Last year, Madonna celebrated four decades of her career with her eight-month-long “Celebration Tour.” Madonna has been in the music industry for over 40 years now and is a huge artist in pop culture history.
On Nov. 12, 1984, Madonna released “Like A Virgin,” an innocuously sexual song about feeling saved in a new love. The 80s were a time of female empowerment through music, signaling a stark change from the previous male-centered topics of the 60s and early 70s. Artists like Cyndi Lauper, with “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun,” sang about girlhood and quite literally just having fun. Madonna also represented female empowerment, but in a more provocative way.
At the 1984 VMAs, Madonna performed “Like A Virgin”—the performance that changed pop culture for decades to come. The performance itself was sexual for the time, with her rolling on the floor and gyrating. Although far less uncommon nowadays, the performance was shocking for a female artist in mainstream music at the time. Her manager even told her that her career could be over after the controversial performance. However, despite the backlash it received, the performance was kind of like a wake-up call for the music industry and society in general. It was almost like Madonna was saying, “Hey, women can talk about sex too!”
Watching the performance now, it doesn’t seem too vulgar compared to some of the media that is mainstream now, but a lot of those sex-centered songs by women wouldn’t have been possible or widely accepted if Madonna hadn’t pushed those boundaries 41 years ago.
Despite Madonna’s significant impact on the industry, there is a double standard when it comes to songs talking about sex. Female rappers, like Cardi B, constantly face backlash for overly sexual lyrics, while male rappers, like Lil Wayne, don’t receive nearly as much criticism.
As the music industry continues to change, there is no doubt that female artists, especially Madonna, will continue to challenge expectations and push boundaries, hopefully changing women’s role in music at the same time.
