G.H. Harding

MADONNA’S FINALLY ENOUGH LOVE — We finally received a copy, through Rhino of Madonna’s deluxe-set Finally Enough Love-50 Number Ones. There’s no question that its a monster of a set; certainly chronicling Madonna’s out-sized career, but the set also posed a few intriguing questions.

A glorious review from Rock and Roll Globe: Has anyone been remixed more than Madonna?

Think about how many records she’s released since her first, “Everybody,” almost exactly 40 years ago (October 6, 1982, to be precise). And the fact that remixing has existed for the entirety of her career. And that she’s a dance/pop artist first and foremost, naturally prone to remixing.

There’s a few of her ballads that didn’t receive official remixes, sure – but the vast majority of her singles have. So many, in fact, that Madonna’s hit Billboard’s Dance Club Play chart 67 times, and 64 of those trips have resulted in top tens. And of those 64, an astounding 50 have topped the chart. (All three numbers are records by far, along with her 75 cumulative weeks at #1; additionally, no artist has topped any single Billboard survey as many times.)

To celebrate the occasion, and also to mark both the 40th anniversary of her first single and the 35th of her first remix album (1987’s You Can Dance), we now get the compilation Finally Enough Love: 50 Number Ones, featuring single-edited versions of each one of these 50 chart-toppers across three CDs. Early on, her dance hits weren’t actually remixed, but sometimes just extended – as in the case of her first #1 on the dance chart, “Holiday” and “Lucky Star” were listed jointly as “LP Cuts,” a common practice on the chart at the time. Club DJs simply played the songs straight off the album! These two songs spent 5 weeks at #1, a run matched in her catalog only by 2000’s “Music.” Oddly, only “Holiday,” but not “Lucky Star,” appears on Finally Enough Love: 50 Number Ones. [I include the album’s subtitle because a more compact 16-track version, just titled Finally Enough Love, was released in June.]

What also doesn’t help is the choices of whose remixes to include: both Offer Nissim and Tracy Young get three selections apiece, for example. Offer Nissim’s mixes are alright, but tend to get very samey (spoiler alert: he really likes hard drums). Similarly, Young’s work is solid, but why not mix things up and give us some different contributors? (That said, her Tracy Young Dangerous Mix of “Crave” is deliciously breezy, and features an indefatigable bassline.) Then there’s “Give Me All Your Luvin,’” which is featured in its Party Rock Remix by, I wish I was kidding, LMFAO.

(Remember them?) It’s as clunky and stupid as their own singles – and worse yet, the thrusting, kinetic Laidback Luke mix of the same track was right there waiting to be used! (Blame Madonna herself, who reportedly curated the selections here.)

To be fair, I’m picky when it comes to these things. Shep Pettibone’s fingerprints are all over the selections here, especially on the first disc (“Into the Groove,” “Like A Prayer,” “Express Yourself,” “Keep It Together,” “Vogue,” and “Fever” all appear via his remixes), and I’m not mad at all – and would frankly welcome even more from the man who I think is one of the all-time greatest to ever remix a record. His take on “Groove” (originally featured on Madonna’s epochal 1987 remix album You Can Dance) in particular is the one I consider definitive; the edit featured here doesn’t defang any of its power.

The other chief problem with this collection is the simple fact that the remixes – and dance chart #1s – have been coming fast and furious this century, and a lot of these songs just aren’t that good. Starting with 2003’s American Life, I’ll argue that Madonna’s only made one good-to-great album in the past two decades (2005’s Confessions on a Dance Floor), and the last 12 remixes featured here are of songs originally on Hard Candy, MDNA, Rebel Heart, and Madame X – a stretch of work that I don’t think anyone would call her strongest. Conversely, however, even if you take her classic 80’s work out of the equation, there’s a lot of killers here.

Madonna’s 90’s-into-00’s can stand up against almost any pop artist’s catalog: from “Vogue,” of course, through “Erotica” (featured in Masters at Work’s legitimately sexy Underground Club Mix), to “Secret” and “Bedtime Story” (both remixed by Junior Vasquez), onto the classic Ray of Light singles, Music’s “What It Feels Like for a Girl” (presented here in its breathtaking Above & Beyond Club Radio Edit), culminating with the Dance Floor classics, remixed by the likes of Pet Shop Boys, Stuart Price, and Axwell. I mean, whew.

To be honest, I prefer the original mix or release of each and every one of these songs. One of my favorites, “Into The Groove” from 1985’s Desperately Seeking Susan on this set, was a totally different mix than the one I first heard and feel in love with.

The other thing I noticed as I carefully made my way through the tracks is that those early records of hers …as good as they were at the time, don’t seem to hold up. I was there at The Funhouse; 12 West; Danceteria and Paradise Garage and her records were legend at the time … it’s just all these years later, so much has changed.

It’s an enormous set and breathtaking undertaking; but well worth it. As I said when her tour was announced, only visual and videos from those early days were referenced and even this 3-CD set features an early Madonna-photo. She was iconic back then … and, we’ll see if she still is.

THE BELZ RANG SILENT —  Richard Belzer passed this past weekend.  I first saw him at Rick Newman’s legendary club Catch A Rising Star on First Avenue eons ago. He was simply hilarious, Snarky for sure, but funny. He appeared onSaturday Night Live; The Groove Tube and always left an indelible impression.

