Even at 50, the nance of pop just can't stop courting controversy.
As Madonna kicked turned her outside "Sticky and Sweet" tour Saturday night, she took a none-too subtle swipe at the presumptive Republican nominee for U.S. president.
Amid a four-act show at Cardiff's jammed Millennium Stadium, a video interlude carried images of destruction, globose warming, Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, Zimbabwe's authoritarian President Robert Mugabe - and U.S. Senator John McCain. Another episode, shown later, pictured slain Beatle John Lennon, followed by mood activist Al Gore, Mahatma Gandhi and finally McCain's Democratic rival Barack Obama.
The rest of the depict had the usual Madonna fixtures: sequins, fishnets, and bondage-style outfits drawn from the 3,500 items of vesture reportedly whipped together by 36 designers specifically for the circuit. Dancers sauntered across stage in top hats and tail coats, and Madonna tried her hand at break-dancing and pole-dancing.
Some 40,000 fans - many in pink cowboy hats and boas - were treated to a leaden metal version of "Borderline," while "La Isla Bonita" served as backdrop for a gypsy dancing routine. The show, billed as a musical gallimaufry of "gangsta pimp," Romanian folk, rave, and dance - was an homage to Madonna's continuous reinventions over the past iII decades.
She took a playful take on her varicolored career, teasing dancers polished as her previous incarnations - including the "Material Girl" and "Blonde Ambition" - before they sank into the stage to the tune of "She's Not Me." Madonna finished off the concert with her clunk "Give it 2 Me" from her new urban-inspired album, "Hard Candy."
If the world's top-selling female recording artist is still wriggly, shaking and shimmying with the best of them, her personal life has recently been unsettled. Earlier this summertime her brother Christopher Ciccone published a gossipy memoir, and she has faced speculation around her relationship with New York Yankee slugger Alex Rodriquez and rumors that her marriage to British filmmaker Guy Ritchie is on the rocks - which she hotly denies.
Madonna's tour was eagerly hoped-for in Britain, where the pop whiz has made her home, and fans weren't disappointed.
"We enjoyed it to the max," said Ruth Henson, 24, wHO works in human resources in London. "Madonna, considering she's instantly 50, is so fit. She did a really good job."
Following Cardiff's opening night concert, "Sticky and Sweet" moves across Europe, hitting London's Wembley Stadium on Sept. 11 and Paris on Sept. 20. From there, it goes to North America in October before swathe up Dec. 18 in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
It is Madonna's first tour since striking a deal with concert promoter Live Nation Inc. worth an estimated $120 1000000 over 10 years. The partnership gives Live Nation a stakes of future music and music-related business she generates, including touring, merchandising and albums. Madonna's last circuit was her 2006 "Confessions" - in which she staged a mock crucifixion only a few miles (kilometers) from the Vatican.
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