all about Madonna

According to TRL US, the performance involving Madonna, Christina, Britney and Missy at last year MTV VMAs, could be included on new Britney Spears’ DVD due for release in November 2004.
source : drownedmadonna

The tickets for the Lisbon date on Sept. 13 at Pavhilao Atlantico will be going on sale Friday, July 30th – 10 am local (5am EST/2am PST) .
The fan club pre-sale will be Tues. July 27 – 3pm local (10am EST) through Thursday, July 29th 5pm local (noon EST).
source : madonna.com

Guess who’s signed back to Sire Records? That’s right ladies and gents, it’s Madonna. After Sire broke ties in 1994, with Madonna and her distributor Warner Bros. to pursue the London music scene with London Records, they are back! Of course with Madonna and Mandy Moore under their belt. I guess London underground music wasn’t as profitable as they’d hope.
Under the new contract with Sire Records, Madonna must record 2 new albums and release a compilation CD. Expect word on the new contract, reportedly worth over 25 million, to be released on Billboard next month. Only in New York kids, Only in New York!
source : nypost.com

Toronto radio station Mix 99.9 has reported that yesterday July 20, Madonna spent the majority of the day at Toronto’s Sick Kids Hospital reading and visiting with the children and their families.
Mix 99.9 also reported that she had read her three released childrens books ‘The English Roses’, ‘Mr. Peabody’s Apples’ and her latest book ‘Yakov and The Seven Thieves’.
source : madonnalicious.com

As the world will celebrate the 100th anniversary of Einstein’s publication of the theory of relativity next year, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, to which the genius bequeathed his intellectual property rights, expects to net a whopping royalty worth millions of dollars.
The university has already netted some $10m over the last eight years, since it started to exercise its rights, from royalties charged for the commercial use of Albert Einstein’s name and image. However, it has not been driven by purely profit motives and has been very selective in allowing the use of the genius’ name and.
Singing sensation Madonna was refused to use Einstein’s image in a concert performance, as the university thought it was not in keeping with the preservation of his legacy, despite the potential royalties of thousands of dollars.
However, a request by director Steven Spielberg to use Einstein’s image for a few seconds in AI: Artificial Intelligence was permitted for $600,000 in royalties.
In another case, Pepsi was allowed to use the most famous Jew’s image in its commercials, but a liquor company that wished to launch a vodka named “Einstein”? was refused permission to use the name.
Last month, the university signed a 10-year royalty deal with a toy company of the Disney Group for a series of children’s toys under the name “~Baby Einstein’. Hebrew University VP and director-general Moshe Vigdor said that the annual royalties have ranged from $1-1.5m, but are expected to make substantial gains in ’05. Germany, Einstein’s native country, will be issuing commemorative stamps and coins, and talks are on to determine the royalties.
Before his death in 1955, Einstein, realised the commercial potential of his name and image, and decided to leave the commercial rights to the university behind which he was a driving force.
source : reuters.com

