this is so interesting.
Speaker 5 (29:27):
So has this explanation then been concocted to like justify it.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
Well, that is the official story. She has told many
times that she fell onto the ground because she was
trying to retrieve her shoe.
Speaker 5 (29:41):
I mean, I guess it is somewhat believable that she
would be trying to like sexily and without causing a pause,
put back on the shoes wallowed the floor, but also
doing it.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
In this way.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
Yeah, But Mary Gabriel tells a different story in her
book when.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
She starts to roll around on the floor her shoes around.
You know, I think that that scenario was something her
manager cooked up to kind of justify her having performed
this what was at the time considered incredibly leude act
where her dress rode up and you know, her underwear
was showed, and I mean it was an absolutely chaste
performance by today's standards. It wasn't just that her bottom
(30:18):
was exposed. It was that she was obviously a lustful
woman satisfying herself, not overtly masturbating. But that was the implication.
And for that to happen on TV at that time,
to have this young gorgeous woman saying, you know what, guys,
I don't need you. You know, I can satisfy myself.
(30:39):
You can keep your wedding cake. That was a message
too far.
Speaker 5 (30:43):
Okay, So I didn't realize there was like this whole
back and forth theory about the shoes. Yeah, you've obviously
watched the performance a lot of times. Now do you
agree with Mary's assessment? Like where I guess it's the
question is the shoe?
Speaker 6 (31:00):
So is that right?
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Yeah, I mean to be honest, I have watched it
a lot, and her shoes were definitely on her feet
when she went down the second time.
Speaker 4 (31:07):
Okay, so the quiet, okay, right, let me just clarify.
Speaker 5 (31:09):
So the question is whether the shoes are already on
her feet when she goes down the second time, or
if she's putting them on her feet and thus has
to like writhe around in order to do stuff.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Yes, the story she's telling is that her shoes were
off her feet, so she went down to put them
back on. She tried to make it look like it
was choreography, and that's why she's riding around on the floor.
Speaker 5 (31:29):
But that's which makes sense for the first time she
goes down, but the second time she goes down, it
does not make sense for the second time.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
That's why I was so clear when we were walking
through it to be like, these shoes are going to matter,
because okay, she kicks off the shoes at the top
of the cake so she can walk down, But once
she gets on the ground, she puts her shoes back on,
and there's a significant amount of the performance where she's
walking around.
Speaker 4 (31:49):
In them in the shoes, and then she lays back
down on the floor.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
And then the part that really scandalizes people is this
crawling around and a stimulating sex and her shoes are
firm on that entire day. I got it, okay, But
I think in a way this also explains something about Madonna,
which is that she's very good at bending reality to
her will. You know, she's really very willing to sort
(32:13):
of be like, no, this is what happened, and she
has said it so many times that I think most
people believe that this whole section of the performance that
got her in trouble was just a mistake, and so
she was given a little bit of a pass for it.
Speaker 4 (32:31):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (32:32):
This is actually reminded me of something that I think
we didn't mention yet, which is that Madonna was not
only at the VMA's to perform like a version, she
was actually nominated for Best New Artist in a Video
for the video for Borderline.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
Yes, she was nominated for Borderline. She ended up losing
to Annie Lennox and the Eurythmics, but you know, she
kind of stole the show, and it turns out that
Annie Lennox was not very gracious in her victory. Really,
after the show, someone asked Annie Lennox out this performance
by Madonna, and she describes it as very very horrish. Wow,
(33:08):
she says something like it was like she was fucking
the music industry. It might have been a parody on
her part, but I thought it was very low.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
Whoa, it's like she's won.
Speaker 5 (33:19):
I'm so confused by this because analytics and the rhythmics
have won, so like, why bother making a nasty comment
about the loser?
Speaker 4 (33:26):
Anyway, Fine, I love them both, but fascinating.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Well, whatever analytics thought, she was wrong, because this performance
really does end upsetting the bar for every performance that
comes after it at the VMA's. In fact, every year
after this, artists have just tried to top Madonna by
being even more outrageous.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
Okay, so let's talk a little bit more about the VMAs.
So this was the first year, but here we are
twenty twenty four. They're still around forty years later, and
there have been many I guess I don't know what
you want to call them, outrageous, iconic, staged wild moments
Like we've talked in a previous episode about Madonna kissing
Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. That was like certainly stage,
(34:22):
but you know they're they are all kind of trying
to top each other.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
And there's also the most maybe famous one which was
not stage, which is when Kanye stole the mic from
t Square.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
Right, thank you so much for giving me a chance
to win a VMA Award.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
No, Taylor, I'm really happy for you.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
I'ma let you finish.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
But Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time.
Speaker 5 (34:49):
I also remember Lady Gaga in the meat dress, like
that was a huge moment about our fashion moment met
there was Miley cyrus turking with Robin Thick in that
Blurred Lines performance.
Speaker 4 (35:02):
I'm sure there's so many, so many right.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Now, we mentioned one earlier. There's Brittany in the Snake.
Speaker 4 (35:07):
There's always something or and if there's not, like that's
a problem for them.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Yeah, it's a bad year for the MS if they
haven't made any noise.
Speaker 5 (35:16):
So that first year, the Madonna year, what were the
awards like or what were the performances like beyond Madonna?
Like was it just all tame or were they kind
of figuring it all out? And then they had this
performance like what else was happening? So I've actually watched
as much of the first year's ceremony as I could.
I've found as many clips of it as are available
on YouTube. It's really hard because there isn't like a
(35:38):
single start to finish recording of this, and I'm so
sad about it.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
I really wish I could have found it. These awards
take place on September fourteenth and nineteen eighty four. It's
a totally live performance, so you know, they don't tape
it and re err it or anything. And it's at
Radio City Music Hall. And it's probably worth noting that
MTV was only three years old at this point. It
was pretty popular already, and it had close to twenty
(36:02):
four million viewers. But the awards were supposed to be
kind of a joke. They were meant to be ironic,
you know. Les Garland, one of the founding executives of MTV,
has said the original thought was to make a mockery
of all award shows. So it surprised us.
Speaker 5 (36:17):
So when people took it seriously, Okay, you know who
else performed that year.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
Well, bat Meddler and Dan Ackward were the hosts, and
performers included Rod Stewart, Tina Turner's Ezy top Holland oates
the famously.
Speaker 4 (36:32):
Anti music video music stars Yeah, Huey.
Speaker 1 (36:36):
Lewis and the News, which was very big at the time,
which people may have forgotten about. And of course Madonna
she was the least famous of the performers. This was
really one of her first big TV appearances. In fact,
her first big TV appearance was on American Bandstand.
Speaker 8 (36:51):
This lady started out as a dancer, went to New York,
went to Paris, worked with bands, came back as a
single and is she hot? This is Madonna.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
It's so funny to watch it now because it's just
like a bunch of white kids like dancing around. And
even that was controversial because at the end he said
to her, like what comes next for you? What are
your dreams? What's like to rule the world?
Speaker 4 (37:14):
There you go, ladies and gentlemen, this is Madonna.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
And people were shocked that she was so presumptuous as
to want to rule the world.
Speaker 5 (37:21):
Okay, And so, just to reiterate for the kids listening, yeah, MTV, Like,
how did you describe how big a cultural impact MTV
had on like our generation.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
Well, let me give you a little background on MTV
stuff that I didn't know, so I think it's interesting.
So MTV was launched on August first in nineteen eighty one.
