MADONNA: Four Minutes To Save Her Stature?

This past week, Madonna released her 11th studio album (and her last for long-time label, Warner): HARD CANDY closes this chapter in her career, and preceeds her new association with LiveNation-- her latest lucrative alliance. So, 2008 finds Madonna topping the global charts once again with her Justin Timberlake collaboration "Four Minutes to Save the World", from this new CD that also includes work with Kanye West, Pharrell Williams, and Timbaland. The Reinvention Queen has reinvented herself as marketable (once again) to US radio. That is basically what this project boils down to, in my opinion... How shrewd to show up, right out of the gates at LiveNation, with a global smash? While Madonna has never really lost her dominion over our popular culture, her grasp of her American audience has managed to lessen over the past ten years. She scored with "Music" and "Hung Up", and a few lesser hits since 2001, and her spectacular and smart disco extravaganza CONFESSIONS ON A DANCEFLOOR CD regained her some clout here, but since the US charts have been predominantly urban-leaning she has lost some of her audience . So what does she do? She reinvents herself as disposable and IRRELEVANT... And what happens? The smashing success of HARD CANDY! Its ironic, because (as a longtime fan and listener/ "spectator"), Madonna seems to have sold out for the first time. Instead of blazing trails (or legitimizing lesser-known trails...), she finds herself in the company of Fergie and Nelly Furtado: Smart, shrewd, and disconcerting. If Madonna has chosen intentionally to be generic, than she is even more of a whiz than anyone ever gave her credit for. While the CD does have its high points (It is, after all, still a Madonna record...), only a few tracks would sit comfortably with the rest of her catalog. Its very "today". It wont be very "tomorrow"... At worst, this will find her sitting very pretty with industry execs at LiveNation once she kicks off her next phase. At best, we have a mediocre new CD from Madonna, with a few singles we'll be humming all summer. Hmmmmmmmm... Well played.