翻譯：Nomanlandever

It should come as a surprise to precisely no one that Madonna rides the Latin pop wave for her first single in four years. From “La Isla Bonita” to Evita, Madonna’s occasional flirtation with Latin America over the years has yielded some career highlights. That, combined with the fact that Madge practically invented the now-common pop-star move of vampiring all that is young and hot from album to album, leads us down to Medellín, Colombia. The reggaeton singer Maluma guides the way, carrying the sultry, dembow-tinged song with his whispered Spanish responses to his duet partner’s eerily still verses. On a track that opens with Madonna counting off a cha-cha-chá like she’s in an ASMR video, Maluma stands out, via actual singing, as the heart and soul really selling this fever dream of young love. The chorus pops off into a joyous celebration because of him.

沒人會(huì)對(duì)Madonna四年來的首支單曲迎合拉丁潮流這件事感到驚訝。從?“La Isla Bonita” 到Evita，Madonna多年來偶爾一時(shí)興起做的拉丁風(fēng)歌曲，成就了她事業(yè)的一些高光時(shí)刻。這包含了一些事實(shí)，就是Madge（英國八卦小報(bào)常以此稱呼代指麥當(dāng)娜）每張專輯都很熟練地邀請(qǐng)一些樂壇紅極一時(shí)的新人，之后榨干他們所有的“精華”，一路到今天哥倫比亞的《Medellín》城。雷鬼歌手Maluma為我們領(lǐng)路，他唱著這首激發(fā)人性欲，Dewbow（一首雷鬼歌曲）味的歌，低聲用西班牙語回應(yīng)他的合唱搭檔詭異寂靜的歌詞。在歌曲開頭，Madonna像是在拍攝ASMR視頻般數(shù)著cha-cha-chá。Maluma通過真實(shí)的歌聲在歌曲里脫穎而出，如同全心全意地推銷著滿是年輕愛情的狂熱夢(mèng)想。因?yàn)樗?，歌曲副歌部分突然扭轉(zhuǎn)為一場(chǎng)充滿歡聲笑語的慶祝典禮。

“Medellín” may end up being a bigger moment for Maluma than Madonna, but as far as the pop icon’s semi-recent cool-hunting exploits go, the song sits closer to the top of the heap than the bottom. It is more sonically restrained than her EDM phase, leaving room in the production for tactile details that mostly work (though the echo and Auto-Tune on her vocals is a bit much). Madonna has struggled at times in her late career to find a balance between campy bangers and more mature balladry; “Medellín” is something of a sexy, stylish middle ground. Of course, she couldn’t let a whole song this decade go by without at least one cringe-y moment. “We built a cartel just for love,” she declares, turning the titular city’s violent drug trafficking history into lyrical myopia.

就《Medellín》整首歌而言，Maluma可能比Madonna表現(xiàn)得更為突出。但就這位流行偶像最近的酷炫探索之旅而言，這首歌更接近雜亂堆砌的頂部而不是底部。與她的EDM階段相比，這一階段她在聲音上更加克制，為制作上可接觸到的大量細(xì)節(jié)騰出發(fā)揮空間，這多數(shù)都奏效了（盡管回聲和她Auto-tune的聲音有些過度處理）。在她事業(yè)后期階段，Madonna有時(shí)會(huì)在火爆熱單和更為成熟的民謠方面上掙扎猶豫；《Medellín》是種處于性感、時(shí)髦的中間地帶。當(dāng)然，她不可能讓交替兩個(gè)十年的單曲，沒有出現(xiàn)一個(gè)令人毛骨悚然的地方，“We built a cartel just for love,”她宣稱，將這個(gè)城市名義上的暴力毒品販運(yùn)歷史掩蓋為抒情詩般的短視。