THE MOTHER of Re-Invention has re-invented herself yet again. And this time, Madonna’s finally admitting it. When The Material Girl, Madge, Esther — take your pick — brings her aptly titled Re-Invention Tour to the Air Canada Centre tonight (for the first of three sold-out shows), concert-goers will be getting a decidedly less raunchy, more preachy evening of music than they’re used to.
Can you say less sex, more politics and religion?
Given it’s been 11 years since Madonna played in T.O.with her much more lascivious Girlie Show Tour at SkyDome, clearly a lot has happened over the past decade to lead to such a dramatic, more mature transformation.
Especially since the 45-year-old singer-dancer has succeeded in shocking us over the past twenty years with her various naughty and rebellious looks, actions, videos and books like Sex, etc.
In a sentence, she’s grown up. Or seems to have.
Two children (seven-year-old daughter Lourdes, a.k.a. Lola, and three-year-old son Rocco), a happy second marriage to British filmmaker Guy Ritchie, who’s ten years her junior (who would have thunk it?) and her study of the Jewish mysticism known as Kabbalah will do that to you.
She’s most recently stated that she chose the Hebrew name Esther for herself as a follower of the religion, prompting huge laughs amongst her critics.
“I’m a little bit irritated that people think that it’s like some celebrity bandwagon that I’ve jumped on, or say somebody like Demi (Moore) has jumped on,” Madge told 20/20′s Cynthia McFadden in the only interview she’s granted thus far while on tour.
“We take it very seriously.”
But when McFadden asked her if there was a reigning philosophy in her household, Madonna replied: “Clean up your s–t.”
A great answer but didn’t we all expect a little bit more in the way of sage wisdom from this female powerhouse?
Especially one that’s rumoured to be visiting fertility clinics in L.A. in an effort to have a third child?
“She’s a pop force to be reckoned with, or certainly was,” Canadian singer K.D. Lang told the Toronto Sun. “And has tremendously placed the bar way above where it was for women in music before (her). She’s been an immense help to women in music.”
That may be so, but there’s been some serious career mis-steps in the past couple of years including Madonna’s obvious manoeuvres to re-capture the youth market.
She hooked up with the far inferior Britney Spears for her Me Against The Music video having earlier famously kissed her at the MTV Awards, appeared in a Gap ad alongside Missy Elliott who remixed Get Into The Groove, and became the author of children’s books that have received mixed reviews. (She just released the third installment in a five-book series.)
And what about those seriously bad movies — 2002s’ Swept Away, directed by Ritchie, and 2000′s The Next Best Thing, — and two of her less-than-stellar albums — 2003′s American Life and 2000′s Music?
Still, to come this year, is production on a Martin Scorsese-produced musical called Hello Sucker!, which doesn’t exactly sound like a winner.
Does great art come from personal suffering? In Madonna’s case, it would appear so.
At the L.A. launch of her Re-Invention trek back on May 24, I kind of missed the gender-bending, provocative artist of old.
Even her 2001 Drowned World Tour, while having fewer chestnuts from the Madonna catalogue, was a way more visually stunning show.
And despite those breathless British tabloid reports of simulated lesbian sex and getting electrocuted on stage during the Re-Invention production — neither materialized. (The supposed electrocution saw Madonna strapped into an electric chair but that was about as exciting as it got.)
Not that she entirely disappointed. On the contrary.
If Madonna really excels at one thing in this world, it’s her live performances. Why else would her three dates in Toronto — she also plays tomorrow night and Wednesday night — sell-out in a record-setting 80 minutes?
She’s an incredible dancer, if not an incredible singer, and she does possess clarity of vision, designer style and a healthy sense of humour.
For example at the Los Angeles tour opener, the reworking of Get Into The Groove, was a hilarious bit of staging which featured Madonna in a kilt — in a shout-out to her husband’s ancestry — accompanied by bagpipers and drummers.
And all those years of serious yoga practice seemed to have really paid off as she emerged from beneath the stage on a platform for the show opener Vogue and immediately went into a stand where she placed her entire body weight on her forearms.
Still, Madonna was hurting for all her physical efforts with a nude bandage on her right forearm and a black tensor bandage around her left knee visible on opening night.
Hey, if the healthy specimen that is Madge is vulnerable, what hope is there for the rest of us?
While Lang, an L.A. resident for the past couple of years, didn’t attend any of Madonna’s shows on the West Coast — “I wouldn’t really be that engaged in Madonna’s tour at this point. I’ve seen here like three times already!” she commented — another prominent, if younger Canadian female artist had plans to catch Madonna in Toronto.
Napanee, Ont., pop-rock teen sensation Avril Lavigne, said she’s more of a fan of the pop icon than the musical artist.
“I have a lot of respect for her because she has longevity and she’s been around for so long and she’s always changed her style and been evolving and I think she’s a really strong woman and she’s always surprising people,” Lavigne told the Sun.
“And I think she’s smart, a very smart business woman. I really like her. I’m not saying I’m a fan. I’m saying her, Madonna, what she has done, what she has accomplished, I look at that and I have a lot of respect for her. I’m curious to see what her show’s like.”
So what can fans expect tonight, tomorrow night and Wednesday night?
An hour-and-50-minute show that’s big on production and costume changes and heavy on the hits — with such ’80s gems as Papa Don’t Preach, Crazy For You and Holiday featured prominently — and plenty of Bush-bashing during the title track from American Life.
Yes, after wimping out earlier and pulling the original video for American Life from music video channels — apparently out of sensitivity to the troops in Iraq — she’s finally showing those controversial visuals in concert as Bush and Saddam Hussein share a cigar.
Madonna is also being followed by a documentary crew, a la Truth Or Dare, and they were highly visible on launch night as they filmed a proud Ritchie beaming near the front of the stage.
Next up for The Material Girl is a planned tour of Israel’s holy places in October with a group of more than 100 students studying Kabbalah.
Apparently, she’ll be staying in an out-of-the-way guest house, avoiding fans and TV cameras. (Now that better make it into the documentary.)
Otherwise, she most recently got bought out of her share of Maverick Records by parent company Warner Music Group and won the right to exclude hikers from her $23-million English country estate saying they would have destroyed her right to a private family life.
Maybe Madonna will concentrate on being a gardener next. Pregnant, barefoot and in her English garden.
Seems like a good place for Esther.
source : toronto sun

Pop star Madonna’s maternal skills have failed to impress America’s female population – she’s last on a list of celebrity parents mothers would most like to babysit their children.
The Like A Prayer singer landed just five per cent of votes in a poll by a US magazine, reports Britain’s Daily Sport newspaper.
American TV host Kelly Ripa was crowned the most sought-after babysitter, ahead of actress Reese Witherspoon, Jada Pinkett Smith and Sex and the City star Sarah Jessika Parker.
Madonna has been criticised in the past for dressing her seven-year-old daughter Lourders in raunchy clothing.
source : contactmusic

Is it the high ticket prices? Or the rocky personal lives of music superstars?
Whatever the reason, this year’s blockbuster summer concert season is turning out to be a bust.
Major acts like Britney Spears, Marc Anthony and Christina Aguilera have all pulled the plug on their big tours before they even started.
Large-scale festivals like Lollapalooza have also been canceled.
In some cases, personal problems are to blame, like Britney Spears’ knee injury.
But many industry insiders point to the increasingly “crazy” ticket prices — and how fans just won’t pay the price. One analysis shows the average ticket price has nearly doubled since 1995 — to about 50 dollars a ticket.
But not all tours are doing poorly. Madonna — asking a top ticket price of 300 dollars — is selling out nearly every show.
source : associated press