Madonna Worship The Podcast Episode 001

DJ Chauncey Dandridge and Stevie Vox explore, discuss and dissect all the stars in the Madonna Universe. Follow @madonnaworship @stevievox and @djchaunceyd on Instagram


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Episode Transcript

(00:05):
Hello everybody. Well, hello there, mister Chauncey. Hello, there's Stevie

(00:40):
Vox. We want to welcome everyoneto the very first episode of the Madonna
Worship of the podcast. It wasa little idea that means Stevie had on
the corner of Seventh Avenue South nearthe Chase Bank right before we were both
going to two different concerts and wesaid, let's do a podcast, and
he was all gung ho about it, and we're finally making it happen and
a couple of months later, Imean, that's usually where we find each

(01:02):
other is usually on the corner,right on the corner. Yeah, we're
at the corner of Wee Hawking andChristopher. I mean, but that was
that was that was like the trialrun for the podcast. We sat there
for a good twenty minutes just talktalking each other's years off and I was
like, oh, I have togo gotta go see Depeche Mode, and

(01:23):
You're like, oh, you gottago. You were going to see Jesse
Ware Jesse Whare. That's right.It's so funny. We're both off to
see. We're both we're both reallybig music offficionados. That's definitely something that
always comes up in our conversations wheneverwe meet, and we have a lot
of similar tastes, and we're caddyin both the same ways. We pick

(01:44):
on artists in the in the sameways, so we always have a good
time. So we're like, let's, uh, let's have a conversation that
gets recorded and distributed and everyone elsecan can listen. I mean, it's
it's time. It's about time wedid something so exactly, and this one
is obviously it's called Madonna Worship thepodcast, so it's obviously going to be

(02:05):
centered around the undisputed Queen of Popuh who's currently on tour right now.
And we've both seen the show,and we saw a couple of shows on
the same night. Yes, didyou go to you went to Brooklyn?
How many times? I went toBrooklyn? Three times? Three times?
Because once were your mom right?Yes? Yes, I got to meet
his mom outside of the theater afterafter the show. Yes, that was

(02:30):
that was her fourth show. Wow, that was her fourth Madona show.
Yeah, oh fourth, like inin in general, in general, not
not this, not this. Iwas like, Wow, she had you
beat your mom is kneaking around onyou? She went to London without me.
She's like, he's there an openingnight. She's sorry, but no

(02:54):
for one mm hmm. She's like, sorry, Stevie, I can only
take one person and then it's notyou. She's like, yeah, bye,
sorry the teacher for not taking meto to uh which to did I
take her to? Rebel Heart?I didn't take her to Rebel Heart?
So, okay, what does yourmom? Does your mom have a favorite
Madonna song? Because my mom's favoriteMadonna's song was Hanky Panky, and I

(03:15):
always thought that was hysterical because ofthe subject matter. You know, I
don't think I ever asked her.I don't think that's that's one. I
usually ask everybody like, oh,what's your what's your favorite Madonna song?
Like I have one of my oneof my closest friends who lives in Florida.
Her friends, I've asked them,oh, what's your Madonna? What's
your favorite Madonna song? And somebodywho she's not so friendly with, like

(03:38):
they're just friends for convenience. Yeah, like years ago, it's like,
so, what's your favorite Madonna song? She's like, take about I was
like, there you go. Soevery time I, you know, we
talk about this person, I alwaysbring up. I'm like, oh,
did you know her favorite Madonna's songis take About No, I never asked
my mom. I would venture tosay, probably something off Confessions on a

(04:01):
dance floor. That makes sense.Yeah, that's that's it's cool. So
you know, everyone has to tunein for our second episode where we'll find
out what Stevie's mom's favorite Madonna songis. She'll be She'll be our special
guest. She'll be our special guest. She'll come on and she'll she'll sing
it. She'll sing a couple ofbars. But yeah, it was.
It was always funny. My momliked Hanky Panky and uh, I do

(04:25):
remember when I got the Sex Bookback in the day. Not to jump
ahead or whatever, but I rememberone day I came home from like,
I think drama club rehearsal or something. I was in high school at the
time. She was like, well, no, I think I woke up
in the middle of night, wentto the bathroom, and I went into
the kitchen and I saw that shewas reading the entire book. Because my
mom us still love like those likeromance novels, those like really steamy romance

(04:47):
Calquin books. Yeah, yeah,I used to read those a lot,
so like, I'm sure that thesex book was like right up her alley.
So I guess I get my likemy my dirty mind from my mom's
side of the But again, myfather's not not not chased in any way,
so I think, well, youknow, it's an Italian thing.
Yeah, well mom was all polished. My mom was the Polish one.

(05:10):
My dad's all Italian. So mymom's side of the family, I know,
what's interesting about my mom's side ofthe family is there were more they
used to call people funny back theninstead of gay, like oh, he's
a little funny. There were morepeople on my mom's side of the family
that were a little more out asbeing gay. But they were all all
the people on my father's side ofthe family that I later in my life
found out were either gay or fulldrama guys. They were all very secretive

(05:31):
about it. So it's interesting,like the dichotomy of like the Italian like
macho and like I guess Polish peoplewere just a little more, a little
more open's family. I don't know, I don't know how that worked,
but we definitely had like my mom'sside of the family definitely had more like
divorce, unwed mother kind of likea lot more like not poverty, but

(05:53):
like in that like level of people. Whereas the Italian side, like they
would like if they had problems,they wouldn't tell anybody. Yeah, you
don't talk about great Italian It's verylike, you know, if we don't
talk about it, it's not real. Are you all Italian? Yeah?
I am are, You're full ofItalian? Okay, pedigree, pedigree,

(06:14):
I mean as far as I know, it's like as far as I mean
any family that I know of,you know, as far as like great
grandparents or great great grandparents never didlike my twenty three and me, maybe
one day, yeah, we should. We should change the name of the
podcast to Italians Do Better the Podcast. Yes, well, you know,

(06:35):
maybe we should both do that becauseyou never know, we might be related
to Celine Dion. We might be, and then therefore we'll related to Madonna
exactly, so then well you knowwe'll be in good. So yeah.
So I think I'm trying to figureout, like everyone would ask me,

(06:56):
like if this is my favorite tourand all that, and I I just
I personally I think that this tourobviously couldn't happen without all the other tours,
just like most of her tours,like one tour can't happen without the
other, like like unfortunately Sticky andSweet tour happened, because that was a
big letdown for me, that tour, but like coming from Confessions, anything
would be a letdown. But likeeach of her shows kind of can't really

(07:18):
exist without the albums that it's promoting, or like can't exist without the previous
tour, like how she performed acertain song, She's gonna do it completely
differently for this time, like Ialways love that, you know, like
a Virgin and Vogue have always beenlike completely new versions every single show.

(07:38):
You know, Well, I thinkshe has to do it that way.
Other words, she's going to getbored. I mean, but I find
that interesting because like other artists likeJanet Jackson, like she really does the
same choreography and the same show orthe same like of course throughout the years
of the choreography has changed. Butand I know her choreography is iconic,
but so's the Vogue choreography. ButMadonna's never done the original Vogue choreography after

(08:01):
the first and after the Video MusicAwards, So like I wonder what it
is about Madonna, I guess becauseshe's constantly inspired, and what it is
about Janet that she kind of likestays six to the the tried and true.
Like everyone goes wild when they seethat, you know, if choreography
or the rhythm Nation choreography. Imean her her concert. I saw her

(08:22):
concert. Her concert was very scaledback, but she packed in all the
hits and she threw in some someunexpected songs too. But like Madonna,
this is also the first time she'sever toured without an album behind her,
right mm hmm, yeah, Sowe've been like promoting either or like three
albums worth, Like drown World hadthree albums worth of music that she hadn't
been able to touch yet. Andthat's why I always found it weird that

(08:43):
people were like shocked that there wereonly like two or three hits on them,
like or like two or three oldersongs, because I'm like, if
you had three albums worth of musicthat you haven't performed yet, of course
you're going to focus on those albums, you know. I mean, well,
within the case of Drowned World,you know, she yet to remember
she had Avida in there, soAvida took up quite a few years.

(09:05):
Yeah, I mean that that wasyou know, between filming and then the
movie premiere and then promotion and youknow, having the baby and all of
that, so there was I don'tthink there was really much time in the
mid nineties to do a tour.I mean after yeah, ninety three was
a girly show, and then likeand then she went into uh, bedtime

(09:26):
stories and then obviously, like yousaid, a Vida and then and then
Ray of Life popped out and itwas like, but I wonder why.
I guess she filmed the next thenext best thing after that, right,
so she really didn't have time togo on tour. So I guess two
thousand and one is really the onlylike possibility of doing a tour. But
she's writing off the coattails of musicbeing so successful and obviously very successful.

