Information about Like A Virgin (song)

"Like a Virgin"
Single by Madonna
from the album Like a Virgin
B-side(s)	"Stay"
Released	November 6, 1984
Format	12" single CD single
Genre	Pop
Length	3:38 (Album Version) 3:11 (Edit Version) From "The Immaculate Collection"
Label	Sire, Warner Bros.
Writer(s)	Billy Steinberg, Tom Kelly
Producer(s)	Nile Rodgers
Certification	Gold
Madonna singles chronology
"Lucky Star" (1984) "Like a Virgin" (1984) "Material Girl" (1985)
Like a Virgin track listing
"Angel" (2)	"Like a Virgin" (3)	"Over and Over" (4)
The Immaculate Collection track listing
"Borderline" (3)	"Like a Virgin" (4)	"Material Girl" (5)

"Like a Virgin" is the first single by pop singer Madonna from her second studio album, Like a Virgin. It was released on November 6, 1984 by Sire Records. It also appears on the 1990 greatest hits compilation The Immaculate Collection.

Song information

Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly wrote the song, and Kelly sang on the demo. In an interview with Songfacts, Steinberg said:^[1]

When Madonna recorded it, even as our demo faded out, on the fade you could hear Tom saying, 'When your heart beats, and you hold me, and you love me...' That was the last thing you heard as our demo faded. Madonna must have listened to it very, very carefully because her record ends with the exact same little ad-libs that our demo did. That rarely happens that someone studies your demo so carefully that they use all that stuff. We were sort of flattered how carefully she followed our demo on that.

Madonna wears a wedding gown in the music video, which was directed by Mary Lambert.

"Like a Virgin" was honored by Rolling Stone and MTV in 2000 as the fourth song on their list of the "100 Greatest Pop Songs".

The hook has been known to be similar to Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean," although Jackson's song is about a man denying paternity of a child and Madonna's is about a reality-altering love. In reality, the hooks of both songs borrow heavily from The Four Tops' "I Can't Help Myself". Madonna acknowledged the similarities between her hit and those of Jackson and The Four Tops by incorporating elements of each into her live performances of "Like A Virgin" (with "Billie Jean" during 1985's The Virgin Tour and with "I Can't Help Myself" during 1987's Who's That Girl World Tour.

Madonna performed "Like a Virgin" at the first MTV Video Music Awards ceremony in 1984.

Production

"Like a Virgin" was written by Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly (who also wrote Cyndi Lauper's "True Colors") and was produced by Nile Rodgers. Other credits on the song are as follows:

• Bass by Bernard Edwards.
• Guitar by Nile Rodgers.
• Drums by Tony Thompson.
• Assorted synthesizers and bass synthesizer by Rob Sabino.

Music videos

The music video, directed by Mary Lambert, was shot in Venice, Italy and partly in New York City. It shows Madonna dancing on a gondola,[1] and running around in a wedding dress with a few interspersed shots of a panting lion [2]. The video's MTV world premiere took place on November 13, 1984, and became an instant hit. [3]

• Director: Mary Lambert
• Producer: Simon Fields
• Director of Photography: Peter Sinclair
• Editor: Glenn Morgan
• Production Company: Limelight Productions

The Virgin Tour live

In 1985, a live music video of "Like a Virgin" from "The Virgin Tour" filmed in Detroit, Michigan was used to promote Madonna Live - The Virgin Tour videocassette. This version was nominated for Best Choreography at the MTV Video Music Awards.

• Director: Danny Kleinman
• Producer: Simon Fields
• Director of Photography: Jerry Watson
• Editor: Mitchell Sinoway
• Production Company: Limelight Productions

Truth or Dare version

The live performance of "Like a Virgin" from the Blond Ambition Tour in Paris, France was released as a music video in 1991 to promote the documentary film . This version was nominated for two MTV Video Music Awards: Best Female Video and Best Choreography.

• Director: Alek Keshishian
• Producers: Tim Clawson, Lisa Hollingshead, Jay Roewe
• Director of Photography: Toby Phillips
• Editor: John Murray
• Production Company: Propaganda Films

Trivia

• This video was ranked #61 on VH1's 100 Greatest Videos.

Live performances

Like a Virgin made its debut at the first MTV Video Music Awards in 1984, where Madonna appeared on stage atop a giant wedding cake dressed in a wedding dress (adorned with the infamous "Boy Toy" belt buckle) and veil. The climax of her risqué performance found her humping and rolling around on the stage.

Madonna's performance of Hollywood at the 2003 Video Music Awards recreated the 1985 performance of Like a Virgin, with Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera dressed in the wedding costume and singing the song atop a wedding cake with Madonna as her groom. Following in the controversial footsteps of the original performance, Madonna created another stir by kissing Spears and Christina Aguilera on the lips.

The song has also been included in five of Madonna's seven tours.

For 1985's The Virgin Tour, Madonna again donned wedding attire and performed a straight version of the song featuring a quotation from Michael Jackson's similar-sounding Motown-style single, Billie Jean. Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" was released before "Like a Virgin". In 1987's Who's That Girl Tour, the song was given a lighthearted comedic theme and included quotations from The Four Tops' I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch).

For the 1990 Blond Ambition Tour, the song was re-invented with a middle-eastern arrangement and risqué (and utlimately infamous) choreography which found Madonna simulating masturbation on a bed. The explicit performance garnered a lot of attention, particularly when police in Toronto Canada threatened to arrest Madonna and charge her with indecency unless she altered the performance. Madonna refused and the show went on unaltered. She was never arrested. (This situation was documented in the singer's 1991 documentary, Truth or Dare.)