Speaker 5 (37:41):
There were exactly one month older than me. Oh amazing,
I'm literally the MTV generation. You are You are the
MTV generation.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
Well, you might actually be a little young to be
the MTV generation because yah, I guess the MTV generation
were the teenagers who watched those fast two years of MTV.
So it was kind of this ragtag operation, like a
couple of executives who thought that this would be a
relatively cheap way to reach teenagers. That there was no
TV for teenagers at the time, and they only had
(38:09):
about one hundred videos to choose from because artists didn't
make were making music videos like that didn't exist as
an art form. And even though the studios were based
in New York, it was initially only available on cable
channels in New Jersey. So really yeah, so only a
few thousand people on a single cable system in northern
(38:30):
New Jersey could see it. In fact, oh my god,
I read somewhere that to watch the launch, the executives
had to drive to New Jersey.
Speaker 5 (38:39):
Such such a fun fact. If I was from New Jersey,
I would be using that fact.
Speaker 1 (38:43):
Yeah, it's amazing, And the first few hours on the
channel are themselves like very iconic moments in pop culture
ten nine eight. It starts with the footage of a
rocket launching.
Speaker 8 (38:55):
Five four.
Speaker 4 (38:57):
We've gone from main engine starts.
Speaker 1 (38:58):
We have reded, and a voice says, and I can
hear this voice in my head because they used to
use this voice a lot on the channel. Ladies channlemen
rock and roll. And then the first video plays, which
is the song video Killed the Radio Star. The song
is from this band, the Buggles, I think that's how
(39:19):
it's pronounced, which was a British new wave band. This
was their biggest and maybe only hit. And the rest
of the launch is a mix of music videos and
introductions hyping up how high tech this all.
Speaker 6 (39:32):
Is, announcing the latest achievement in home entertainment, the power
of sight, video, the power of sound MTV.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
Music tele and all of the programming was guided by hosts,
or as they called the VJs, which you know, is
like the video version of a DJ.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Welcome to MTV Music Television, the world's first twenty four
hour stereo video music channel.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
They would go on to become household names like I
don't know if you remember, but we knew the names
of vj's on MTV growing up and back in nineteen
eighty one. They were just introducing the concept in this
grandiose way.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
The best of TV combined with the best of radio
starting right now. You'll never look at music the same way.
Speaker 4 (40:16):
Again, that's amazing, okay.
Speaker 5 (40:18):
And so if they only had about one hundred music
videos to choose from, did they even were.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
They calling them music videos?
Speaker 7 (40:25):
Then?
Speaker 4 (40:26):
Like, what where were they finding these things?
Speaker 1 (40:28):
Well, a lot of the videos came from abroad, actually,
so they found clips or videos that had been made
by bands in other countries. In fact, one of the
things that MTV did is really bring a lot of
British music to the States because that wasn't really being
played on the radio. It's considered sort of the second
British invasion. And it is just true that music videos
(40:50):
the way we think about them genuinely did not exist.
I know that's hard to believe, but you know, shows
that focused on music, like American Bandstand, which launched in
fifty seven and was such a huge and popular show,
they just featured live performances. So when there was a video.
It was considered a short film before this. And one
of the things that was so funny in the research
(41:12):
is that reporters couldn't figure out how to describe what
music videos were when the channel launched. And I found
this amazing clip when Time magazine tried to describe it
to its readers. This is how they did it. The
main ingredients in MTV's programming are video records or videos
colon current recordings illustrated by three or four minute video tape.
Speaker 5 (41:33):
Oh my god, did you watch that video colin current
recordings posted by three or four minute video tapes?
Speaker 1 (41:38):
Wow?
Speaker 4 (41:39):
That's me. I love archives.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
Oh and I have to tell you the other detail
I love is that because it was literally like a
person who was just like inserting tapes into a VCR
in the early years, sometimes the screen would go black
when someone was changing.
Speaker 5 (41:54):
Out changing the v Oh my gosh, changing the tape
in the VCR. Yes, Can we go back to that time? Honestly,
it just feels like such a simpler time.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
I mean, it was a simpler time, but there were
lots of horrible things happening back then too. There was
the AIDS crisis. I mean, I think That's what's kind
of interesting about the era, right, is like, in some
ways it does feel simpler, but part of it is
because there was this aura of oh, everything's fine, but
underneath it, there were a lot of things that weren't fine.
And you know, that's what the MTV generation, this generation
(42:26):
of kids who grew up on MTV, were reacting to
in a lot of ways. That's what Madonna was reacting to,
for sure. But yeah, the channel is almost instantly successful,
even though it's like barely available. They start getting more
and more carriers, and one of the ways they convince
carriers to use it is they do a survey. They
send people to record stores and say, are people asking
(42:48):
for records that they're only seeing on MTV versus things
that are being played on the radio, And record stores
say that that is the case. They are seeing kids
coming in increasingly and they are selling more and more
music only available on MTV. And that's how the executive
convinced more cable stations to take it. And another thing
that's kind of interesting about this is that cable television
(43:10):
wasn't that big at that time. It was kind of
still in its early stages, and there was no programming
specifically for teens. And you know, cable TV was more
common in the suburbs and rural areas because it was
easier to run cable there. So you need to actually
run cable to make cable available to more people.
Speaker 4 (43:30):
And so initially a lot of what does run cable mean?
Like run a wire?
Speaker 1 (43:34):
Well, no physical cable, like you know, cable is a.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
Okay, yeah, run like running a wire, that's what, right,
Like running cable wasn't a cable.
Speaker 4 (43:43):
This is kind of the same as a wire.
Speaker 1 (43:45):
I mean, I mean I'm not a technical expert, so
let's say yes.
Speaker 5 (43:48):
Anyway, Okay, so you mean they need running a physical.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
Cable, yes, so to actually like make it available to people.
And so, because a lot of the kids who saw
it were in these suburban and rural areas, first they
really loved it because they didn't have access to what
was going on in New York. Now, they didn't have
access to this world that suddenly they were seeing for themselves.
Speaker 5 (44:12):
Right, It wasn't like everyone could access the same things
on the internet. This was like truly you were kind
of on the inside or in the know if you
had access to this.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, and so within a few years, kids are demanding
that their parents buy cable so they can see MTV.
And in a lot of ways, CNN and MTV are
really credited with leading TV's transition from being just the
three main channels, you know, ABC, CBS, NBC to really
expanding the cable world and leading to this cable explosion.
(44:45):
But the cultural impact honestly goes beyond just cable, right.
MTV really changes the way people experience music. You know,
Mary talks about this in her book about how after
centuries of just listening to music, people now really want
to watch it.
Speaker 3 (44:59):
Here she is again in Madonna's generation young filmmakers, this
whole generation took that idea and made it an art form.
And Madonna was the absolute perfect person for that because
she was so visually aware of how she appeared in
a camera, how she appeared moving in front of a camera.
(45:19):
She was preternaturally prepared for the video era.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
And in many ways, the rise of Madonna and the
rise of MTV happened together, right, they're sort of inextricably linked.
Speaker 3 (45:29):
Yes, there's time almost simultaneous. That year that Madonna recorded
her first video, which was also nineteen eighty two, for
her song burning up. Changes had begun to occur because
the people making the videos weren't corporate. They were artists,
and you know, the culture was about to change radically,
and Madonna was at the forefront.
Speaker 5 (45:53):
That feels like a really good place to end Part one, Susie,
what do we have in store next week?
Speaker 1 (45:58):
So next week we're going to take you beyond the
like a virgin performance and tell you what happens next.