(09:50):
But what I always found so crazyMadonna's concerts and even just Madonna's albums from
album to album, like Music andAmerican Life A obviously, you know,
mostly produced by the same people,but they're like two different artists. Ray
of Light to Music, two differentartists. It feels like like a Prayer

(10:11):
and True Blue, like two completelydifferent artists. You hear a little bit
of the voice similarity, but it'sreally she's really never done. It's it's
fascinating to me how she just intwo years. You can go from like
Blonde Ambision tour, where she's likego to this go say that, everything's
sleek and everything's like, you know, colorful all that. Then go to

(10:33):
this complete circus themed short hair,very sinewy body and like almost androgynous body,
and everyone's got their hair shaved,and like there's something happened in her
life right after the Blonde Amission tourthat really like catapulted her creativity, I
think, and I'm so glad ithappened, but I wonder what it was
because we had the sex book,we had you know, you know,

(10:54):
the Mechanic collection. I was atthe tour, and then like Rottica album
all that kind of stuff. Butlike right after Blonde Ambition tour or right
after that, like Dick Tracy,like she met somebody that totally changed her
past because her her nuances and herlike references were so like queer and so

(11:18):
fashiony and so so much deeper.I think, I think so like I
feel like with Blonde Ambition it wasthe time. It was just the timing,
like all of that played into thatconcept. You know, from meeting

(11:39):
jose and Lewis to i mean doingDick Tracy, you know, dating Warren
Baby. There was a lot ofdifferent things going on at Blonde Ambition compared
to you fast forward a year anda half, you know, to where
she's getting ready to do erotica,the sex book, Body of Evidence.

(12:01):
Yeah, I mean there's there's thethere was different things, and she's always
inspired you know, obviously by variousyou know, queer art, you know,
European art, dancers, different,so there's always like a concept it's
and it's different. It's in theearly eighties. I feel like a lot

(12:22):
of artists didn't have like concepts behindthings. It wasn't like, oh I'm
gonna you know, I was reallyinspired by this. It was like,
Okay, I'm going to put adance record. You know, this is
this is this is my my wheelhouse, this is what I'm going to do.
And Madonna kind of took that.She's like, you know, obviously
the first album dance record, youknow, great dance record, perfect dance

(12:43):
record, you know, then goingon to like a Virgin, it's a
little different same idea true Yeah,but you definitely had like a different She
definitely had a different set of chefsin the kitchen for that that that that
did a little different little like therewas like a funk in there, and
there was like a Nile Rogers.She's almost like an acoustic. There was

(13:05):
more of an acoustic or like realguitars in like a Virgin compared to like
the person was very synthetic, whichI love, but like I feel like
like a Virgin definitely had more likereal instruments in the in the in the
recording. So I think like sheshe she takes her inspirations and things that

(13:26):
she loves and she kind of moldsit into you know whatever, an album,
a song, a tour, andthat's why it's it's changed so much
over the years. Yeah, Andthen I think when she went into True
Blue, she was, you know, she did the whole Her look changed
drastically and she kind of there's kindof like a fifties element to it,

(13:48):
like a leather jacket and like likealmost like a like a pink Lady from
Grease kind of feel to it.She was like the tough girl that was
like vulnerable at the same time.You know, did you ever see the
Jane Paui interview that she did aroundthat time like True Blue time, Yes,
yes, it was not sure,I feel like I must have maybe

(14:09):
maybe seen a little bit of it. Sure, it's on YouTube, but
I remember they had released it backin two thousand and five on iTunes,
you know when I when iPods cameout with videos, you know, video
iPods, and I was like,Oh, I'm gonna buy videos off of
you know, iTunes, and Ibought the Jane paul interview And in that
interview, she was wearing like avintage thrifted you know, I believe it

(14:33):
was floral dress, and Jane PAULIhad asked her like, oh, you
know, where'd you get that dress? And she's like, oh, I
got it at a thrift story.You know, it's it's vintage, it's
fifties blah blah blah. So yeah, that definitely had, you know,
something to do with the the vibefor True Blue. And even though the
song true Blue has a very likelike supremesy, kind of like bouncy,

(14:58):
like mot town kind of sound toit, like like she's she's she's on
roller skates bringing us milkshakes while we'redefinitely in the car, and then you
got like then you got like popinotpreach where it's like she's like a teenager
that got pregnant kind of thing likethat. That's something that kind of happened
in Greece, you know, likethat's kind of like you know that that
kind of like, oh, don'ttell anybody you know that you're pregnant,

(15:20):
or like, you know, isyour friendly like that kind of attitude,
that kind of greas her kind ofeven like even the True Blue, the
original True Blue video before, doyou remember the make My video? That
was amazing? Oh my god,that was the video that MTV played more.
I don't really remember seeing the originalvideo back very much back then,

(15:41):
but it ended up on like allthe compilations, so I saw it more.
But that video was so like campyand and low budget compared to compared
to like like a virgin or materialgirl or whatever. Like that was like,
all right, we have a littlebit of money left, let's make
a video for True Blue because wewanted to be a single. But you
got the soundstage, this car that'sgoing to drive by and bring your friend

(16:02):
Debbie Mays ar to be one ofthe one of the one of the one
of your best buddies, you know, and she she makes appearances in a
lot of videos. Yeah, that'sthat's that's the amazing thing. Like I,
of course everybody wants to be Madonna, but I kind of wish I
was Debbie Masar sometimes because she's alwayshad a connection to her, and you
know, even Rosie O'Donnell. Iwonder how much closer, how close they

(16:22):
are still. I know Rosie wasat the show in La I think a
couple of nights ago. But Iremember when I saw Rebel Heart and when
she h when she performed True Blue, she dedicated to Debbie, who was
in the audience that night. Butyeah, Debbie has been Debbie has been
a part of her life for everover forty years. Yeah, it's like
like they really are just best buddies. But you know, they don't they

(16:45):
don't make appearances together, like Iwonder if they just like how do they
run into each other on the cornerlike we do and have like a conversation.
Do they call each other up?Like like do you just call Madonna
up if you're her friend and sayand talk the ship talks ship with her
like I don't like, we'll comesend her a message on snapchat, I
mean stapchat, and she's like,I'll get to it in a minute.

(17:06):
Let me get in my let meget in my, uh my bathtub,
and I'll call you. I'll callyou from the bathroom. Yeah, Madonna
loves her bathtub. And if you'reif you're a big fan, you know
that that she loves taking pictures inher bathroom and near her bathtub in her
palatial household on the Upper East sideof Manhattan. Uh, I mean,
I find that's so funny. Likeme and my friend Eric h one of

(17:29):
my one of my big Madonna buddies. Uh, he was, he was
he had lived here for a whileand he just moved. He had moved
back to uh, North Carolina shortlyafter we did this, But we did.
We went to see a show atJoe's Pub down in the village and
then we said, let's go seethe tree. And we went to go
see the tree in Washington Square Parkand the tree was unplugged because it was
like one o'clock in the morning,and I think I have a picture somewhere.

(17:51):
It shows up every now and thenon Facebook of him trying to find
the plug to plug it back in, and to no vow, we never
got We never got the tree plugback in. But we decided to go
up to rock A Feller Center andsee the tree up there. We went
up there. It's like three o'clockin the morning, where you know,
only us and the weirdows are out, and then we go to have breakfast
and we're like, let's go toMadonna's house. Just just walk about it.

(18:14):
Yes, we ate a a dinerlike on the Upper east Side,
and then we started we continued walkingand we just we stood outside her apartment.
She was on the MDNA tour,so it was twenty twelve, so
she wasn't there, so we weren'tstalking her. We knew she wasn't there.
We knew she was in like Brazilor something. But we were just
stood outside her her what we callit is not a castle, her mansion.

