If you’re as big a Madonna fan as this writer, you may need to sit down for this news:
The Queen of Pop will release a new album sometime in 2018.
She recently sat down with Vogue Italia to chat about her new life in Lisbon with her children, upcoming projects and more. Among the biggest bombs dropped: she announced that her fourteenth LP will be released “by the end of the year.”
Madonna has been living in Portugal for about a year, and she says the music scene there has inspired her deeply, calling it “a nice antidote to what’s going on in the music business now where everything’s so formulaic, and every song has 20 guest artists on it, and everyone sounds the same.”
OMG PREACH, MADONNA.
She continues: “In Alfama [the oldest district of Lisbon], you’ll hear people singing and playing fado music everywhere. There are these weekly sessions called living room sessions which pop up in people’s beautiful homes that are 500 years old, and you walk up the marble steps which are lined with candles into the living room which is also dimly lit with candles, and there’s this rolling, very intimate performance happening where people play, they sing, they recite poetry.”
“It’s like a salon; something which doesn’t really exist in many places anymore – people elsewhere say, ‘Call my manager, this is how much I charge.’ I’m pretty sure in Lisbon people would do these shows and not get paid, they just do them for the love of what they do, and for me, this is glorious and inspiring.”
Madonna’s key collaborator on her new record will be producer Mirwais, who produced Music (one of the best pop albums ever by anyone) and American Life (one of Madonna’s least successful records).
As for her most recent albums. 2012’s MDNA had its moments (“Gang Bang” and “Love Spent” are great) and Rebel Heart might have been a home run if it were three our four tracks shorter.
Madonna also told Vogue Italia she left America for Lisbon to help her son David pursue soccer dreams—and also to get her kids away from Trump. “This isn’t America’s finest hour,” she says.
h/t: NME
Madonna’s Vogue Italia Cover Story