Madonna – Hard Candy

On the cover of her new album, Hard Candy, Madonna rocks a championship belt around her waist and sits with her legs spread open. She sure deserves the champion-of-sex title. No one could eye and mind fuck us longer than she could. She did it when she was “Like a Virgin.” She is doing it again like a MILF.

Right off the opening “Candy Store,” she wastes no time offering us her raw sugar (“sticky and sweet”). Then in “4 Minutes” she flirts with the young Justin Timberlake: “Just say the words and imma give you what you want.” In the next track, “Give It 2 Me,” she follows up with more seductions: “If it’s against the law, arrest me / If you can handle it, undress me.” While she does all these sizzle talks, a handful of hot, clubbing beats (courtesy of Pharrell Williams, Timbaland, Justin Timberlake and Nate “Danja” Hills) are backing her up. The only problem is that you don’t take a fifty years old woman to a club, even though she is Madonna. You want to take her somewhere else away from the crowd. Know what I mean?

All in all, Hard Candy is nothing more than a dance album with Madonna’s sex touch lost in the beats. Though her words are filled wit lust, suggestive metaphors, her delivery lacks the passion. Even when she sings, “Sex with you is… uh… incredible,” she comes off like a kindergarten teacher who offers her kids some candies for their cooperation. In the closing “Voices,” Timberlake brings up the questions: “Who is the master? Who is the Slave?” Not sure if she still holds the whip.