(18:36):
Mansion, that's the word. Andwe were surprised at how not far
away from the curb the front dooris. Like we really thought when I
heard that she lived in a mansionon the east Side, I really thought
there's gonna be a lot more spacebetween like the front gate and the house.
But it really was like you couldthrow a rock and hit the window
easily. We didn't do that,But but did you have you ever been

(18:59):
up there? I've drove, I'vedrove past it. I okay, it's
weird that it's like it's I didn'tI was. When I think of a
mansion, I guess it's more ofa romantic idea of a mansion, like
on top of a hill or likeall this front yard space before you get
to the front door. But it'sliterally like fifty feet to the front door.
Well, because isn't it wasn't wasn'tthe original property, like it was
multiple like units that she purchased,right, I think maybe I might be

(19:23):
wrong. I think that was tocome for me. But upper west side,
upper west side, her apartment onthe upper near the near the park
on the upper west Central Park West, she bought like three other of the
apartments and turns into one huge apartment. Okay, all right, that's probably
that's the place. That's the placethat she used to get Like the neighbors

(19:44):
used to bitch about her for playingmusic too loud or whatever. Meanwhile,
it's not her, it's it's themaid. The Maid is in there,
like twirling around to technical music,yes, wearing the goate boustie exactly,
like she's like, oh, Madonna'snot here, let me go through the
closet. Can you imagine like,like, wasn't she put she was pulling
out I'm sure everyone knows, butshe was working on her biopic and they

(20:08):
went she went to storage that onetime, remember, and she like pulled
out all these like crazy artifacts fromher career. She posted them all on
Instagram and stuff like that. It'slike, can you imagine having access to
that storage unit and just walking inand seeing like Curly Show costumes and bought
admissions to our costumes and like keepcarrying painted jackets from the like a Virgin

(20:30):
tour and like, my god,it must have been it must be so
amazing to just be in that roomthen just feel that energy. You know,
masters from Blonde Ambition Tour, likethe video you know, original video
print and you know audio masters thatare there that you know exactly the rain
tapes. The rain tapes are thereon you know on cassette. You know,

(20:52):
a track, a track. It'sjust so wild that like like it's
just so wild how how back thenhow music was made, Like how it
was just like you would record somethingon a cassette tape and bring it to
the DJ, and the DJ wouldsomehow play it like in between his set,
you know, like that's how shegot her you know, her connections
in the beginning, like here's mynew here's my new single, my new

(21:15):
demo, would play it and likelike I couldn't imagine. I mean,
the closest that I ever came throughthat was when my first I've been DJing
almost twenty two years now and Istarted my my my first DJ gig was
at this place that's not open anymore, was called Urge in the East Village
on Second Avenue and Second Street,and my friend Sir Paul and my friend
Dmitri Minucci, they were both musicians, like queer musicians that were you know.

(21:41):
They would bring me like Sir Paulwould bring me his single on CD,
like his newest single all the time, and I would incorporate that into
my playlist and all that. Andmy friend Dmitri, who I unfortunately had
stopped making music. I believe Ireally wish he would continue because he was
a beautiful, beautiful voice beautiful lyricistand everything. Sir Paul. It a
lot more like electro pop, andhe had some deep lyrics, but it

(22:03):
was he was mostly like more performanceoriented and all that kind of stuff.
But Dmitri would like work on asong because he lived three blocks away,
and he would run over on aSunday night, like at like three o'clock
in the morning, knowing that Iwas there, say I really want to
hear this loud? Can you playthis? I'm like, of course.
It was really funny, like tohave that kind of uh opportunity with with
with with with with the younger likewhen I was younger, with with like

(22:26):
local queer artists like to like playtheir songs in my sets, and I
still do that today, but it'slike it was cool to have a couple
of people who were like, Hey, it's my new single, can you
play it? So I guess it'skind of what went on back in the
eighties. You know, he's stillthere, Stevie, I'm here. Can

(22:47):
you hear me? Yeah? Okay, guys just kind of like you dropped
out? So am I talking toomuch? Did I put in sleep?
Steve? No? No, no, no, you didn't know. I
hit meute on my mic. That'swhat happened. Oh, there we go.
So my question is, but whatformat did he bring it to you
on? Was it? Was ita CD? Was it? Yeah?
That was I only played CDs backthen, Like I just have a big

(23:08):
book of CDs. I had tocarry with me to all the gigs.
That was my version of carrying recordsto the gigs. I started right when
when CDs first kind of came out, and like Napster was a big deal.
So I would spend my my weeklike downloading music from Napster because it
took that long. And that's whereyou first heard music was on Napster.
Yes, it it leaked on there. I was a member of there's a

(23:32):
forum back before, like like beforeFace, way before Facebook and all that,
there was this there was a modonnaform called Madonna mad and that's why
I and that's how I met alot of the Madonna community and I'm still
friends with them today, like Facebookreunited us all and uh we sometimes see
each other at the tour and atconcerts and stuff like that. But uh,

(23:52):
that's why I found out that musicleaked and it was I think I
still have that that leaked demo onmy hard drive. The yeah, I
remember my computer back then was itwas one of the originally like early on
computers, I think the whole thewhole desktop computer had nineteen gigs of space
on it, which is like andit too, And it took you a

(24:14):
half an hour to download one onesong or even longer. So took you.
You would set it up before youwent to bed. You wake up
and go, oh, five songsof the of the hundred that I clicked
on came through. Yeah, Iremember, Yeah, So I would have
to. I would have to downloadmusic, burn it out to CD,
and then delete it so I coulddownload more music. That was the That
was the struggle back then, asbeing being a DJ and trying and stealing

(24:36):
and pirating music. We all didit. We all had to because some
songs you really couldn't find anywhere unlessyou went to like a record store in
another state or country or whatever.So the Internet has definitely helped people spread
their music around, you know,but now just imagine, well I'm sure
you well, I guess you don'thave to imagine because you were there.
So drag queens, you know,when they're like, oh, here's my

(24:57):
flash drive of you know, tracksthat I'm going to perform tonight. Now
they bring you a CD, oreven better, they bring you a cassette
and it's like, here, canyou play this? It's the second song,
you know, and you have tolike shove it through a cassette to
find it then get out of here. I'd go, oh, yeh know
the Imperial Court when they used todo shows. It's like kind of before

(25:18):
MP three's, I guess, orlike right when MP three's were first happening
and people didn't know how to sendthem. I would get like fifteen CDs
with like a a what are theycalled, like the note sticker I posted
on it that said the drag queen'sname and which song they were doing.
So it's just so funny because sometimesthey would hand me a CD that was
all scratched, and I would praythat it would not skip while they were

(25:41):
performing. But yeah, that's whatdrag queens would bring you a CD back
then. Yeah, that's I wouldgo insane. I would go nuts.
I would be like, no,no, I can't do this. Yeah
no, it's just it's just wildthat that's how that's how we distributed music.
Like people hand me their CD oftheir single, you know, and

(26:03):
it was like not labeled. Itwas like just a burn CD and it
would say like demo just name ofthe song and the artists, and you
just like pop it in and playit for them. It was pretty cool,
I would so. I obviously I'mnot a DJ by any means,
however I did. I used tohelp out. I have a couple local
front like local queens up here byme, and they'd be like, hey,

(26:27):
could you can you you know,bring your speakers and help out do
my show blah blah blah blah.Yeah okay, and they'd be like,
okay, well I'm going to makesure everybody gets their music together. And
I would tell them. I'd belike, okay, I want files on
a flash drive and you have tonumber them like what you're like, in
what order you want them played?Because I'm not shuffling through was this?

(26:49):
It is? That it? Butyou no, like number it on the
flash drive and that's how it's goingto go. So it's quite startling how
many people don't know how easy thatis, you know. And then they'll
be like, well here here thisis it's from YouTube, and I'm like
no, no, we're not doingthis. No, Oh I get I
get YouTube links all the time andwhen I'm doing a show and I'm like,
you do know that there are websiteswhere you could just grab the song

(27:11):
from YouTube and you can send methe actual file. And they're like,
oh, I didn't know that.Yeah, because it's yeah, but so
Madonna's bringing here's Madonna bringing her cassette. Here play my demo. Hopefully she
rewound the tape, you know,made sure everything was was good, or
you know, they just popped iton. It's like midway through the song.

(27:33):
I know, like eight tracks usedto be that way. When you
flip the eight tractor would start playinglike the second half of the If you
were on the second half of thesong on the on side AY and you
flipped it, it would be inthe middle of the song on side B.
I was. I always wondered howmany how many minutes were on each
track because there's you know, atrack, it's it's technically four tracks because

(27:55):
there's four programs. Yeah, Ithink it's four on each side, right.
I have no idea. I knowone of our cards had an AH
track player when I was a kid. I mean, but what a primitive
way of playing music, like evencassettes like it was like they were so
easy to warp. Like I rememberlike, actually, what's Funny is on
the Seaside Heights Boardwalk in New Jersey, I actually won the true Blue cassette,

(28:22):
played the hell of it, ahell out of it. That weekend
that was definitely. That was definitelythe weekend that I went from being like
a big Madonna fan to like apsychotic Madonna fan. It was August fifth.
Me and my family used to havea house down the shore and near
Tom's River, New Jersey. We'dspend like a whole Me and my family

(28:44):
would spend two weeks there. Soit was me and my great answer'd spend
like a month there. But therewas one It was nineteen ninety summer vacation.
We were there for a week,but we would go for two weeks
after that. As the first weekwas ending, it was when Madonna's Blond
A Vision tour was showing on mtM h and Z one hundred or one
of the radio stations played the audioof it. So I listened to the

(29:10):
concert and taped it and played itover and over and over again that weekend,
that and for the whole next week, but I listened to it and
didn't get to see it until likea week and a half later, So
I got to hear the entire showand imagining what was going on on stage,
wown what were you imagining? Doyou remember that? Do you remember

(29:33):
listening to like, I don't know, like like a Virgin? Okay,
something like you wouldn't you necessarily wouldn'tthink you know that the performance of Like
a Virgin was the performance of likea Virgin if you heard the song first,
right, Yeah, it was.It was interesting to me how she
slowed it down and added like thethe Arabian influence. So I just thought

(29:59):
that she like just like stood thereand sang it on a slower version.
I had no idea that she was, you know, in that course dancing
with two guys with with the youknow, the boobies and then the masturbation
part. Like, I didn't knowany of that until I went home and
watched it. So it was wasit really her being such a visual artist.