We'll chart how those three minutes on the VMA stage,
which we're supposed to tank her career, actually end up
turning Madonna into the huge superstar we know that she
is now. So please join us for that. This is
(46:24):
in retrospect. Thanks for listening. Is there a pop culture
moment you can't stop thinking about and want us to
explore in a future episode. Email us at inretropod at
gmail dot com or find us on Instagram at in retropod.
Speaker 5 (46:37):
If you love this podcast, please rate and review us
on Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen. If you
hate it, you can post nasty comments on our Instagram,
which we may or may not delete.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
You can also find us on Instagram at Jessica Bennett
and at Susie b NYC. Also check out Jessica's books
Feminist Fight Club and This Is Eighteen.
Speaker 5 (46:55):
In Retrospect is a production of iHeart Podcasts and the Media.
Speaker 4 (47:00):
Larn Hansen is our supervising producer. Derek Clements is our
engineer and sound designer. Emily Meronoff is our producer. Sharon
Atia is our researcher and associate producer.
Speaker 1 (47:10):
Our executive producer from the media is Cindy Levy. Our
executive producers from iHeart are Anna Stump and Katrina Norbel.
Our artwork is from Pentagram. Our mixing engineer is Amanda
Rose Smith. Additional editing help from Mary Do. We are
your hosts Susie Bannacharum and Jessica Bennett. We are also
executive producers. For even more check out in retropod dot com.
(47:34):
See you next week.
The MTV Video Music Awards were launched in nineteen eighty four.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
MTV presents Dead Waiting, Rock and Rolling ba again of
the last three thousand years the MTV.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Music It was meant to be ironic, a way to
poke fun at the seriousness of traditional award shows, but
the new music channel for teens was popular and big
stars showed up this lad story. Nick Jagger also there
a relatively unknown twenty six year old Madonna, in one
of her first performances on television, there to sing an
(00:33):
unreleased song like a Virgin. She stood atop a seventeen
foot wedding cake, dressed like a bride but wearing a
belt buckle emblazoned with the words boy toy. When she
got to the bottom of the cake, she dropped to
the ground, crawling and rolling around, simulating sex and revealing
(00:54):
her lingerie and a little bit of her butt. The
audience and the world aghast at the sheer audacity of it.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Madonna so outraged everyone in that room that her manager said,
your career is done.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
But far from ending her ascent to the top of
the charts, that performance would change Madonna's career and life forever,
transforming her from pop newcomer to superstar.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
I'm Susie Bannacaram and I'm Jessica Bennett.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
And this is in Retrospect, where each week we revisit
a cultural moment from the past that shaped us and.
Speaker 4 (01:32):
That we just can't stop thinking about.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Today, we're talking about one of Madonna's iconic early performances,
one that was so scandalous many predicted it would end
her career. But we're also talking about the rise of
MTV and how together MTV and Madonna became a force
that would define eighties pop culture.
Speaker 5 (01:51):
This is part one, Susie, I don't remember this moment
from real time, but I of course from watching clips
of it or seeing clips of it over and over
and over again because I was such a Madonna fan.
Speaker 4 (02:05):
Yeah, but there are so many Madonna moments, so why
this one?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Yeah, I mean, you would have been really young, so
it doesn't surprise me that you didn't see this in
real time. I'm a little older than you, so I
do remember it when it happened. But also I've just
always loved Madonna and I loved MTV. Like early MTV
is hard to describe to people who are used to
current MTV. But MTV was so fun and it felt
(02:30):
so free, and it was a way to discover music
and artists. So this moment felt like a good way
to talk about two things that were really big cultural
influences on me. And Madonna herself is just amazing. I
was just like this huge fan I dressed liked her,
I loved the music, and I don't know if it
(02:51):
was conscious at the time because I was still pretty little,
but she sort of represented what it meant to be free, right,
Like what it was like to be cool and to
do whatever you wanted and to not listen to other
people Like it felt very liberating to me to love her,
and so I was thinking, I really want to do
a Madonna episode. But you can't do all of Madonna,
(03:13):
you know what I mean, Like you said, such a
prolific career. There have been so many chapters, and her
influence is so broad. So I was like, what could
I do that could just encapsulate one period or one
moment in her time? And this felt like a good
example of that.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Yeah, I totally agree.
Speaker 5 (03:32):
I mean, it's really hard to explain to someone growing
up today how cool MTV was.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Yeah, it was really cool.
Speaker 5 (03:41):
Even now, occasionally there's like weird channels or I'll find
them on Hulu that are playing just old MTV music
videos and I'm like, oh my god, oh my god,
and i feel like I'm thirteen again, because that was
how we got culture, I guess, and it was like,
I don't know what felt transgressive, and I just remember
going over to friends houses who had k and just
(04:01):
clapping down on the couch and sitting there for hours
and hours and hours, absolutely glued to the television, wanting
to memorize every little detail of every video and every song.
Speaker 4 (04:11):
The big number one last week Salt and Pepper and
Bog Water Man. Yep, and we've got two hours of
the hottest videos in the country.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Well, you know, I think another thing that's important to
note is that we didn't have YouTube, We didn't have
access to video on demand. So getting to see your
favorite video was like really special. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Yes, you had to race to the television, yes, and
you had to.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
Like record it on VHS if you wanted to watch
it again. And when they debuted a video, it was
a big event.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Here is the planet's first look at smells like teen Spirit.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
It's just really different when all you have is a
few channels on the television, and only one of them
is really geared towards you and the things you're interested in.
That's like four, we're in to someone growing up now.
Speaker 5 (05:02):
Okay, so you know we're talking about this performance she
gave in nineteen eighty four, like a virgin. She's like
writhing around on the floor. It's you know, goes down
in history in many ways. And you're going to walk
us through all of that. But before we get deep
into it, who is Madonna in this year? She's not
yet a big star?
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Is that right? Yeah, she's not a big star yet.
She's sort of an up and coming star. She's released
her first single.
Speaker 6 (05:28):
The song that out on the radio right now, called Everybody.
It's about getting people could dance and lose their inhibition.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
And in nineteen eighty two, just a couple of years
before this, it charted on the dance charts, but it
wasn't super mainstream, but it did help her get her
first album deal. Right, so she does have an album.
She's released an album at this point in July of
nineteen eighty three, and it's a great album. I just
want to say, I listened to it again this morning,
just to psych myself up. And it's just full of bangers, right,
(05:56):
Lucky Star Holiday border line, Like, she comes out of
the gate with this really strong album. But it debuted
on the Billboard charts at one ninety. Oh that's so surprising, okay,
Right in the United States, it wasn't that popular, and
it didn't peak until after this performance. After this performance,
it made it to number eight on the charts, I see.
(06:16):
And that was more than a year after it was released,
So you know, this is the performance that's going to
push her into superstardom. At this point, she's still kind
of like a known entity, but not by everyone. Holiday
as a great single. I think we're going to hear
a lot more of you such license, thank you, and
thanks for doing the interview.
Speaker 6 (06:34):
You're welcome.
Speaker 5 (06:35):
So that's interesting because if she wasn't huge at that moment,
why did MTV pick her to perform or how did
they have the fourth site to know that she was
going to be huge?
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Well, Empty's audience was a little different than the mainstream
radio audience, right, That's one of the things MTV did
that was pretty unique is that they chose their artists
in a different way. Than the radio DJs did, and
Madonna was very much an MTV artist. She embraced music
videos really early, when a lot of other musicians were
(07:05):
extremely skeptical. She saw a potential in it.
