Madonna is our pop goddess. She has worked hard at it. From her first albums to Music she has made a constant progress through a few themes. The Three i think are most important are Gender , Lust/Love and Religion

I am thinking of three albums :

BEDTIME STORIES
The first is one was overlooked. It was the first one done after Erotica, The SEX debacle, the Gautier show. People were sick of her tits and her leathers. Her instincts should have worked. She made a gentle album . One that said nothing about tits or leathers
The gender paradigms she usually works with were made clear in two of the videos .
They were not at all expressed in the songs.
However her songs about lust did not deal with the sex act. They dealt with needing to find find a man who "travels in his unconsciousness" A Sanctuary to rest in. Surviving without glory. About making the Family becomes feral.

The next two were done back to back and supposed to show her new maturity after giving birth. They seem to return to the gentleness of Bedtime stories but go further .

Ray Of Light .

This is the album where lust becomes cold. It is a watery place, frozen over and only freed by G-d. It is an album that is not explicitly Catholic and uses the themes of consumption and brokenness.
This album is an album that deals with the protean aspects of gender. It talks about fragrant and delicious woman being consumed by delicate boys. The concept of "Velvet Porcelain Boys" being devoured by "Candy Perfume Girls" being so important they make "the oceans throb". At the end of the song the Candy and Perfume. The delicacy and the consumabilty transform to the boy. Because they transmit together they become Magic Poison.
In similar themes the only way to be whole, to see everything, to rid yourself of shame and guilt is to open your eyes , let your heart free . These sounds like cliches but the throbbing background and her brittle phrasing make the track sound like an intonation.
This whole album deals with cycles, completeness,water. It is an album of searching sex . Her grasp of Yoga and The Dharma seem clear.


Music

Music starts with bombast. It seems to be a party album. But even on the opening track
It is not an Ordinary dance track. She seems to confuse the people ( who she grew up as )
and the bourgeoise ( who she is now) . Who is coming together.
The album deals with loss acquiring itself. Being satisfied with her g(G)uy. The liberation of feeling like a girl. Strength of Emotion becomes Strength of will . The liberating of cowboy imagery. The skipping stuttering stops and starts. Which make the album sound much less sure then it is.
People think she is happy. Maybe the ambiguity exists to subvert . It seems like she is enough of a master to t improvise. She knows the idiom so she twists and massages it.