Like A Virgin
Lyrics
I made it through the wilderness
Somehow I made it through
Didn't know how lost I was
Until I found you
I was beat
Incomplete
I'd been had
I was sad and blue
But you made me feel
Yeah you made me feel
Shiny and new
Like a virgin
Touched for the very first time
Like a virgin
When your heart beats
Next to mine
Gonna give you all my love boy
My fear is fading fast
Been saving it all for you
'Cause only love can last
You're so fine
And you're mine
Make me strong
Yeah you make me bold
Oh your love thawed out
Yeah your love thawed out
What was scared and cold
Like a virgin
Touched for the very first time
Like a virgin
With your heartbeat
Next to mine
Woah, woah, oh, woah
You're so fine
And you're mine
I'll be yours
'Til the end of time
'Cause you made me feel
Yeah you made me feel
I've nothing to hide
Like a virgin, hey
Touched for the very first time
Like a virgin
With your heartbeat
Next to mine
Like a virgin, oooh
Like a virgin
Feels so good inside
When you hold me
And your heart beats
And you love me
Oooh baby
Can't you hear my heart beat
For the very first time
Credits
Written by Billy Steinberg and Tom Kelly
Produced by Nile Rodgers
Bass by Bernard Edwards
Guitar by Nile Rodgers
Assorted synthesizers and bass synthesizer by Rob Sabino
Drums by Tony Thompson
Album
Single
Though Like A Virgin seems tailor-made for Madonna, the song was actually written a year before its release, without any singer in mind. The songwriter team gave the demo to Madonna who recorded it with her producer Nile Rodgers. The release date had to be pushed back because of the success of Madonna's singles from the first album. On October 31, 1984, it was released simultaneously in the US and Europe as the lead-off single of her second album, and it would soon become one of her biggest classics. Like A Virgin was her first #1 hit, stealing the top spot in the US for 6 weeks and eventually reaching Gold. It also reached #1 in Canada, Japan, Australia and top 10 positions in numerous other countries. At its sales peak it sold 75,000 copies a day!
Video
The original video, directed by Mary Lambert, was shot in Venice, Italy and partly in New York. It shows two personas of Madonna, one dancing on a gondola who ends up with a man in a lion mask, and another running around in a wedding dress. It premiered on MTV in the fall of 1984 and became an instant success. There are also two videos from live performances, one from the Virgin Tour (directed by Danny Kleinmann, released in 1985) and one from the Blond Ambition Tour (directed by Alek Keshishian, released in 1991).
Tour
Madonna performed Like A Virgin for the first time live on the very first MTV Video Music Awards in September 1984, before the actual release of the single. Dressed in a wedding dress, Madonna crawled on the floor, practically masturbating with the veil, causing an enormous controversy, marking Madonna's true arrival. On the 20th MTV Video Music Awards, Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera paid tribute to that performance, before singing backup to Madonna's Hollywood.
A few months after her first VMA performance, Madonna sang the #1 hit on her very first Virgin Tour as one of the closing songs. She appeared on stage in a wedding dress again and flirted around with her dancers. She sang a verse of Michael Jackson's megahit 'Billie Jean' in the middle of the performance as both songs have a similar bassline.
On the Who's That Girl Tour Madonna sang a medley of Dress You Up, Material Girl and finally Like A Virgin, all in the same goofy outfit. During this last song, she danced around between her musicians and her backup singers, while she took off her outfit one by one until she was back in her black corset. As an interlude she sang a verse of 'I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)' (originally by The Four Tops). At the end, Madonna flirted with the young dancer, who was dressed up as her groom.
Only Madonna could top the controversial 1984 VMA performance. On the Blond Ambition Tour, the pop song became an erotic masterpiece with Eastern vibes. Madonna wore the notorious golden bustier by Jean-Paul Gaultier, which would go down in history as one of her most defining costume pieces. She performed on top of a red velvet bed, with beside it two male dancers with fake breasts, who were constantly touching and caressing her. As the song got more intensive and erotic, Madonna moved around faster and faster, eventually simulating masturbation on the bed. In Toronto, the police even intended to arrest her for this explicit performance.
As she couldn't perform it any sexier or more erotic than she did on her previous tours, Madonna turned the song into a parody for the Girlie Show. Dressed in a manly suit and top hat, Madonna performs Like A Virgin as it could've been done by Marlene Dietrich, with a german accent, making it Like A Wurgin. Her perfectly timed moves and her play with the Pierrot are hilarious. At the end of the performance, she sings a few lines of Marlene's 'Falling In Love Again (Can't Help It)' from the 1930 movie The Blue Angel.
Ten years later, during a Tower Records in-store appearance to promote American Life, the crowd convinced her to sing the song again for the first time since, but she forgot (maybe on purpose) half of the lyrics and just laughed her way through.
After years of refusing to play this song on tour, Madonna performed it again on her Confessions Tour. During the Equestrian part of the show, she asks the crowd "Are you ready to ride with me?" as she climbs on top of a mechanical saddle and shows off her acrobacy skills while pole dancing. Contrary to the previous performances, this version resembles the album version, though spiced up by Stuart. She gives a whole new meaning to "I made it through the wilderness" when the video screens show scenes of horse accidents and x-rays of broken bones, with an obvious wink to her own horse accident in the summer of 2005.
"Sometimes it's easier to show your ass than your feelings. Tonight I'll try to do both". Madonna sums up this MDNA Tour performance perfectly. Singing a slowed-down Like A Virgin while her pianist plays Evgeni's Waltz - the love theme composed by Abel Korzeniowski for W.E. - makes it the most vulnerable and emotional performance of Like A Virgin. Stripped to her bra and string, Madonna literally bares her body and soul. In Istanbul and Paris, even a breast too. Every show, her back shows a different tattoo, ranging from "No Fear" (most European shows), to "Obama" (before the US elections), to "Eva" in Argentina, to the Hebrew symbols used in the Die Another Day video. Often the tattoo referred to a social issue, such as "Malala", the young Pakistani girl assaulted by the Taliban. Halfway the performance, dancer Marvin steps in to force Madonna into a corset, in a play of affection and rejection. This part was later moved to the newly added Love Spent performance. For the rest of the American tour leg, Madonna instead climbs on top of the piano, then later crawls on stage, collecting money for Sandy victims.
Remaining one of the classics that many concert goers expect to hear at a Madonna show, Like A Virgin also got a firm place in the Rebel Heart Tour setlist. After she gets rid of her ex-lover and love does not live with her anymore, Madonna still comes back strong and finishes off the 1950s love story inspired segment re-energized, proving she is still living for love. As she takes off her blouse after some freestyle choreoraphy combined with fan interaction and lets loose her hair with the wind machines near the stage, a beefed-up album version, based on Dens54's remix (which includes samples of Erotica & Heartbeat with a nod to her 1990 rendition), pleases longtime fans as if they were in 1985.