(30:19):
It was really interesting to hear theconcert like maybe five or six times
throughout the week before actually seeing it, And I do remember I didn't know
I didn't recognize. I didn't knowcausing a commotion back then for some reason,
maybe it wasn't as big of aradio hit in my part of town
or something. But when I whenI heard that, I love that song,

(30:41):
and when I heard it on theon the concert, I was like,
I don't really know where this songis from, but I like it.
Well, I mean it it didfairly well in America, didn't it.
I mean, maybe, like yousaid, it just wasn't wasn't you
know, had heavy airplay on Zone hundred or remember I remember I remember
hearing Who's that Girl? A lot? I remember hearing Open your Heart a

(31:03):
lot. And also I don't thinkthere was a music video for causing the
commotion or maybe it was just likeI think there's a montage a live performance.
Yeah, So that's how I consumedmy music, really I was.
I mean I was like five yearsold when MTV came out, So music
and visuals together, like, that'sbeen my the way I've consumed consuming music
at a young age. So theysaid on Fireworks in a story, Yeah,

(31:30):
because well, isn't it. It'snot Fourth of July, so I
mean Mard of March is coming up. Maybe some maybe some Greek holiday too.
There's a lot of Greeks in Astoria. Okay. And where where are
you? You're You're I'm in theHudson Valley. I'm upstate. That's a
value, okay. Yeah, soI'm about I'm about an hour. It

(31:52):
depends on where hour and a half. I'm gonna say an hour and a
half. I mean, I've madeit down in an hour and twenty,
but from Manhattan, like from themdown out? Yeah. Cool. What
was your first? What was yourfirst Madonna concert? My confessions? Wow,
confessions. And I'm glad that you'reYou're a bit younger than I am,
a little bit a little bit,so Reinvention would have been my first.

(32:16):
And I could not afford those tickets. I had X amount of money
and like face value sold out inno time. And I mean things times
were a little different, you know. It's not like we didn't have like
those apps, you know, allthe different apps and all the different stores
for resale tickets or anything like thatat that time. So I didn't go.

(32:39):
And that's okay, I'm okay withthat. I'm kind of like reinvention.
I like reinvention for the time,but definitely wasn't my favorite. Confessions
was my first tour, So that'sa great tour to be your first.
My MI was Girly Show, andyou know, I was a little too
young to see fun ambitions, SoGirly Show is any like just like I

(33:07):
don't know how like to see itlive, like to have been there in
person. Obviously I've seen it abillion times on Chess. I be chess,
I have GVD, I have alaser DSc. Like to be there
live because like, her vocals werejust so good and like her vocals were
amazing, her like and just everythingeverything about her whole her like attitude was

(33:32):
really badass too, Like she waslike she was like coming off of like
all this negativity she was. Shewas definitely riled up. Yeah, she
want to push buttons and she likewas kind of like I imagine she's probably
like, oh my god. Youknow, two three years ago, I
was on top of the world andeverybody loved me, and I was like
the pinnacle, and then all ofa sudden, like now I'm like this

(33:55):
witch demon that everybody wants to burnat the steak was the nineties. Everybody
hated women in the nineties. Yeah, so it's it kind of you know,
led up to led up to toall that angst and you know she

(34:15):
was she was, she was hot, she was she was ready to cause
a commotion, and she did.I mean that core is just vocally so
good. The con like even justlike the concepts behind, like all those
different like like sets were great.Christopher to write her brother the tour director,

(34:38):
right, yeah, so I mean, I mean, Erotica itself is
an amazing album, and supporting thatalbum, we got a lot of Erotica
tracts on there. So yeah,like there's nothing was like to see the
performance of Why It's So Hard Livewas just mesmerizing. Like and the thing

(35:01):
is, I was Erotica was mycoming out album. Like I mean,
I definitely realized I knew I wasgay during you know, like like a
Prayer and Blond Ambission era obviously,but like Erotica was when I was a
soundtrack to my like hanging out inthe city I grew up in. I
grew up in Jersey, but wehad a path train in our in our

(35:22):
town, so that was our escape. It was a dollar each way,
and like that dollar, we'd slidethat dollar in and we get all excited
because we knew we were going tobe in like grungey West Village. Like
we could, we could flirt withguys if we wanted to. We could
kiss a guy, we could,we could be gay. We could,
you know, wear that chain aroundour neck. We could, we could,
you know, we do whatever.So like that was the soundtrack to

(35:44):
my like West Village to the tothe early days, the early Yes.
Yeah, So it was like,I mean I graduate graduated high school in
ninety three, so like ninety twowhen Erotica came out, I was a
senior in high school, you know, or had a few like faild you
know, like high school romances andpeople that I fell for and they didn't

(36:07):
like me back kind of thing.But also like I started to realize,
you know, how shitty men were, you know in general. And that's
what you know, that whole album. She's kind of like, you know,
Waiting is about you know, don'tdesert me. You know, all
the songs are about like bye byebaby. You know it was. It's
it's a it's kind of a cuntyalbum. You know, it's got a

(36:28):
lot of very it's a very NewYork album, especially for that time.
It touches up on a lot ofthings, and also like she was exploring
that like S and M thing,and like I started like finding these clubs
that were like leather, people wearingleather or like my friend used to take
me because even at sixteen, Ilooked a little older. So I mean

(36:50):
they didn't really card you as muchback then in the city. It wasn't
so uh, they weren't so strictabout how old you were to get into
the club, as long as youbehaved yourself. But like that's when I
started going to the rock scene andgoing out dancing and hearing Fever by Madonna
on the dance floor and hearing youknow, remixes of Erotica and remixes of
you know, all the good ninetiesdance music and all that kind of stuff.

(37:13):
Like the nineties were. I mean, that's when classic house kind of
that's when it was born. Solike being able to experience the nineties in
the nineties is something I'll never takeregret it, you know, and that
definitely shaped me as the DJ wouldbecome like ten years later. Is my
sensibility of what kind of music Ilike, the kind of remixes that I

(37:36):
like, the just the vibe Ilove like sleazy, you know, I
call it so, I call itsauna house, like it's kind of house
music you would here in like asauna or like a sex club. I
love that kind of like drony,but like funky, sexy, not a
lot of vocals, just like stuffthat makes you makes you feel naughty.

(37:58):
You know, what was the firstdo you remember the first track you played?
Like your first gig? Like,what was it? What did you
open your set with? Oh?God, wow? What do you think
it was? Was the Madonna?I don't think it was a Madonna,
I'm not. I definitely don't knowexactly what it was, but I do
know that two and two when Istarted, was like the height of electroclash.

(38:20):
So I definitely played a lot ofMiss Kitten. I played what's that
song? Sweet Deduction in the magazinesilver Screen by Miss Kitten, remixed by
b Stewart Price, who eventually producedher Confessions album Everything That Man. I
would definitely I would definitely play likeremixes of of of American life music and

(38:46):
also like music and Don't tell Methunder Push was really big back then.
Mm hm. Trance Trance music wasbig, right, yeah, like the
Sarah McLachlan's Silent song with Delirium,that remix of that that was big on
my playlists above and beyond kind ofremixes. But definitely I played a lot

(39:09):
of electroclash and what's his name?Felix to Housecat and who's the guy who
mount Sims who remixed nobody knows me? So yes, it was a mixture
of like eighties sounding dance music withlike tribally stuff. Peter Rahaffer was big
back then, so yeah, soI did. I was coming off of

(39:30):
like the early two thousand and twothousand used to be my like Limelight club
club kid days. I used togo to Limelight in the nineties, mid
nineties or like early nineties and then, but we used to go to the
Roxy more in the early nineties.Roxy was definitely like the Mega club where
like all the games had their shirtsoff, people were doing whatever they were
doing, ecstasy whatever. That wasright before like Manhunt had just started around

(39:55):
then, like ninety four ninety five, so people didn't have to really go
out as much to have sex.They would they would, but then once
the apps came out, the apps, and I don't want to go into
too much detail with this, butthe apps and the harder drugs all started
around the same time. Yeah,so the club seemed kind of diminished because

(40:15):
people were either in their k holeor smoking their peanut or whatever, blah
blah and having sex for ten hoursstraight. But they didn't need to go
out and find it anymore because theycould just search for it, you know,
in the apps. When's the lasttime? When when's the last time
you logged into your Manhunt account?It still exists, it does. I
logged in recently just to see ifit was still there, you know,

(40:37):
obviously I had. Out of allthe apps and all the websites, Manhunt
has been my most successful one mostsuccessful. I meant them the hottest,
the most and had the best experiencesthrough through through that app, I website.
I'm looking, I will not,I'm not currently looking. I was.
I'm not on Manhunt now, letme buy that. I when I

(41:01):
had logged in, there was allthese photos from like fifteen years ago,
and I was like, wow,Wow, they they're still there, all
of them. I was like,okay, well, at least I know
where they are. And then forall of you who don't know, man
Hunt was kind of like the predecessorto h to scruff or to grinder.