Always outfitted in black, TV discovered him when he launched the character of John Munch in Barry Levinson and Tom Fonatna’s cannily brilliant Homicide; Live On The Street. It was just a sensational show and really stood among the past great cop shows like  Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue. A crossover with Dick Wolff’s Law & Order, with Jerry Orbach, was just stellar. Orbach’s character dated Munch’ ex-wife and the hi jinks ensued. Together theysolved the crime, but there was an underlying dynamic that was just brilliant between the two.

Wolff in fact has said that the union was so good, he immediately wanted to introduce the character into one of his “newer”: shows Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

Per the Hollywood Reporter: Munch made his first appearance in 1993 on the first episode of Homicide and his last in 2016 on Law & Order: SVU. In between those two NBC dramas, Belzer played the detective on eight other series, and his hold on the character lasted longer than James Arness’ on Gunsmoke and Kelsey Grammer’s on Cheers and Frasier. Certainly one of the most memorable cops in TV history, Munch — based on a real-life Baltimore detective — was a highly intelligent, doggedly diligent investigator who believed in conspiracy theories, distrusted the system and pursued justice through a jaded eye. He’d often resort to dry, acerbic wisecracks to make his point: “I’m a homicide detective. The only time I wonder why is when they tell me the truth,” went a typical Munch retort.

In a 2016 interview for the website The Interviews: An Oral History of Television, Homicide executive producer Barry Levinson recalled listening to Belzer on The Howard Stern Show and liking him for Munch. “We were looking at some other actors, and when I heard him, I said, ‘Why don’t we find out about Richard Belzer?”

Levinson said. “I like the rhythm of the way he talks. And that’s how that happened.”The pencil-thin Belzer portrayed Munch on all seven seasons of the NBC series. When it ended in 1999, the actor wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye to the role. He had appeared as Munch on NBC’s Law & Order three times from 1996-99 and thought he might be a good fit on that show. “When Homicide was canceled, I was in France with my wife and she said, ‘Let’s open a bottle of champagne and toast: You did this character for seven years,’” Belzer recounted in the 2009 book Law & Irder: Special Victims Unit Unofficial Companion. “And then I remembered that Benjamin Bratt was leaving  L&O, and so I called my manager and said, ‘Call Dick Wolff — maybe Munch can become [Det. Lennie] Briscoe’s partner’ —- because we had teamed for the crossover. So he called and Dick said, ‘What a great idea, but I’ve already cast Jesse Martin to be the new guy [opposite Jerry Orbach].’”

Wolf, however, was in the process of developing a Law & Order spinoff to focus on the NYPD’s Special Victims Unit, the division that investigates sexually based crimes. He wanted Munch for that. When Law & Order: SVU debuted in September 1999, Munch had relocated from Baltimore to New York to join forces with Det. Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) and Det. Elliot Stabler (Christopher Meloni). Capt. Donald Cragen (Dann Florek) was brought over from Law & Order to head the squad. Munch’s sardonic demeanor turned out to be perfect for the grim tone of the series, and Belzer stayed 14 seasons. The character announced his retirement from the NYPD in 2014, but Munch returned a couple years later for the 17th-season episode “Fashionable Crimes.”

I’d often bump into Belzer at The Friars club in NY with Orbach back in the day. He was a real NY-guy. Huge, huge loss.

Ronald Dahl

SHORT TAKES — This whole brouhaha over the re-writing of some of Ronald Dahl’s books (Matilda; James and the Giant Peach; Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) is, in my opinion, just absurd. Let me explain it best this way: I am not a fan of the director’s cut or a song being remixed to death. For me, I want to hear a piece of art (movie, TV show, record) exactly the same way I first heard it the first time and the way it was when the artist created it and released it. One of my favorite movies is Blade Runner: I think I understood it the first time I saw it, but I sure loved everything about it. Then came  the director’s cut; then came the version without the narration. Neither was better than the original version. I recall trying a bit too hard trying to figure out what the difference was and losing track of the story. And, I feel exactly the same way about this Ronald Dahl-situation. It’s blatant censorship. Art is a very personal choice and what you get out of it is also very personal. Sad for sure …  Sighting: PR-pasha David Salidor and staff at Dimmer Summer on Smith Street in Brooklyn Heights …

Sara Gore

Micky Dolenz, in NYC next week for The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on Monday the 27th, also will be on NY: Live Wednesday interviewed by the terrific Sara Gore.

Saw one of oddest movies I’ve ever seen this past weekend, The Outfit, with Mark Rylance and Zoey Deutsch. Eerily creepy, it seemed like a David Mamet-play at times. Rylance is just stunning as a tailor? Maybe, maybe not. I’d definitely recommend it … Lenny’s, the Brooklyn-pizza shop where John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever, gets his pizza in the opening moments of the 1977 film, closed this weekend after 70 years. Talk about staying power. I wonder if club promoter turned manager turned politician Vito Bruno still owns the original dance floor from the movie?

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA – MAY 30: Wes Bentley attends the Premiere Party For Paramount Network’s “Yellowstone” Season 2 at Lombardi House on May 30, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images)

And, from Yellowstone’s Wes Bentley:  ‘If you think this has a happy ending, you’re not paying attention.’” Ominous, right?

NAMES IN THE NEWS — Jason Elzy; Plastic EP; Jeff Smith; Andrew Saffir; Paul Yasso; Mary Q.; Marion Perkins; Angela Tarantino; Nancy Andrews; Bruce Grakal; Vinny Napolitano; Keren Red; Andrew Saffir; Guy Pearce; Robert Funaro; Tom & Lisa Cuddy; Jeff Smith; and CHIP!