Speaker 4 (07:09):
It's so funny to think about now.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
A lot of artists were really skeptical of MTV and
music videos. They felt like it was impinging on their
art in some way, Like there were like were these
lessons and like this is asking us to be actors.
Speaker 5 (07:23):
Oh god, it's like if we could go back to that, honestly,
like now everyone has to be actor anyway, Kerry.
Speaker 1 (07:29):
Oh yeah. And actually, there's this amazing video you can
find on YouTube where Madonna is on a panel at
some music conference in nineteen eighty four and they're talking
about the rise of MTV and music videos and all
the other musicians are complaining about it, and Madonna is
pushing back.
Speaker 6 (07:44):
You could be reaching a lot of people that would
never be able to come and see you live, So
I think that definitely an advantage.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
She's really the least famous person on this panel, but
in true Madonna fashion, she interrupts James Brown at one points.
Speaker 6 (07:58):
I'm sorry, but you know, kids today worship the television,
So I think it's a great way to reach them.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Honestly. The funniest part is that she gets into it
with John Oates of Holland Oates. They would, by the way,
go on to completely embrace music videos and performed at
the same VMAs where Madonna performed like a Virgin. But
here John Oates is very against the idea of music
videos because he is a serious musician as far as
I'm concerned. You know, I always wanted to be a musician,
(08:28):
and you know, to me, that's still my purpose.
Speaker 2 (08:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (08:33):
But listen, when you perform on stage, you're acting. I mean,
that's a performance. So what's I mean if someone puts
a cam on you, what's the difference?
Speaker 1 (08:41):
So she really saw the potential, right, And that's partially
because a lot of her early career was tied to
the culture in New York in those early years that
she got here, and there were a ton of filmmakers
around her and artists, and so she was just really
comfortable with the medium. She was comfortable being on camera. Yeah,
and I'm going to tell you about all of that,
(09:02):
but I want to finish telling you about the performance first.
Speaker 4 (09:05):
Yes, Okay, So back to the performance.
Speaker 5 (09:07):
You know, you said in the intro that like a
Virgin hadn't actually been released yet, so it's interesting or
I guess is it interesting?
Speaker 4 (09:15):
Tell me that she chose to perform that song on stage.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
It is interesting, and I think it's really unusual. I'm
not sure that MTV or your label would let.
Speaker 5 (09:25):
You do that now because it's like a debut, right
She's debuting it on stage kind of.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
Yeah, and she debuts a song and people are obsessed
with it, but they can't buy it. That's why her
album goes back on the charts, because they're like, this
is an amazing song, and when they go to record stores,
I need more. You can download it, so it's not
available right away. She chose to sing this, I think
because she was really anxious to release it. You know,
(09:53):
this performance was in September. The song itself isn't released
until the end of October, and she knew knew it
was going to be a big hit. She suspected that
it was going to really resonate, and she was anxious
to get it out and she was saying to people,
I'm anxious to get it out, but her record label
didn't want her to release it until the previous album
(10:15):
had kind of peaked and valleyed, because they wanted to
take as much advantage of that as possible. So it
kind of makes sense that they wanted her to wait
and that she didn't, And I think she just convinced
MTV to let her do it. And at the time,
the labels didn't think of MTV as that important, so yeah,
they wouldn't have argued with her about it. They would
be like, yeah, perform whatever you want on that like
(10:36):
silly thing on that channel that like teens watch.
Speaker 4 (10:40):
You know, that's so interesting.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
So I want to tell you a couple other things
about the song, which I think are fascinating and I
learned through this process. The song was actually written by
two men. One of them had recently started a new
relationship and he wanted to like describe how amazing it
felt to be in a relationship again after a rough patch.
So all of the double entendres that you hear when
Madonna sings it, they weren't really intended in the song,
(11:07):
and it was written for a man to sing. They
thought a man would likely sing it. They just happened
to play it for a record executive and then that
record executive happened the next day to me meeting with Madonna,
so he has this idea that it might work for her.
He plays her the demo and she immediately gets it.
She's immediately like, this song will be amazing. I want
(11:29):
to record it.
Speaker 5 (11:30):
It's so perfect because it's you think that she has
written and I mean, I didn't know it was written
by two men, but like you, it's the it is her,
like that song is her.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Yeah, it's interesting because she's gotten to writing credit on
almost every song, or maybe every song she's ever sung.
And I think it's because even when other people write
music for her, she's very involved in the process of
making it her own. So I think all her music
sounds like she's written it, even though you know she's herself.
Would admit she's not a musician in that way. She
(12:01):
doesn't write the music, but she has a very clear
sense of what she likes and what she thinks is
going to work for her and her point of view.
It's not even really just about the music. It's like
about the story she wants to tell at any given time.
Speaker 5 (12:16):
I mean, that's a perfect entree into the performance itself.
I haven't watched it in a while, and I assume
listeners haven't either.
Speaker 4 (12:25):
Can you describe it for us?
Speaker 1 (12:26):
Oh yeah, I'd be happy too, because I've watched it
like ninety times in the last three weeks. I just
keep watching it over and over again.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
Welcome back to the first annual MTV Video Music Awards Show.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
So the performance starts and Madonna is dressed kind of
like a rock and roll bride, right, And she's standing
on top of this seventeen foot three layer wedding cake.
And there's a mannequin next to her dressed as a groom,
So it's like a bride and groom on top of
a cake. And she has on a veil and she's
(12:59):
holding a bouquet and she starts singing, and it starts
with a real close up of her and it sort
of pulls out and as she sings, she kicks off
her heels and they land in front of the cake.
This will matter later, and she starts walking down the
cake using the layers as steps, okay, And she pulls
(13:23):
back her veil and you see that she's wearing all
these necklaces, one of which is a cross, right, and
she has on this white belt.
Speaker 4 (13:31):
Oh yeah, it's like I can see it.
Speaker 1 (13:33):
I can see it, And the belt buckle says boy toy, which, incidentally,
I learned in my research was her graffiti tag because
when she was living in New York, graffiti had become
a big art form and she was dating Bascyat and
she was really close to Keith Herring, who were both
really into graffiti. So she had her own graffiti tag
and it was ironically boy toy.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
Wow.
Speaker 5 (13:55):
So it's like every little detail of that outfit is
so meticulously thought her.
Speaker 1 (13:59):
Yes, and also just tells you a story about Madonna
and where she was at that time. So she's an
all white lace and there's like Cooca dot tool in
her dress, and she's wearing a bustille with spaghetti straps,
and she's wearing the fingerless gloves. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (14:14):
I mean we all had a pair of those, right,
Like everyone did. It became that classic look.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Yeah, it was the very classic Madonna look that all
the little girls emulated. And when most people dress up
as Madonna for Halloween, they put on right. I've definitely
done that. And you can see in the performance that
she already knows how to work a camera. At times,
she looks straight into it in a way that can
only be described as extremely seductive. Like I can't think
(14:38):
of another way to describe it. But she's working the camera,
which a lot of people just didn't know how to
do yet. Right, she's conscious of where it is. She
knows how to move in a way that it's going
to capture her in the ways that are most flattering.
And as she starts to walk down the cake, she
takes off the veil and she takes down her hair.
(15:00):
Her hair's up and she sort of like takes out
the thing that's holding it and she shakes it out
the way you do when you're getting ready for bed.
And even that a scene at the time is a
little risque, right, Like she's.
Speaker 4 (15:13):
It's not progressed. It's not how you shake your hair
when you're going to bed.