(41:22):
But it was a website, soyou had to like be on your computer
to log in, and we saidmessages and all that, and I think
that's what changed to like you hadto be home to like search for okaps.
Now you could just do it atthe bar. Yeah, I meet
somebody down the block. Like Iremember, there was one time where it's
a funny story. There was Halloweenweekend. I don't think it was exactly

(41:44):
Halloween, but it might have beenthe day before whatever. But I was
DJing a party at Rock Bar inthe West Village and when I was leaving,
I was dressed as a nun.Funny enough, and I was and
some guy asked me to come over, and I went over and like I
had, like I think I accidentallyleft my rosary beads at his house.
And so the next time we hungout, he's like, oh, I

(42:04):
still have a rosary beasts. It'slike, but it's just weird how you
could be at a bar down theblock and somebody's at home they want you
to come over, but like thatdidn't happen. That person actually had to
be at the bar in the nineties, that person to actually be at the
club in the nineties dancing near you, and there's there's just it's so much
more of a romanticness about it aboutthe sexual compatibility. Like you see somebody

(42:30):
on an app and you don't knowwhether they're hot in person and all that
kind of stuff, but you don'tknow. It's a two dimensional thing.
But like when you sit and youmeet somebody across the bar, and people
still smoked at bars, there's somethingabout like lighting your cigarette with a match
and looking at somebody the way thatthe match light would light up your eyes
as you looked over, Like there'sjust something And I think that's what erotica

(42:51):
kind of encompassed, like that,like that grimy New York like smoky club
bar, felling of a little bitof beer and a little bit of you
know, he's a little bit ofpoppers smell, like like the like a
Prayer album was centered with patchuli.I think the Eurotic album should have been
scented with poppers or something that wouldbe I mean, we could, we
could pitch that, we we should. I just thought of that too.

(43:15):
That's really funny. It's like,Wow, it went from potfuliy to Poppers.
That's you know, that's a that'sa great that that's a great title
for something from a mixtape, amixtape nineteen eighty nine to nineteen ninety three
from Petuli to Poppers. So youdon't know, you probably know that we

(43:37):
all didn't know this when we openedit up, but the like A Prayer
album and the cassette liner notes,uh, and the CD booklet were all
scented with Peculi, the essential oil. It was very hippyish and it kind
of smelled like a church when wefirst opened up as kids, why does
this smell like an old book?Because Petuli does kind of have like an
old book smell to it. Butthen we found out later on that it

(44:00):
was sensored with Petuli. I guessthe first pressing, right, not like
all of them, right, Ithink it was just the first pressing,
yeah, And it was like,uh, it just added to the album.
And we're gonna get on this topic. But like a Prayer on the
twenty first of March is celebrating thirtyfifth. It's thirty fifth anniversary, so
that brings back a ton of memoriesand like but that when I hear those

(44:22):
songs. I almost smell them aswell, like I like keep it together
from the like a prayer album smellslike petuli to me, like oh father,
like you think of like the church, like you think of like it
really added to the experience, andthat's what's terrible about Like I know,
streaming is great, and everything's onthe digital platform, and nobody really makes

(44:44):
CDs, but like you get ifthe album comes out at midnight, you
get it. You get the songat twelve oh one. We had to
wait in line at the music store. The next day. We had to
like wait till we got home toput it in our CD player, Like
we had to, like when weused to go shopping for CDs in in
the village. We'd have to likelook in the booklet on the way home

(45:05):
on the path train and wait tillwe got home to put it in our
CD player, you know. Andthen c D Walkmans came out and that,
but c D walkmans always hard toalways skipped, and you like you
couldn't really do much and them youhad to sit still, but like you
actually had to like wait till yougot home to pop the music into your
player. And it just added sucha such a It's so much more fun

(45:25):
that way. Well, it's adifferent experience. You know, here you
are, you have this tangible itemin your hand. You want to go
home, you want to listen tothis album, So you pop it in
your CD player, pop it inyour cassette player, you know, headphones,
whatever. You could open the booklet, you could read it and you
could smell, you know, thatnew book smell or petrually if it was
like if it was like a prayer. So it's you connect with it differently.

(45:52):
I think that's why, like Ialways, I always like kept to
purchasing physical media, mm hmm,whether it's a you know, vinyl,
whether it's a CD or you knowanything. The last cassette I bought was
actually a Pete Burns cassette. Sorecently, yeah, recently, I got
a good price on it, soI have I don't have any way to

(46:15):
play any of that stuff anymore.No, you don't have a walkman,
still, I wish I did.I mean, you can get one.
I bought one used off eBay afew years back. My my original one
from when I when I was akid that I played all my Madonna cassettes
on. I'm pretty sure, it'sjust a belt or something inside it just
it no longer works. I stillhave it. I won't get rid of

(46:37):
it. But I bought one offe Bay. It was a local seller
up here, and the guy workedat like a like a like a parachute
place, like where people go skydivingor something. Oh wow, And I
was like, okay, I'm gonnabuy a cassette player, you know,
a walkman, so I could playcassettes in the car. And I get

(46:59):
there, and you know, obviouslyI was like, oh, hi,
you know, are you whatever hisname was. He's like yeah, I
was like, you know. Sohe goes into his little locker and he
pulls out, you know, thewalkman. He's like, but why a
walkman. I was like, uh, like, you know, I didn't
really didn't want to go into anyyou know, crazy conversations with him.
He's like, you like books ontape, don't you. I was like,

(47:20):
you know, you're right, Iguess I like books on tape.
So after that, I took thewalkman and I left. But that that's
a really interesting way of looking atit. Yeah, yeah, it's it's
it's different. It's like you said, you can get it at twelve oh
one, or if you you know, happened to be in Australia, you

(47:43):
get it a little earlier. Butit's it's a different experience, you know,
you connect with it differently. Ithink I'm like I'm a little too
young. I never really had arecord player, so my brother would get
albums, but his record player waslike really high up on our a dresser,
so even even had to like climbon a chair to like put it

(48:04):
on. So like, I neverbought records, but I was, I
was, I was. I wasthirteen fourteen in the early nineties. So
my first musical like thing to playmusic was a cassette player boombox like with
the CD player and the cassette player. So okay, so that's how I
started my music collection with CD.See. I was always obsessed with records

(48:24):
as a child, like my likemy mother's records, because my mother had
like a huge collection of disco records, like twelve inches albums everything. Oh
wow, And like I could rememberbeing like two years old, do you
know Shallamar, Yeah, of course, okay, so I can distinctly remember

(48:45):
the Shallomar Friends record, like thesleeve and like my mother playing it so
I was always like into it,you know, and I had my own
records, like my mother gave methe first Village People album. You know,
Wow, surprise your son's gay.I wonder why like that, that

(49:07):
first Village People album that like FireIsland and uh Hollywood and like all those
songs didn't have like YMC on it. Oh wow, I didn't even know.
I didn't even had an album beforethat. Wow. Yeah, it's
very good. Listen to it.I think I think you can get down
with it. Probably won't. Andthen shortly there after, you know,

(49:30):
I think my parents got CDs,so and yeah, the rest is history.
So I do have that. Ido have the album somewhere in my
in my archives. So good,so good, brilliant, it's brilliant,
like so good. I would loveto find them, I would. I
would like to find that, likemint condition, like I would love just

(49:52):
like a perfect copy of that sogreat things coming up right? Oh my
goodness, but so like a prayer? Was your original? Like did your
cassette? You might not even rememberthis. Do you remember the booklet?
Okay? Obviously, well obviously youknew you do remember the booklet because it

(50:13):
smelled like truly was it glossy?Was yours glossy like glossy paper? Yeah?
I think so? Yeah, sowas mine? Okay, And I
remember being like enamored with it,like wow, this is like well that
font was incredible. It was abeautiful font. I mean, I'm such
a font snob, but I lovea good font. It was it was

(50:35):
you know what it I think?I mean, did you grew up Catholic?
Right? M hm? Yeah?I think I think if you were
a Catholic kid and you listen tothat, like it just it just hit
you differently than most people, Likeit just had like this. I think
the songs sounded familiar, but theysounded fresh. There was like a some
of the songs had like a hymnlike quality to them. Her voice had

