Madonna‘s worst songs are, at least, bizarrely awful. They’re the sort of bad tunes that could only come from someone with the Material Girl’s ambition. One of them is possibly the only pop song to include the word “spanky.”
1. ‘Hanky Panky’
Writing a jazz tune called “Hanky Panky” is a horribly kitschy move. Madonna makes “Hanky Panky” even worse by rhyming “hanky panky” with “spanky.” Yes, this is a pop tune about erotic spanking. The fact that this hit No. 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 is mind-boggling.
For her movie Dick Tracy, Madonna went retro and released an album of retro jazz tunes. Going retro would be another artist’s excuse to be innocent and sweet, but Madonna instead had to find a way to write a dirty song for a children’s movie. It’s no wonder this embarrassing novelty has been forgotten.
2. ‘American Life’
Madonna took a lot of inspiration from rap music in the 1990s. The hip-hop influence present in songs like “Justify My Love,” “Human Nature,” and “Erotica” is part of what makes them interesting. “American Life” is arguably the first song where she actually raps.
Madonna rapping is a horrid idea on the surface but the lyrics make it even worse. She raps “I’m drinking a soy latte, I get a double shoté / It goes right through my body, and you know I’m satisfied / I drive my Mini Cooper and I’m feeling super-duper / Yo, they tell I’m a trooper, and you know I’m satisfied.” What on earth!
3. ‘B**** I’m Madonna’
Well, there’s a title. Madonna has every right to sing about how awesome it is to be Madonna, but on “B**** I’m Madonna,” she sells herself short. She brags about partying like she’s a wild club kid over an earsore of a beat. Everything about the track is wrong, including the chipmunk vocals, the calculated swearing, and the dubstep drop that was passe even when this song came out in 2015.
“B**** I’m Madonna” also includes some synthesizer noises that sound like phone notifications. I can’t get through it without thinking I received a text message. This song is torturous.
4. ‘Give Me All Your Luvin”
Madonna made a return to her original teen-pop style with “Give Me All Your Luvin’.” This tune, complete with its Toni Basil-esque chant and a reference to “Lucky Star,” might’ve worked for Madonna in 1983. In 2012, “Give Me All Your Luvin’” was an inexplicable anomaly. It shows what the Material Girl’s early stuff would have sounded like without talented producers.
If this Madonna was going to put out a tune this bad, it should have been a bonus track for massive fans only. Instead, she premiered it during the Super Bowl and got Nicki Minaj and M.I.A. to perform guest verses on it. We’ll never know why she had so much faith in this atrocity.
5. ‘Revolver’
Much of Britney Spears’ career was based on Madonna’s. Here, the borrowing worked backward, with Madonna singing over a beat that sounds like a cross between Spears’ “If U Seek Amy” and “Radar.” The ugly, stale production is bad enough but the lyrics make “Revolver” stand out in the worst way.
In the track, Madonna brags that her love is a revolver and her sex is a killer that will cause you to die happy. The metaphors here are questionable at best. She also brags about being a “sex pistol.” That’s the first and last time Madonna invoked Sid Vicious.