Speaker 5 (15:17):
Yeah, I mean, of course, it's like when you're getting
ready to jump into bed with someone.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
Maybe I know. It's also that like classic librarian thing
whenever they want to make a librarian hot. She like
takes down her hair and she shakes it.
Speaker 5 (15:28):
There is a name, by the way, I forget what
it is, but there is a name for that shaking
down of the butt.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Oh, really oh amazing.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
Yeah, yeah, it was like a trope name for it. Anyway,
carry amazing.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
And so when she gets to the bottom of the cake,
she drops to the floor and she lays on her
back for a second, and you see that she's grabbing
her white stiletto heels and putting them on, sort of
off camera.
Speaker 4 (15:50):
Oh so she's like putting them back on because she's
thrown them off.
Speaker 1 (15:52):
Yeah, she threw them off to be able to walk
down this like really kind of precarious cake, to be honest.
And so now she's putting them on and the camera's
focused on her face. So the next time you see her,
the shoes are back on her feet and she throws
the bouquet into the crowd. And when she went down
for the heels, she did lie down for a second.
She sort of like laid down, so when she was
putting them on, it wasn't so noticeable that she was
(16:14):
putting them back on. But now she's on her feet,
and she's on her feet for some amount of time,
and then she decides to go back down to the
floor and she throws her veil onto the stage and
she gets down and she does what I think can
only be described as writhing or rolling around on the floor.
(16:35):
She sort of similates sex by thrusting her hips and
at the end she's crawling around and the skirt rides
up to her waist and the camera gets a picture
of essentially her legs and her garter belts and her butt.
But I don't know how else to say this. It's
sort of just like under butt, Like it's not her
full butt, even though that's what everyone would say after.
Speaker 4 (16:57):
This, because she's wearing underwear.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Yeah, she's wearing underwear, so you're just seeing her long ray. Okay,
I mean you can't really see the underwear. It's just
like I think it's just white lace underwear. But she
has these garter belts on and you see your hose,
so it's not that crazy. But at the time it's
considered wildly inappropriate. And as she's lying there on the
ground on her back, the camera cuts to black.
Speaker 4 (17:26):
So are people like going wild? Is the audience screaming?
Speaker 7 (17:31):
Like?
Speaker 4 (17:32):
Are what's the reaction?
Speaker 6 (17:33):
Like?
Speaker 5 (17:33):
Is it actually as scandalous as I don't know, you
made it sound like it doesn't sound that scandalous, But
was it considered scandless?
Speaker 1 (17:41):
In nineteen eighty four, it was considered scandalless. So, I mean,
the audience just claps like normal. They're not like on
their feet and freaking out there. It's a regular sort
of clapping. And then I mean, who are these people?
Get on your feet? I don't know, but you know,
and then immediately it goes to commercial. But you're right
that it wouldn't be considered a wild performance today. It
was seen as extremely controversial. But people have come out
(18:05):
in much less clothing since this, Right, there's like the
Brittany with the snake, and Madonna herself has done performances
that have been far more risque since this. But you
have to think about that. Even at that time, the
fact that the song used the word virgin was seen
as a provocation. So then suddenly pairing it with a
wedding dress and a cross and showing some skin is
(18:28):
considered just beyond what is acceptable. And in the video
that's available now, you don't see the crowd reaction shots, right,
You just see them clapping and then it goes to
the commercial. But reporting at the time said that people
were literally aghast. Her longtime publicist Liz Rosenberg, said that
people were gasping in the audience. Oh really, okay, and
(18:50):
that Madonna took it so much further than anyone knew
she was capable of.
Speaker 4 (18:54):
Oh interesting, okay, So maybe they were a guess, we
just didn't see it.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
You just don't see it because unlike now where they
have made a point to like go to the audience
and show your reaction, they just weren't that sophisticated at
the time.
Speaker 5 (19:05):
Yeah, that's a good point too. It's like this is
a different kind of camera work.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
Yeah, than we would expect now, because now they would
be prepared, they would wanted to assume a shot in
a house. So and so reacted exactly. And another example,
just so you get a sense of what the reaction was.
A cultural critic at the Philly Inquirer wrote at the
time that despite the fact that people think rock musicians
and rock industry people are you know, jaded and decadent
(19:30):
and nothing can shock them, that in fact, the crowd
looked absolutely shocked, and that you know, co host Bet Midler,
who herself was seen as you know, a little provocative,
was moved afterwards to roll her eyes and make a
few a few remarks about Madonna's virginity.
Speaker 4 (19:48):
Oh interesting. Yeah, I wish we knew what those were,
but I'm sure they're not.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
I tried to find them, honestly, because I thought it
would be really funny to play them. But I haven't
been able to uncover that particular of the award show.
But you know, this Philly Inquirer critic basically makes the
point that the rock business must now be conservative because
look how they responded to this, which is kind of
a funny idea, right.
Speaker 5 (20:11):
Yeah, I mean it's worth noting or contextualizing a little
bit what was happening in the eighties. This is the
Reagan era, the whole like traditional family values thing.
Speaker 8 (20:21):
Family life has changed much down through the years. The
days when we could expect to live in only one
home and hold only one job or probably gone forever.
Perhaps we will not go back to the old family ways,
but I think we can and should preserve family values.
Speaker 5 (20:36):
So it's not shocking in some way to think people
would be scandalized by this in nineteen eighty four, whereas
had this performance occurred in nineteen sixty nine, it would
stock or something like.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
Maybe that wouldn't have been the case.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Yeah, I mean, I think, yes, very much. The Reagan era,
which starts in eighty one when he's elected president, and
he remains in office until eighty nine, so he's really
president for all of the eighties. And you think about it,
and that era was very much a reaction to the
civil rights and feminist movements, and he was an extremely
popular president, probably the most popular Republican president. And some
(21:13):
could argue whether or not Trump is as popular as Reagan.
I think there's a lot of evidence he is not,
because Reagan really appealed even to moderates, right They felt
like he was this kind of goofy actor turned politician.
Speaker 8 (21:25):
Tomorrow is my birthday, and I prefer to think of
it as the thirty sixth anniversary of my thirty ninth,
but I'll be just about due for a midlife crisis.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
He exudes this very wholesome americanism, and what he's sort
of reassuring Americans of is that we're going to go
back to family values, traditional family values, whatever that means.
Speaker 5 (21:47):
So Madonna with her cross and the virginal yes, the
virginal whore on top of the wedding cake with her
cross strutting down onto the stage is not considered traditional
family value.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
Is not considered traditional family values. And actually, to prepare
for this episode, I read this great new book about
Madonna from the renowned biographer Mary Gabriel. The book is
called Madonna, a Rebel Life, and she's written a lot
of books about remarkable women. I highly recommend it. It's
an excellent book, and in it she actually talked a
little bit about what this era was like.
Speaker 3 (22:23):
Oh great for young people who don't understand that time.
It was a time of extreme reaction, conservative reaction. It
was a time when the conservative movement really gained leverage
within the Reagan administration to turn back the clock on
reforms legislatively and politically and socially. So any social advances
(22:44):
that had been made that freed people and made actually
post war freedoms, whether it's financial equality, the labor union's
sexual equality, racial equality, whatever had been achieved up to
let's say the seventies, all came under attack by conservatives.
I mean, they really, you know, we know this phrase,
they played the long game. That phrase wasn't used in
(23:06):
but that's what they were doing.