(50:58):
like a weariness but like what wisdomto it. Like I think that was
the difference between True true Blue.She sounded very like naive and like fun
and you know, she sounded likea kid almost in True Blue, like
she was a happy then. Ithink the divorce really changed her so so

(51:19):
much that like a prayer just hadlike she just sounded she sounded tired,
but not in a like not notthat she was tired, but like she
sounded like she'd been through something lifeI mean life experience. Yeah, yeah,
like she just sounded like she justwent through like a rough patch and
like she was trying to tell hertale. And like, you know,

(51:40):
I mean, the record as awhole is brilliant, brilliant start to finish.
It's probably one of the most perfect, you know, modern rock pop
albums, you know, you know, like Rolling Stone said, as close
to artists pop music gapts. Youknow, it really was like it was
so lush. There were so manylike beautiful instruments in it, all natural
instruments. The harmonies were amazing,you know. The song with Prince was

(52:05):
like you felt like you the songwith Prince loved song, Like I felt
like I shouldn't have been listening toit, Like it was like I had
like such a taboo, like Iwas I was eavesdropping on someone's conversation,
you know. And like promise Promisedto Try is the opposite side where it's
just heart wrenching, you know.Yeah, it's sad that Promised to Try

(52:27):
is a sad song. Yeah,very sad. I mean I remember listening
to it for the first time,and and and and feeling like feeling that
sadness because you could you could hearit in her voice. You know,
it's not like I'm gonna just singabaut it. It's you know, it's
you could tell it's personal to her. Yeah, that's what it probably was

(52:47):
too. It was probably her mostpersonal album. So it's like you really
felt like you were getting to knowher, you know, Like it wasn't
like Chewa Blue Baby, I LoveYou, which is a great song,
lies Up and each is a beautifulsong, you know, open your Heart
changed, you know, change theworld that song, and you know,
and Papa Don't Preach was you know, magnificent, but like it just like

(53:09):
a prayer, was dark and ithad like a like a pain, like
a sorrow to it, even thoughthere was celebratory songs, you know,
but like it ultimately was kind oflike like the struggles of being like Catholic
and Catholic guilt and and and andbeing in love and then being out of

(53:30):
love and then you have like butthe bubbly cherish but you know, Cherish
kind of has like a little bitof a there's a little the cherish as
bright as cherish as it's still maybebecause it's in that album. It still
has a little bit of like likethere's a little bit of darkness to Cherish
To me, I don't I don'tknow for me, I don't know why
you think so like it's a happysong, but like it's almost like kind

(53:52):
of like there's she's like, Idon't really know whether this is ever gonna
happen, Like it's like a hopelessromantic The song m so I keep it
together about family, and then wetalked. We talked about it that one
time, like both of our favoritesong on the album, well, I
have a million, Most of thesongs are my favorites, but you like

(54:15):
you like Spanishize really Spanishize, Yeah, and that is it's such a beautiful
ballad, beautiful and her voice isso oh, like it's so strong and
so like you like she's almost cryingin some parts. It sounds like what
are you saying? Like some ofthe pressings say that it's to pray for

(54:35):
Spanish eze, right, Yeah,I never I never understood that either,
Like let me see if I could, let me let me let me fact
check here a little bit of historytwo fifteen Madonna worship. I used to
start Madonna worship with my Madonna Partythat this podcast is named along with.

(54:58):
We used to do it ice calledthe Reinventions Benefit Concert and it was a
two hour concert. I guess beforeI met you, actually before the dance
party. We should do a twohour concert of people reinventing Madonna songs.
And I always used to do one. And one year I did Spanish Eye
and sang it. I don't knowhow good it was. Nobody recorded it.
Maybe you could do it again?Do you want to do it for

(55:20):
us right now? No, wecould play we could play the actual track,
and we play the actual track people, Yes, we should. I
think we should because it's our favorite, right yeah, one of one of
our One of the things we're goingto do every every episode is kind of
have a little song that kind ofwe talk about and we dissect and all
that. And this this first oneto celebrate the thirty fifth anniversary of the

(55:44):
Lake A Prayer album is Spanish Eyes. I don't know sure his heart is

(56:24):
he with me? Go? Iwish you first? I know he cannot
sing, can't travel, Hello,he hears me say, and I just

(56:49):
can't watch you throw he DearS onmy bellow Paris. A rice come to
night to play. The Spanish shieshad left to shop the tears on my

(57:13):
pillow, but I do my business. If not exists, then help me
bring the Spanish shies. He failto fight like all the rat in the
body of all the streets are papers, don't stand. At least he was

(57:47):
a mad I love like this canthe mutchet from tears on my pillow?
Christ, it comes to night topray the Spanish shies and then my nothing

(58:09):
have to show show my b whatkind of lifeiness thing? If God exists,
then help me break the Spanish shop. How many eyes will they have

(58:36):
to day? How much haney?How many sons will they have to Spanish
shy when we may have the yourethe monovia in a We were proud to

(59:30):
fight, but we cannot grip thisfan, your dunce against the who's next
delight to fall? I nest watchingfrom a beloveds a Christ of your comety

(01:00:00):
night to pray the Spanish shyes andmy theyen to show on my pillow when
kind of livestes avisis? Then helpme bring the Spanish shy. Love it

(01:00:24):
Mustada will be how many nice whenthey have to tame, how much hearty?
How many songs when they have toSpanish shies? When will they ever

(01:00:49):
le I never want that song,And it's so crazy. They should they
should do like a like an extendedversion. It's just so like, well
we went to see h uh chepetomum. Patrick Leonard did a show at
Patrick Leonard did a show at theat the at Joe's Pub a few years

(01:01:14):
ago, and he did all instrumentalsof his songs, and he did all
the Madonna songs that he wrote,like he just played them like a band,
and it was like a religious experiencebecause he did Spanish eyes. He
did uh live to tell? Uh? Didn't he play at that? And
at that gig he played some ofthe demos or am I thinking of something
different? This is like a liveband that he was, but there were

(01:01:37):
no vocals. It was just themusic of all the of all the songs
he wrote with Madonna and other people. It was it was it was wow.
It was so good actually, likeit was another instance where I felt
like I was not eavesdropping, butlike I was like I wasn't supposed to
be in the room when this washappening. Like that's how intimate. It
was. It was really great,but spanishized. Supposedly it's supposedly a song

(01:02:04):
about about the HIV epidemic, aboutAIDS, but you said it might have
been about I read in particular,right, Yeah, I read online that
it was allegedly, you know,supposed to be for Christopher Flynn. Ah
her like her dance teacher, right, her dance teacher, her dance instructor,
went back in Michigan, right fromMichigan. Yeah, yeah, he
was in Michigan. I think he'sthe one who took her to her first

(01:02:25):
K club, right, he did? And when did he die? He
died around this time. He youknow, obviously succumbed to AIDS, but
I think he died. Maybe hedied around this time, and which would
make sense if that song was abouthim. Yeah, I didn't even know.
You said he was Latino. Right. When I hear the word name
Christopher Flynn, I think of likethe whitest guy on earth. That's something

(01:02:51):
else I've read too. But youcan't. You can't. You can't go
buy everything that you read on theinternet. I wonder, because because I
would. Also, here's another thingthat a lot of people don't like really
attribute her to or like really thankher for it. But like the like
a Prayer album had a little sheetin it that told you about how to
prevent there's an AIDS back sheet,and like unheard of back then. She

(01:03:14):
was one of the few, youknow her, Elizabeth Taylor maybe and a
few other people that actually like didn'twant people to die and wanted to make
sure people knew how to be safeand had to like save sex. And
even even in the liner, likeher little intro in the sex books,
she's like, this is this bookis a book of my fantasies in a
in a in a time, ina world where AIDS doesn't exist. But

(01:03:37):
if you're going to do anything,you know, make sure you have consent
and make sure you use a condom, all that kind of stuff. So
like that's what spoke to me asa young gay man, especially me like
starting to have fool around with people, Like when like a Prayer came out,
seeing that was like chilling, butit also was like, oh,
she's looking out for me, youknow, She's like she's on my side,

(01:03:59):
you know. But it made peopleask questions for sure, Yeah,
I asked questions. Yeah, Imean I was I was really young.
I was I was a child.I was a kid, and I remember
I remember asking my cousin because youknow, I wasn't the best at reading,
and I said to I said tomy cousin, was like, oh,

(01:04:20):
what does this say? And hetold me what it was. I
was like, oh, like,I guess maybe at the time I didn't
connect with it like I was withlistening to Madonna music. Yeah, Like,
how old were you? Like five? I was. I want to
say when I when I first gotlike a prayer, I was probably like
six sih. Wow. Yeah,I had like a prayer before I had

(01:04:43):
erotica. Wow. Though I thinkI was that's so young to see the
word aids wow. I think.Well. The first Madonna album I could
tell you this. The first Madonnaalbum I bought on release date was Bedtime
Stories. That might have been thepre when I did too. Maybe release
date was was Bedtime Stories. NobodyBeats the Whizz in Brooklyn eighty sixth Street.