Madonna swapped the wedding dress for a tuxedo and adopted a Marlene Dietrich-like persona for 1993's The Girlie Show Tour, singing the song with a thick German accent and including a quotation from Dietrich's signature tune, Falling in Love Again (Can't Help It).

In 2006's Confessions Tour, the song was given a horseriding theme. Madonna performed the song atop a studded leather S&M carousel horse while x-rays of her broken bones (the result of a horse-riding accident on her 47th birthday) flashed on the screens behind her.

Tributes and cover versions

• The song was the subject of a famous exegesis in the opening scene of Quentin Tarantino's film, Reservoir Dogs. It was also the subject of a parody by "Weird Al" Yankovic, "Like a Surgeon", and was performed by Jim Broadbent in the film Moulin Rouge! (2001) as a comic piece sung in the third person singular ("She made it through the wilderness. ..").
• In 2001, MTV gay punk rocker Nick Name performed a punk cover version for the Madonna tribute at the historic El Rey Theatre.
• Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera paid a tribute to Madonna's performance at the MTV Video Awards show nineteen years later at the same awards show, Madonna at the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards finishing the performance with a kiss. The kiss generated months of discussion in celebrity magazines.
• Japanese pop singer, Hitomi, performed a shortened cover of it during her LOVE LIFE tour in Japan, recorded on the tour dvd.
• Winnipeg death-folk outfit The Horribly Awfuls recorded an ironic cover on their 2003 record, "We Fight Like the Crips and Bloods."
• Richard Cheese and Lounge Against the Machine covered this as a swingin' Lounge version on their 2006 album "Silent Nightclub".
• Lords of the New Church covered it on the 1985 IRS's "Best of" Album.
• In Shrek's "Karaoke Dance Party" extra Fiona can be heard singing this song.

References in Pop Culture

In the movie Reservoir Dogs, the song comes up in a conversation amongst a group of gangsters, Mr. Brown (Quentin Tarantino) raises the theory that the song is actually about an oversexed woman who meets a man who is so well-endowed that the woman experiences pain during intercourse with him - reminding her of the pain accompanying the loss of her virginity. (Madonna would later meet Tarantino after "Reservoir Dogs" was released and when giving him her autograph wrote "Quentin, it's about love, not dick. Madonna.")

In the short story La Bamba, by Gary Soto, a boy is at a talent show. While describing the lineup of the event, he mentions there are three young girls singing "Like a Virgin". Also, the year after the song came out, Weird Al Yankovic came out with a parody of it.

In one episode of Married with Children Kelly says to Bud that he got a dedication from a girl.The dedication is Like a virgin.

Charts

"Like a Virgin" became Madonna's first of 12 number-one hits on the Billboard Hot 100, remaining at the top for six consecutive weeks and eventually earning gold certification. The single also reached number one on the Hot Dance Club Play, and was her first top-ten hit on the R&B chart.

"Like a Virgin" slammed onto the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 singles chart the week of November 17, 1984 at #48, and shot up the chart rapidly, reaching #1 by its sixth week, December 22, 1984. "Like a Virgin" was the first of four Top five singles from Madonna's album of the same name. "Like a Virgin" remained in the Top 10 for nine weeks, in the Top 20 for eleven weeks, and in the Top 40 for fourteen weeks.

Internationally, the song was a Top 5 hit in the United Kingdom (behind million sellers Band Aid and Wham!) and reached the top spot in numerous countries. It was her first number one single in Australia (in fact, her first anywhere in the world) and Canada. The song would be her biggest selling and top-charting single worldwide until "Like a Prayer" in 1989.

Chart (1984/1985)	Peak Position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	1
U.S. Billboard Hot 100 Airplay	1
U.S. Billboard Hot 100 Singles Sales	1
U.S. Billboard Adult Contemporary	29
U.S. Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks	9
U.S. Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play	1
U.S. ARC Weekly Top 40	1
Australia	1
Austria	8
Canada	1
Eurochart Hot 100	1
Japan Oricon Weekly Singles Chart	19
Japan Oricon International Singles Chart	1
Germany	4
France	8
Italy	1
Norway	8
Switzerland	9
Sweden	15
United Kingdom	3

References

• Mad-Eyes.net - "Like a Virgin" Single Page

Preceded by "Out of Touch" by Daryl Hall and John Oates	Billboard Hot 100 number one single December 22 1984- January 28 1985	Succeeded by "I Want to Know What Love Is" by Foreigner

•  • [ e] Madonna
Studio albums	Madonna (1983) Like a Virgin (1984) True Blue (1986) Like a Prayer (1989) Erotica (1992) Bedtime Stories (1994) Ray of Light (1998) Music (2000) American Life (2003) Confessions on a Dance Floor (2005) TBA (2007)
Compilations	You Can Dance (1987) The Immaculate Collection (1990) Something to Remember (1995) GHV2 (2001) (2001) Remixed & Revisited (2003) Confessions Remixed (2006) Best of Remixes (2007)
Soundtracks	Who's That Girl (1987) I'm Breathless (1990) Evita (1996) The Next Best Thing (2000)
Live albums	I'm Going to Tell You a Secret (2006) The Confessions Tour (2007)
Related topics	Discography Concert Tours Videography Achievements and Awards Bibliography Unreleased songs Controversies