Speaker 5 (23:08):
So it's interesting because it almost feels significant that Madonna
is perhaps I mean, I think, knowing what we know
of her now this probably becomes true challenging that with
this performance, Reagan was very much focused on preserving the
sanctity of the traditional family. And I'm sure Madonna, who
had you know, was like gallivanting around New York City
(23:30):
in the late seventies and early eighties in this like
very specific time of artists and free love is pushing
against that.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Yeah, very much. And interestingly, her initial idea for this
performance was also out there, but probably wouldn't have been
so challenging to that worldview. The wedding cake was actually
her second choice for our prop. She initially wanted to
sing the song to a tiger, but the producers obviously
were like, no, be serious, we can't have it like time,
(23:59):
like a live tiger, like a giant. And she's like,
singing the song to the tiger, yes, like if the
tiger was the one who was making her feel like
a version, oh.
Speaker 5 (24:08):
Okay, And so that that's so interesting because that weill
wild and dangerous and whatever like wouldn't have actually been
as controversial.
Speaker 1 (24:16):
So it wouldn't have been but obviously the producers are like,
it's too dangerous, like the tiger could kill.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
Someone pre Britney Snake era, Yes, pre Britney snak era, Right, they.
Speaker 4 (24:25):
Don't want to get mauled by a tiger.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
And so just five days before the performance, she goes
back to them and says, how about this seventeen foot cake?
She had recently done something like this at a party
and it had been this big success, and so the
producer say that they built the cake for her, even
though it put them over budget.
Speaker 5 (24:43):
Okay, that is such an important detail. And also that
made me remember, isn't there some sort of maybe a
lion or like some other large cat in the music
video for the Yes?
Speaker 1 (24:54):
In the music video she does get her wild cat.
She gets a lion and she sings to it. But
you know, it's still sort of like tied a little
bit to this performance. And in fact what happens is
a lot of times MTV actually just runs this performance
as the music video because it's such a popular moment.
Speaker 4 (25:13):
But why the cake? Like, what did this cake represent
to her?
Speaker 8 (25:17):
Do we know?
Speaker 1 (25:17):
Yeah, we do know, and in fact we know because
of Mary Gabriel. She wrote a lot about this performance
in the book I mentioned, and she discovered something interesting
in her research.
Speaker 3 (25:27):
Her idea was that she was going to make a
comment on marriage about how when you're on the top
of the cake, in other words, just getting married, everything
is so wonderful and rosy and dreamlike and gauzy and pure.
But as she came down the cake, it was like
Dante's Inferno. You know, she went through the various layers
of marriage, you know, and by the time she got
(25:48):
to the floor, it was, you know, she was well
acquainted with what marriage really was, and so she started
rolling around on the floor and you know, kind of
writhing mock masturbation, and you know, it was classic Madonna.
Speaker 5 (26:02):
I love hearing how deliberate her choices are and how
she's always focused on telling a story. Like these are
things that I think we assume about Madonna. But Mary
Gabriel really.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Uncovered this, yes, because this had never been published before.
It was part of the reporter's notes that she got
access to for her book. So I love this detail.
It's one that's never really been discussed. And I do
think at the time people thought Madonna was manufactured in
some way, like they felt like, you know, she was
a pop star. Maybe the record labels were making her decisions,
maybe this or that, But the reality is she always
(26:34):
had real intention behind the choices she made, and they
were her choices, right, And it really speaks to that
when you think about this, right, this is a really
complex setup for this what seems like just an off
the cuff performance.
Speaker 5 (26:48):
There's a lot of messages, yeah, wrapped into this one performance. Okay,
(27:09):
so we know that people are apparently aghast in the audience,
although we don't see it on their faces if you
watch the video back now. But has Madonna ever talked
about what immediately happens after that performance.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
She has talked about it, and in fact, she talked
about it recently in twenty twenty one. She was on
Howard Stern's show, and here's what she said.
Speaker 9 (27:27):
After I got off stage during that performance, my manager
was white as a ghost, and he looked at me
and said, do you know what you just did? And
I said, yeah, I sang a song and I lost
my shoe on stage and he's like, no, your butt
was showing for the entire song.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
Your career is over. Wow.
Speaker 5 (27:43):
So I wonder if she freaked out that he says that,
or is she like, I'm Madonna, I'll do anything, you know.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
She says she wasn't even then, even that early in
her career. She says, you know, I wasn't that apologetic.
I was just like, well, fuck it, I made a mistake.
Speaker 4 (27:56):
You don't go somewhere and crying say I just lost
my career. No that, but also interesting that she did
consider it a mistake, at least it first.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
It doesn't seem like she really ever questioned her choices, right,
She comes into this with so much confidence. She has
sort of this inherent confidence that she's making the right
decisions even if men, you know, and it's usually men
can't see her vision. And that's I think something about
her I really admire, Like I feel like I have
so many doubts.
Speaker 5 (28:24):
Well, as you're saying this, I'm like, god, I need
to like put a Madonna slogan up on my computer
screen to be like, no, actually, you know what the
fuck you're doing?
Speaker 1 (28:31):
Yeah, truly, because I feel like I spent all of
my life second guessing myself. Like it's amazing that she
doesn't have that quality. What a gift in her life.
But either way, her team obviously realizes that she's pushed
the envelope maybe too far this time, and they come
up with this explanation for how she ended up on
the ground with her skirt around her waist. And I
(28:51):
have to tell you that I've heard her tell the
story in many different arenas over the course of many years,
and she told it as recently is twenty twenty two
on Jimmy fallon and she must believe it at this
point here she is talking about what happened when she
got to the bottom of the giant wedding cake.
Speaker 7 (29:09):
My white still little pumps fell off and I was
trying to do like the smooth move, like dive for
the shoe and make it look like it was choreography. Yeah,
and my dress flipped up and my butt was showing.
Can't imagine happened by accident. I didn't even know my
butt was showing.
Speaker 4 (29:25):
Wait, okay, this is so interesting.
Speaker 5 (29:27):
So has this explanation then been concocted to like justify it.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
Well, that is the official story. She has told many
times that she fell onto the ground because she was
trying to retrieve her shoe.
Speaker 5 (29:41):
I mean, I guess it is somewhat believable that she
would be trying to like sexily and without causing a pause,
put back on the shoes wallowed the floor, but also
doing it.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
In this way.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
Yeah, But Mary Gabriel tells a different story in her
book when.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
She starts to roll around on the floor her shoes around.
You know, I think that that scenario was something her
manager cooked up to kind of justify her having performed
this what was at the time considered incredibly leude act
where her dress rode up and you know, her underwear
was showed, and I mean it was an absolutely chaste
performance by today's standards. It wasn't just that her bottom
(30:18):
was exposed. It was that she was obviously a lustful
woman satisfying herself, not overtly masturbating. But that was the implication.
And for that to happen on TV at that time,
to have this young gorgeous woman saying, you know what, guys,
I don't need you. You know, I can satisfy myself.
(30:39):
You can keep your wedding cake. That was a message
too far.
Speaker 5 (30:43):
Okay, So I didn't realize there was like this whole
back and forth theory about the shoes. Yeah, you've obviously
watched the performance a lot of times. Now do you
agree with Mary's assessment? Like where I guess it's the
question is the shoe?
Speaker 6 (31:00):
So is that right?
Speaker 1 (31:00):
Yeah, I mean to be honest, I have watched it
a lot, and her shoes were definitely on her feet
when she went down the second time.
Speaker 4 (31:07):
Okay, so the quiet, okay, right, let me just clarify.
Speaker 5 (31:09):
So the question is whether the shoes are already on
her feet when she goes down the second time, or
if she's putting them on her feet and thus has
to like writhe around in order to do stuff.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Yes, the story she's telling is that her shoes were
off her feet, so she went down to put them
back on. She tried to make it look like it
was choreography, and that's why she's riding around on the floor.