(01:05:06):
Wow. I got it on cassettebecause it was cheaper than the CD.
I either got it a Tower Recordsthat I gotta have ever been to
record runner on yes of the fourthWest Worth we used to go there for
all our imports and Madonna imports andCD singles, and I think I think
we got bedtime stories there. SoI do remember reading the liner notes on

(01:05:28):
the way home on the train,and now like it was so it was
a complete like and of Erotica.Erotica was all blue and cold and white
and like black and white, andthen like Bedroom Stores was all like pinks
and blues, and the the fontswere all bubbly and and pretty and like
lush, and she was in likeNeglige and she was all like soft.

(01:05:51):
It was like the complete opposite ofyou know, the wild, sassy,
icy ice queen from Erotica. Itwas pretty pretty wild, but yeah,
like a Prayer definitely. Me andmy friend Pedro, who was my first
Madonna maniac friend. We grew uptogether, went to high school together.

(01:06:12):
We would share like here headphones andwe would listen to like a Prayer and
cassette in in home room in aBeau that came out in eighty nine,
so we were still came out inMarch we eighty nine, so we were
we were in eighth grade, sothat would be eighth grade. Yeah,
yeah, So we were in ahome room in eighth grade or actually,

(01:06:32):
like when we were in eighth grade, you like stayed you kind of stayed
in the same room the whole day, not un till high school you switched
classes, right, That's how weworked for us. So we would like
have recess and we would me andhim would listen to we would share headphones
and listen to the like a Prayeralbum. And then, uh, you
know, a year later we werein high school and that's when like a
Mexican collection came out and just formy love, and I remember, I

(01:06:57):
remember defending Madonna's like Madonna's not lesbian, She's just bisexual, because everybody was
everybody was talking about the fact thatshe was kissing a girl in the video.
And I don't know why that wassuch a thing to defend, Like,
no, she's not she's not gay, she's bisexual. Like that was
like that made it okay, Thatmade it, That made it okay.
It was just so funny. Meanwhile, like I'd already like been, you

(01:07:20):
know, been fooling around with afriend of mine, and like I knew
about being gay, and I was, but it was like it was the
time where you made sure nobody elseknew that you were gay, so you
like, I don't like guys,I like girls guys. You know,
like you you like overdo it,you overcompensate, so like, I think
that's where that all came from.And then eventually everybody was like, yeah,

(01:07:40):
he's gay. I mean, butyou love Madonna, so like obviously
you want you wanted Madonna, youwanted to marry Madonna exactly. That's what
people thought that people thought that wewere in love. Like, no,
I'm not in love with her,you know, I'm you know, fascinated
by her, and I I justwant to hang out with her, you
know, I think it was Ihad listened to a pot cast a few

(01:08:00):
years ago with Cassandra Peterson Elvira,Mistress of the Darka, and she she
was saying how most kids, likemost men that would come to come,
you know, come meet her orwhatever. It's either they wanted they wanted
to fuck her, or they wantedto be her. And she compared herself

(01:08:21):
to like Madonna and share in thatrespect. It's like, you know,
you have these these these boys,either they they wanted you, they wanted
to fuck you, or they connectedwith you a strong, you know woman,
and they wanted to be you,not necessarily that you want to be
her, but you know, andyou know, they're all like kind of
caricatures of women, Like they're overdone, like their boobs are sticking out,

(01:08:43):
and they're their makeup's really powerful,and their hair is really big, and
you know, like so they're likethey're like super women. You know,
so you're kind of like, wow, yeah, hey, Madonna, put
put Elvira, Mistress of the Darkon, you know, the guest judge
panel for Vogue exactly, they go, that would be pretty awesome. Actually

(01:09:03):
I met her. She came tosee Lady Bunny and she actually just came
out as lesbian, which is funnya couple of years ago. But she's
I mean, you've obviously seen herout of makeup. I would never ever
think that that was the woman whowas a viral all those years. Like
she's it's such a transformation. Haveyou met her outside of her outside of

(01:09:23):
a viral drag? I haven't.I have not. That's you would not
if you saw a picture. I'veseen pictures of her. I've seen interviews
with her as Cassandra, you know, not in you know, the Elvira
persona. But you're right, You'reright on that one. But I think
that she she does that on purpose, so she could she could walk down
the street and not necessary Everybody wouldn'tnecessarily be like, oh look there,

(01:09:46):
that's Cassandra Peterson. That's how viral. You know that. I think twice,
you know, seeing this woman walkdown the street. It's actually pretty
smart on her part to like shecould be anonymous. She can still go
to the movies and still you know, live a normal life. And just
when she goes into that little makeuproom, she comes out and she's this
amazing creature Elvira. But yeah,so I think what I'm excited about is

(01:10:14):
this Monday, I fight to Denver. I'm going to see Madonna on Tuesday,
but I'm doing a little Madonna worshipfor all who don't know I this
will be my sixteenth year I doa party called Madonna Worship and Madonna Worship
Night, And because she's on tourthis year, I decided to try to
take it take it on the roadas well. So I'll be in Denver
on Tuesday, March nineteenth at Trade. We're doing like a little happy hour,

(01:10:36):
Madonna Happy Hour, and then backin New York on the twenty second
at Red Eye for my birthday.It's funny, it's like it didn't actually
start out it was going to bemy birthday party, but that was really
the only date that they had availablethat I could do as well. So
I was like, well, let'sbuilt as my birthday party. Maybe people

(01:10:57):
show up either for Madonna or forme, or at least show up,
and then also do to party inHouston on the thirtieth at Space Cowboy.
My friend uh Adriana made that allhappen, and then I'm back in Fort
Lauderdale the beginning of April to uh, We're gonna do a Madonna worship party,

(01:11:17):
but we ended up mixing that.But something very special is happening.
But if you follow me at djCD or Madonna Worship on Instagram, you'll
find out what that secret is.And how can they how can they follow
you? Stev Oh, I'm onI'm on Instagram at Stevie Vox, I'm
on x Twitter at Stevie Vox,Christian Mingle at steveee Box, and at

(01:11:44):
s T E v I E vO x v O x v O X
Voice of Expression. Voice of Expression. You like that Huh. It sounds
like a perfume. It kind ofdoes. It kind of just it's what
are you wearing? I'm wearing voxvox voice of expression. It smells like,
you know, leather, and thathappened. Yeah, but we're both

(01:12:13):
gonna be in Miami to see theMiami Show. I've so you know,
I've never been to Miami. You'venever I've only been one, never been
to my I've been to Florida obviously. I went to Art Basil. I've
never been to Miami. I've neverbeen to like Fort Lauderdale. I've never
been. I've been. I've been. I've only been in Fort Lado in

(01:12:33):
Miami, I've been. I've beento Orlando. I have a friend that
lives like if Florida is a penis, she lives in the center of the
shaft shafts. She's okay or whatever. Yeah, she's in. She's in
the shaft, she's waiting to popout. But yeah, I really like
Fort Loaderdale Miami. I went.Actually one of my most amazing trips.

(01:12:56):
Uh, I went to Art Basiland my friend kind of talked me into
it. She said, you're comingdown for art pazzles. This year,
and I'm like, I don't knowif I get She's like, no,
book your flight, You're staying withme. You're coming to Art Pazzle this
year. And I'm like i'll tellyou why later. I'm like okay,
And like two weeks later, Isaw the announcement that Madonna was doing her
Tears of a Clown show there.So I worked the whole week for Fayena,

(01:13:18):
the art center down there that myfriend Aaron worked at, and are
like like the crescendo of the weekof busting our butts doing all these events
on the beach and in the domewas we got to It's good to see
Madonna's Madonna's show called Cheers of aClown, which she was dressed as a
clown. She did a lot ofsongs that she's never done before and she

(01:13:40):
probably never will again. And itwas a fundraiser for Malawi. And it
was probably one of the most insaneexperiences in my life because everybody thought I
was security. So I snuck rightin and like that snuck in, but
like I they knew that I hadworked. Yeah, I snuck in and
people people were asking me like wherethe exit was and where the and I'm
like, I don't know the like, aren't you security, I'm like no,

(01:14:01):
maybe, yeah. That was thatwas when we got we got our
little lanyards that say that we wereon Madonna's staff. So that was like
twenty sixteen was quite a year forthat, right did she do easy?
Right? Yes she did, andshe did inter and she did my favorite
song of American life called Intervention.Intervention. There needs to be a whole

