Madonna’s Confessions Tour

Having Madonna out here even if for only one concert remains a dream. Her talent fee must be so astronomical for the local market. Besides, there does not seem to be an available venue that will hold the number of people required for the promoter to be able to recoup his investment.

Not that there is any reason for us to complain. We do get good shows in this part of the world and the music business is doing quite well concertwise. But the Material Girl is more than an entertainer. She is an icon of the times and it would be really nice if we could have the experience of watching her perform in one of her fabulous shows.

But since there is no chance we will get one of those live out here soon and the chances that we will in the future is getting slimmer by the day. Note that Madonna is turning 47 come August and though incredibly daring, I do not think she will still be singing while hanging from a cross when she is 50 years old.

But because a Madonna concert is well worth time and effort, you might want to do the next best thing. That is watch her on video, which I assure you, might even be better than watching her live when all that you can afford to buy are tickets to the general admission tier close to the sky. And this is where Madonna: The Confessions Tour – Live from London album comes in.

I think that fabulous is indeed the only way to describe Madonna’s Confessions Tour, which was the biggest grossing concert series of 2006. It is so masterfully put together that you can also use words like amazing or spectacular or fantastic, etc. The sets, the costumes, the staging, the dances and most of all the concepts are all eye-popping. You really have to hand it to this girl. Her singing might not be able to hold its own against Christina Aguilera or Norah Jones and she is certainly not as young as the gorgeous Beyoncé Knowles but she does know how to put on a great show.

Filmed last year at London’s huge Wembley Arena during her sold-out Confessions Tour, the album is a two-disc set with CD and DVD. It includes old favorites Like a Virgin and La Isla Bonita but most of the cuts are from the Confessions on a Dance Floor CD. These are interpreted in out-of-this-world concepts that only Madonna seems able to think of. Because of those ideas, the live album becomes a must for fans even if they already own the original Confessions.

Hung Up, one of her best works, holds the package together as closer for both audio and video. Disc one, the live recording, also has Future Lovers/ I Feel Love, Jump, Confessions, Isaac, Sorry, I Love New York, Let It Will Be, Music Inferno, Erotica and Lucky Star.

Disc two which is the DVD of the actual concert includes some of those songs and also Get Together, Live to Tell, Forbidden Love, Like It or Not, I Love New York, Ray of Light, medleys of Drowned World/ Substitute for Love and Paradise/Not for Me, plus others like the bonus tracks of Je suis L’Art and They’re Naughty Children.

Incidentally, Madonna, who for years had shied away from doing live recordings, seems to be on a live album kick these days. I have never heard about nor do I expect to hear about a pop star releasing one live album after another. That is not good business. But Madonna clearly thinks otherwise.

This must be because she knows that she is now singing better than she ever did before and is also determined to document her successes for posterity. So in a surprise move, she released Confessions as her follow-up to I’m Going to Tell You a Secret, another live recorded CD/DVD album that was released last year.

Secret contains tracks from her Re-Invention concert series two years ago and it is so well-produced that I can honestly swear, most of the songs sound better than the original versions. Vogue, American Life, Holiday and Die Another Day are among those included. She also does mean versions of Nobody Knows Me and Imagine.

The video is made up mostly of concert excerpts, short bits that make one hungry for the full versions. It also documents the creation of the Re-Invention tour and has footage of Madonna talking about assorted topics and shows her with her husband, kids and parents.