Speaker 5 (31:29):
But that's which makes sense for the first time she
goes down, but the second time she goes down, it
does not make sense for the second time.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
That's why I was so clear when we were walking
through it to be like, these shoes are going to matter,
because okay, she kicks off the shoes at the top
of the cake so she can walk down, But once
she gets on the ground, she puts her shoes back on,
and there's a significant amount of the performance where she's
walking around.
Speaker 4 (31:49):
In them in the shoes, and then she lays back
down on the floor.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
And then the part that really scandalizes people is this
crawling around and a stimulating sex and her shoes are
firm on that entire day. I got it, okay, But
I think in a way this also explains something about Madonna,
which is that she's very good at bending reality to
her will. You know, she's really very willing to sort
(32:13):
of be like, no, this is what happened, and she
has said it so many times that I think most
people believe that this whole section of the performance that
got her in trouble was just a mistake, and so
she was given a little bit of a pass for it.
Speaker 4 (32:31):
Okay.
Speaker 5 (32:32):
This is actually reminded me of something that I think
we didn't mention yet, which is that Madonna was not
only at the VMA's to perform like a version, she
was actually nominated for Best New Artist in a Video
for the video for Borderline.
Speaker 1 (32:44):
Yes, she was nominated for Borderline. She ended up losing
to Annie Lennox and the Eurythmics, but you know, she
kind of stole the show, and it turns out that
Annie Lennox was not very gracious in her victory. Really,
after the show, someone asked Annie Lennox out this performance
by Madonna, and she describes it as very very horrish. Wow,
(33:08):
she says something like it was like she was fucking
the music industry. It might have been a parody on
her part, but I thought it was very low.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
Whoa, it's like she's won.
Speaker 5 (33:19):
I'm so confused by this because analytics and the rhythmics
have won, so like, why bother making a nasty comment
about the loser?
Speaker 4 (33:26):
Anyway, Fine, I love them both, but fascinating.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Well, whatever analytics thought, she was wrong, because this performance
really does end upsetting the bar for every performance that
comes after it at the VMA's. In fact, every year
after this, artists have just tried to top Madonna by
being even more outrageous.
Speaker 5 (33:59):
Okay, so let's talk a little bit more about the VMAs.
So this was the first year, but here we are
twenty twenty four. They're still around forty years later, and
there have been many I guess I don't know what
you want to call them, outrageous, iconic, staged wild moments
Like we've talked in a previous episode about Madonna kissing
Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. That was like certainly stage,
(34:22):
but you know they're they are all kind of trying
to top each other.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
And there's also the most maybe famous one which was
not stage, which is when Kanye stole the mic from
t Square.
Speaker 4 (34:34):
Right, thank you so much for giving me a chance
to win a VMA Award.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
No, Taylor, I'm really happy for you.
Speaker 2 (34:42):
I'ma let you finish.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
But Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time.
Speaker 5 (34:49):
I also remember Lady Gaga in the meat dress, like
that was a huge moment about our fashion moment met
there was Miley cyrus turking with Robin Thick in that
Blurred Lines performance.
Speaker 4 (35:02):
I'm sure there's so many, so many right.
Speaker 1 (35:04):
Now, we mentioned one earlier. There's Brittany in the Snake.
Speaker 4 (35:07):
There's always something or and if there's not, like that's
a problem for them.
Speaker 1 (35:11):
Yeah, it's a bad year for the MS if they
haven't made any noise.
Speaker 5 (35:16):
So that first year, the Madonna year, what were the
awards like or what were the performances like beyond Madonna?
Like was it just all tame or were they kind
of figuring it all out? And then they had this
performance like what else was happening? So I've actually watched
as much of the first year's ceremony as I could.
I've found as many clips of it as are available
on YouTube. It's really hard because there isn't like a
(35:38):
single start to finish recording of this, and I'm so
sad about it.
Speaker 1 (35:41):
I really wish I could have found it. These awards
take place on September fourteenth and nineteen eighty four. It's
a totally live performance, so you know, they don't tape
it and re err it or anything. And it's at
Radio City Music Hall. And it's probably worth noting that
MTV was only three years old at this point. It
was pretty popular already, and it had close to twenty
(36:02):
four million viewers. But the awards were supposed to be
kind of a joke. They were meant to be ironic,
you know. Les Garland, one of the founding executives of MTV,
has said the original thought was to make a mockery
of all award shows. So it surprised us.
Speaker 5 (36:17):
So when people took it seriously, Okay, you know who
else performed that year.
Speaker 1 (36:23):
Well, bat Meddler and Dan Ackward were the hosts, and
performers included Rod Stewart, Tina Turner's Ezy top Holland oates
the famously.
Speaker 4 (36:32):
Anti music video music stars Yeah, Huey.
Speaker 1 (36:36):
Lewis and the News, which was very big at the time,
which people may have forgotten about. And of course Madonna
she was the least famous of the performers. This was
really one of her first big TV appearances. In fact,
her first big TV appearance was on American Bandstand.
Speaker 8 (36:51):
This lady started out as a dancer, went to New York,
went to Paris, worked with bands, came back as a
single and is she hot? This is Madonna.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
It's so funny to watch it now because it's just
like a bunch of white kids like dancing around. And
even that was controversial because at the end he said
to her, like what comes next for you? What are
your dreams? What's like to rule the world?
Speaker 4 (37:14):
There you go, ladies and gentlemen, this is Madonna.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
And people were shocked that she was so presumptuous as
to want to rule the world.
Speaker 5 (37:21):
Okay, And so, just to reiterate for the kids listening, yeah, MTV, Like,
how did you describe how big a cultural impact MTV
had on like our generation.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
Well, let me give you a little background on MTV
stuff that I didn't know, so I think it's interesting.
So MTV was launched on August first in nineteen eighty one.
Speaker 5 (37:41):
There were exactly one month older than me. Oh amazing,
I'm literally the MTV generation. You are You are the
MTV generation.
Speaker 1 (37:48):
Well, you might actually be a little young to be
the MTV generation because yah, I guess the MTV generation
were the teenagers who watched those fast two years of MTV.
So it was kind of this ragtag operation, like a
couple of executives who thought that this would be a
relatively cheap way to reach teenagers. That there was no
TV for teenagers at the time, and they only had
(38:09):
about one hundred videos to choose from because artists didn't
make were making music videos like that didn't exist as
an art form. And even though the studios were based
in New York, it was initially only available on cable
channels in New Jersey. So really yeah, so only a
few thousand people on a single cable system in northern
(38:30):
New Jersey could see it. In fact, oh my god,
I read somewhere that to watch the launch, the executives
had to drive to New Jersey.
Speaker 5 (38:39):
Such such a fun fact. If I was from New Jersey,
I would be using that fact.
Speaker 1 (38:43):
Yeah, it's amazing, And the first few hours on the
channel are themselves like very iconic moments in pop culture
ten nine eight. It starts with the footage of a
rocket launching.
Speaker 8 (38:55):
Five four.
Speaker 4 (38:57):
We've gone from main engine starts.
Speaker 1 (38:58):
We have reded, and a voice says, and I can
hear this voice in my head because they used to
use this voice a lot on the channel. Ladies channlemen
rock and roll. And then the first video plays, which
is the song video Killed the Radio Star. The song
is from this band, the Buggles, I think that's how
(39:19):
it's pronounced, which was a British new wave band. This
was their biggest and maybe only hit. And the rest
of the launch is a mix of music videos and
introductions hyping up how high tech this all.