(01:14:25):
movie written around that song because thatsong is so cinematic. That whole album
is pretty cinematic. Actually, actuallyher music is cinematic in general. I
don't know if you remember, butlike, one of my favorite things about
Madonna was in between each album therewas always a soundtrack song, and those
soundtrack songs like she she should releasean album of just her soundtrack songs,

(01:14:45):
because like a compilation, because theywere like they were always like out of
this world, fantastic, and sometimesthey like like Erotica was really sexual and
cold, old and like and sassy, and then in between that she releases,
uh, this used to be myplayground, which is like, oh

(01:15:08):
no, was this used to bemy playground before Erotica or after Erotica?
Oh god, I'm gonna lose mymenonta card. Yeah, I'm pretty sure
it was ninety two. Maybe itwas in between. It was in between,
just when My Love and Erotica wasthis used to be My Playground,
which is so funny because it's suchlike a sappy ballad. It was ninety

(01:15:30):
two. It was really ninety two, ninety two, early ninety two though,
right, because then Erotica came outin October. Right, let's say,
let's let's let's check the wikipedias.You're like the you're like the fact
checker about you June sixteenth, nineteenninety two, and Erotica came out after
single single Wise, Erotica came outafter so it's en Rescue Me and Erotica,

(01:15:53):
okay, all right, perfect?And then yeah, so like they're
back at the collection and and justwith My Love the scandalous video that you
know, all that, then shereleasedes this beautiful like this used to be
My playground, and then right afterthat it's like Ironica Romance, you know.
It was like, it's so funnyhow she like I would say,
remember, I can still do thistoo. I can be I can be

(01:16:14):
a slut and talk about sex.But I can also sing these pretty ballads
that you all love, you know, and in fun. This used to
be my playground. Is actually well, I shouldn't say it is my least
favorite, but it was. Itwas one of my least favorite Madonna songs.
I don't know why. It justnever like it when it came out.
But if I never heard it again, I wouldn't I wouldn't cry.
I mean, I'm okay with itnow. I'm I'm okay with it now,

(01:16:38):
you know. I like what it'sabout. I think that's beautiful in
itself. But this used to bemy playground. And Spanish Lesson, well,
Spanish Lesson is really nobody's favorite song. I don't think anybody likes such
song. I don't really know anybodywho does. It's just it's cringy because

(01:16:59):
she's like saying things is wrong andpronouncing things wrong in Spanish. It's really
I don't know who like said yeah, put that on the album. I
was hoping for a sequel. Iwanted, like Italian lesson, that would
be really funny, that'd be reallyfunny. Yeah, And then we had
like I'll remember it was after Eroticaor after bedtime Stories. Maybe I'm before

(01:17:23):
it was definitely before Bedtime Stories.What was I'll remember. I remember it
was ninety five. I'm probably wrongbecause it was on something. Oh you're
right, yeah it was well thatsong alone, Something to Remember, the
song from from from My Breathless.That's one of my favorite Donna ballads ever,

(01:17:45):
Me Too, to Tell? Iwould I would if I had,
If I had to pick ballads liveto Tell, Something to Remember, those
are those are probably the tops.I really like. Falling Free though from
her later or later. Falling Freeis very good, beautiful. She always
has She always has the kick assalbum Closer, like the last song on

(01:18:09):
every album is always so so good. She really knows how to close an
album or a show or whatever.I wish I see that live. What
what song? Falling Free? Yeah, that would be intense. I think
that her voice, she sounds likean angel on it, beautiful and the

(01:18:30):
lyrics are so the lyrics are incredible. I just wonder sometimes you know where,
like does she sit down? Didshe write that? And like it's
been in her little notebook for likefive years and then she decides, let
me, let's see if we cando something with this song or like or
is every time she released an album, like all the songs Fresh Sod,
Always Wonder. No, I thinkI think she has she has some lyrics

(01:18:51):
written down where she's like, oh, you know this, let's let's let's
try to work with this. Yeah, I'm pretty sure there's some kind of
like I Love New York was waswritten prior to you know, Confessions,
it was that's right. It almostended up on on the Reventioned tour,
right, h yeah, this ison like there's like a demo of it

(01:19:14):
or something, and then they usedit in the I'm going to tell You
a Secret. Yes, that's right. So yeah, there's a lot of
intertwining with her career and then that'swhat that's what. Like the soundtrack songs
kind of like gave us a littlebit of like it like helped like take
away the waiting, the pain ofwaiting for her next album. We would

(01:19:38):
get like one track that everybody like, Beautiful Stranger came out after a Ray
of Light and you know, butshe doesn't. She hasn't really done a
soundtrack song in a while, andit's like the closest we have lately is
popular with the Weekend, which islike the song that never that's never dying.
It keeps like going up the charts, and it's like her long lasting,
longest lasting song in a while.If you haven't heard it by the

(01:19:59):
weekend from his what was it calledThe Idol The Idol, Yeah, it
was a series he did. Yeah, and it kind of wasn't very critically
acclaimed but h and his acting waspanned. But uh, the song is
really fun, really fresh. Shesounds great in it. But the last
couple of things that she's done havebeen like remixes of old songs. She
did that song with Dua Lipa thatdid okay people. I rarely heard people

(01:20:23):
play the remix with her on it, like when I was out, it
would always be the original. Andshe did the Frozen remixes that backed that
up, backed that up to thewell that was that was TikTok. TikTok
got that. Uh yeah, itwas wild. It was like if the
B side from the Rebel Heart albumand TikTok people found it and turned it
into like this hit. I'd reallythought she was gonna perform it on tour,

(01:20:45):
but she didn't. But I kindof thought it would be incorporated someplace.
Yeah, like just like background orsomething we did. We did get
a couple of songs on the tourthat I didn't expect to ever hear,
like Up Down Swede and uh badBad Girl especially, and now now she's
been doing take a Bow lately insteadof Rain, which Rain was amazing to

(01:21:06):
hear live after after like thirty somethingyears. But yeah, well, I
think on our next episode we'll divemore into the tour because more people will
have seen it, and I'm hopingwe're going to get a cool, like
filmed release of it so that peoplewho didn't get a chance to see it
will get to experience, like howcool it was. I think La was

(01:21:26):
shot all five dates. They theypro shot. That means that means that
take a Bow will being instead ofRain. That's cooopy. I'm kind of
excited to see take a Bell though. Yeah, I can't wait to hear
it live. I was. Iwas thrilled to hear Rain, and like
anybody who I spoke to the tourabout, like that's all I talked about,

(01:21:49):
was like, oh my god,Rain, Rain, Rain, because
another song I never thought I wouldget to see live. You know,
she did it. She did agirly show and that was it. Yeah,
I feel like I feel like shereally loved her erotica. Dta arabs
that seems to have a lot ofaction in this in this show Justice for

(01:22:09):
Erotica. Come on, children,come on, children, put that on
your tic TACs. Yeah, exactly, all right, So I think I
think we should wrap things up.We've had a really cool first episode,
I think, and I'm excited tosee where we go with this. I'm
excited that we actually, like said, we're gonna do something and we're doing

(01:22:30):
it. So and like I said, you could follow Stevie at Stevie Vox
on Instagram and an X, youfollow me at DJ shohn c D.
That's d J c h A nc e y D. Or you could
follow Madonna Worship on Instagram to findout out whether there's a party near you.
We gotta we got parties coming upin New York and Brooklyn. Yeah,

(01:22:51):
if you follow u us on Instagram, you find out everything. And
uh, what's cool about Miami is, uh is it's right around Stevie's birthday.
So on the twenty second of March, we'll be celebrating my birthday.
Then we're Miami seeing the show.We're gonna be celebrating Stevie's birthday. So
and uh follow follow me so youcan find out what's going on on April
fifth in AH in the Florida areanear Miami. Very exciting, uh event

(01:23:16):
that will be happening. So gladto hear about it. Yeah, it's
gonna be cool. It all kindof happened on accident too, kind of
funny. But yeah, we're gonna, I guess we're gonna try to do
this like maybe monthly or whenever weget the chance to do it. If
something comes up that we want todiscuss, we'll get on the on the
Spotify for podcasters app and whip outa short episode or you know, you

(01:23:40):
know whatever. But I want tothank everybody for listening and hopefully you'll continue
listening. Yeah, anything, wantsanything, you want to leave the kids
with Teev Justice for Erotica hashtag Justicefor Erotica Beta forever. All right,
we love you all, Bye byebye. Oh my God, I hope

(01:24:08):
say well heaven. And I detestoh my sins because the die just down
the streets, but more stiff,because my God, I've got founded who

(01:24:30):
art a good My God, newyou work. I'm resolving of my mom.
I reserve, I reserve, Ireserve, I reserved, I resolve.

(01:24:55):
I have a reservation. I havea reservation. What do you mean
it's not in the computer.