June
9, 2003
Excerpts:
Madonna
hasn't been "like a virgin" for a long time, but the Material
Girl is desperate for new material to keep her warm in a cooling spotlight.
Sean Penn, her ex, is in trouble, too. He needs a pen name. Both have
been eclipsed by events that have cast them deep into the shadows.
Madonna
lost her direction and edge looking for the zeitgeist. Her new album
dropped off Billboard's Top Twenty after only three weeks. Her pop
vulgarity once tapped into the rebellious spirit of the times, but
her current sensibility is more suited to the '60s.
Her
ex is in the wrong decade, too. He's locked in lawsuits with the language
of the 1950s, accusing movie producer Steve Bing of "blacklisting"
him because he spoke out against the war in Baghdad.
Penn
is an "oldcomer" to bad publicity, but Madonna managed to
get out of the marriage unscathed by his bad press. She even profited
it by it, by looking sympathetic.
But
now the national mood has changed and she's getting bad publicity
on her own. She cancelled a music video of herself decked out in army
fatigues, aping Che Guevara, throwing a hand-grenade at a George W.
Bush lookalike.
One
music insider calls her persona a "tired shtick," and she
offended the lefties by trying to capitalize on one of their cherished
revolutionary heroes, selling nothing more than herself.
Trendsetters
with a sharp ear for the buzz hear another message in the decline
of Madonna's pop appeal. The newest generation of teenagers and young
adults are discovering - horrors! - music their parents and even grandparents
enjoy.