Speaker 6 (39:32):
Is, announcing the latest achievement in home entertainment, the power
of sight, video, the power of sound MTV.
Speaker 1 (39:40):
Music tele and all of the programming was guided by hosts,
or as they called the VJs, which you know, is
like the video version of a DJ.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Welcome to MTV Music Television, the world's first twenty four
hour stereo video music channel.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
They would go on to become household names like I
don't know if you remember, but we knew the names
of vj's on MTV growing up and back in nineteen
eighty one. They were just introducing the concept in this
grandiose way.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
The best of TV combined with the best of radio
starting right now. You'll never look at music the same way.
Speaker 4 (40:16):
Again, that's amazing, okay.
Speaker 5 (40:18):
And so if they only had about one hundred music
videos to choose from, did they even were.
Speaker 4 (40:24):
They calling them music videos?
Speaker 7 (40:25):
Then?
Speaker 4 (40:26):
Like, what where were they finding these things?
Speaker 1 (40:28):
Well, a lot of the videos came from abroad, actually,
so they found clips or videos that had been made
by bands in other countries. In fact, one of the
things that MTV did is really bring a lot of
British music to the States because that wasn't really being
played on the radio. It's considered sort of the second
British invasion. And it is just true that music videos
(40:50):
the way we think about them genuinely did not exist.
I know that's hard to believe, but you know, shows
that focused on music, like American Bandstand, which launched in
fifty seven and was such a huge and popular show,
they just featured live performances. So when there was a video.
It was considered a short film before this. And one
of the things that was so funny in the research
(41:12):
is that reporters couldn't figure out how to describe what
music videos were when the channel launched. And I found
this amazing clip when Time magazine tried to describe it
to its readers. This is how they did it. The
main ingredients in MTV's programming are video records or videos
colon current recordings illustrated by three or four minute video tape.
Speaker 5 (41:33):
Oh my god, did you watch that video colin current
recordings posted by three or four minute video tapes?
Speaker 1 (41:38):
Wow?
Speaker 4 (41:39):
That's me. I love archives.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
Oh and I have to tell you the other detail
I love is that because it was literally like a
person who was just like inserting tapes into a VCR
in the early years, sometimes the screen would go black
when someone was changing.
Speaker 5 (41:54):
Out changing the v Oh my gosh, changing the tape
in the VCR. Yes, Can we go back to that time? Honestly,
it just feels like such a simpler time.
Speaker 1 (42:04):
I mean, it was a simpler time, but there were
lots of horrible things happening back then too. There was
the AIDS crisis. I mean, I think That's what's kind
of interesting about the era, right, is like, in some
ways it does feel simpler, but part of it is
because there was this aura of oh, everything's fine, but
underneath it, there were a lot of things that weren't fine.
And you know, that's what the MTV generation, this generation
(42:26):
of kids who grew up on MTV, were reacting to
in a lot of ways. That's what Madonna was reacting to,
for sure. But yeah, the channel is almost instantly successful,
even though it's like barely available. They start getting more
and more carriers, and one of the ways they convince
carriers to use it is they do a survey. They
send people to record stores and say, are people asking
(42:48):
for records that they're only seeing on MTV versus things
that are being played on the radio, And record stores
say that that is the case. They are seeing kids
coming in increasingly and they are selling more and more
music only available on MTV. And that's how the executive
convinced more cable stations to take it. And another thing
that's kind of interesting about this is that cable television
(43:10):
wasn't that big at that time. It was kind of
still in its early stages, and there was no programming
specifically for teens. And you know, cable TV was more
common in the suburbs and rural areas because it was
easier to run cable there. So you need to actually
run cable to make cable available to more people.
Speaker 4 (43:30):
And so initially a lot of what does run cable mean?
Like run a wire?
Speaker 1 (43:34):
Well, no physical cable, like you know, cable is a.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
Okay, yeah, run like running a wire, that's what, right,
Like running cable wasn't a cable.
Speaker 4 (43:43):
This is kind of the same as a wire.
Speaker 1 (43:45):
I mean, I mean I'm not a technical expert, so
let's say yes.
Speaker 5 (43:48):
Anyway, Okay, so you mean they need running a physical.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
Cable, yes, so to actually like make it available to people.
And so, because a lot of the kids who saw
it were in these suburban and rural areas, first they
really loved it because they didn't have access to what
was going on in New York. Now, they didn't have
access to this world that suddenly they were seeing for themselves.
Speaker 5 (44:12):
Right, It wasn't like everyone could access the same things
on the internet. This was like truly you were kind
of on the inside or in the know if you
had access to this.
Speaker 1 (44:20):
Yeah, and so within a few years, kids are demanding
that their parents buy cable so they can see MTV.
And in a lot of ways, CNN and MTV are
really credited with leading TV's transition from being just the
three main channels, you know, ABC, CBS, NBC to really
expanding the cable world and leading to this cable explosion.
(44:45):
But the cultural impact honestly goes beyond just cable, right.
MTV really changes the way people experience music. You know,
Mary talks about this in her book about how after
centuries of just listening to music, people now really want
to watch it.
Speaker 3 (44:59):
Here she is again in Madonna's generation young filmmakers, this
whole generation took that idea and made it an art form.
And Madonna was the absolute perfect person for that because
she was so visually aware of how she appeared in
a camera, how she appeared moving in front of a camera.
(45:19):
She was preternaturally prepared for the video era.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
And in many ways, the rise of Madonna and the
rise of MTV happened together, right, they're sort of inextricably linked.
Speaker 3 (45:29):
Yes, there's time almost simultaneous. That year that Madonna recorded
her first video, which was also nineteen eighty two, for
her song burning up. Changes had begun to occur because
the people making the videos weren't corporate. They were artists,
and you know, the culture was about to change radically,
and Madonna was at the forefront.
Speaker 5 (45:53):
That feels like a really good place to end Part one, Susie,
what do we have in store next week?
Speaker 1 (45:58):
So next week we're going to take you beyond the
like a virgin performance and tell you what happens next.
We'll chart how those three minutes on the VMA stage,
which we're supposed to tank her career, actually end up
turning Madonna into the huge superstar we know that she
is now. So please join us for that. This is
(46:24):
in retrospect. Thanks for listening. Is there a pop culture
moment you can't stop thinking about and want us to
explore in a future episode. Email us at inretropod at
gmail dot com or find us on Instagram at in retropod.
Speaker 5 (46:37):
If you love this podcast, please rate and review us
on Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen. If you
hate it, you can post nasty comments on our Instagram,
which we may or may not delete.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
You can also find us on Instagram at Jessica Bennett
and at Susie b NYC. Also check out Jessica's books
Feminist Fight Club and This Is Eighteen.
Speaker 5 (46:55):
In Retrospect is a production of iHeart Podcasts and the Media.
Speaker 4 (47:00):
Larn Hansen is our supervising producer. Derek Clements is our
engineer and sound designer. Emily Meronoff is our producer. Sharon
Atia is our researcher and associate producer.
Speaker 1 (47:10):
Our executive producer from the media is Cindy Levy. Our
executive producers from iHeart are Anna Stump and Katrina Norbel.
Our artwork is from Pentagram. Our mixing engineer is Amanda
Rose Smith. Additional editing help from Mary Do. We are
your hosts Susie Bannacharum and Jessica Bennett. We are also
executive producers. For even more check out in retropod dot com.
(47:34):
See you next week.
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