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REBEL HEART album credits. Madonna produced Hold Tight by herself?


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The multiple songwriters is mind boggling. Does it really take 9 producers to pen the lyrics? Or did some of the producers write the music and that counts as a songwriting credit?

No joke, I'm seriously asking this. It used to sound much simpler then to produce and write a pop song.

Aside from writing the lyrics, you can gain a songwriting credit from just composing the melody which may explain the complexity with these Rebel Heart credits.

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This past decade every damn song has like 5 lyricers and 5 music writers and the results use to be a mess. Madonna has written her own lyrics for years, it's stupid this situation and surely it obeys to some weird thing that in the end will be tied to save taxes or something like that.

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Hold Tight is poorly produced and mixed.

Its like shes singing from a cave. Sucs.

tumblr_mtfzt9EV7t1rpuizjo1_500.gif

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Hold Tight is poorly produced and mixed.

Its like shes singing from a cave. Sucs.

poorly mixed? yes

But the production fits the lyrics really well abeit its generic Ryan Tedder sound

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There's no way she solo produced Hold Tight? If she had would've she have a made a huge fuss about it? I think it's a typo.

Remember back in a 1989 interview, she was asked something about why she wasn't given more credit as a songwriter. She replied with something along the lines of "It's listed in the credits - if people don't read that, I'm not going to make a big deal of it". If she was the sole producer of "Hold Tight", then she wouldn't necessarily shout it from the rooftop - it's not her style to do so.

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The multiple songwriters is mind boggling. Does it really take 9 producers to pen the lyrics? Or did some of the producers write the music and that counts as a songwriting credit?

No joke, I'm seriously asking this. It used to sound much simpler then to produce and write a pop song.

I think you're confusing the terms "songwriter" and "producer". A songwriter is anyone who is involved in the composition of the song, including music and lyrics (your comment suggested that you thought everyone listed was involved in writing the lyrics). A producer is responsible for determining how the song sounds. In the old days, most producers weren't involved in the songwriting process - they simply took a song and determined how it would sound. Jellybean produced "Holiday", "Crazy For You" and "Gambler", but he wasn't involved in writing any of those songs - he determined how they sounded, though. Two different producers could take the same song and make it sound completely different (see "American Pie", for example - same song, but the two versions sound completely different).

If a producer changes/adds a melodic line, a new synth arrangement, a guitar riff etc. etc., then they can claim a songwriter's credit (which, it seems, almost everyone involved in the production of RH has done). Even a minor addition/change can be worthy of a credit (see Madonna's input on "Revolver", which consists of minor lyrical changes and the addition of a vocal riff - "faaaaaaaaaallllllllllll").

Hope this helps! :)

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Aside from writing the lyrics, you can gain a songwriting credit from just composing the melody which may explain the complexity with these Rebel Heart credits.

9533581432_3be28ea980.jpg

This is a cool diagram, but it doesn't actually account for the music (i.e. the instrumental that's left behind when the vocals are taken away). Melody and lyrics constitute what the singer sings, whereas the music is what backs the singer. As I said, though, it's a cool (and interesting) diagram - thank you for sharing!!

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This past decade every damn song has like 5 lyricers and 5 music writers and the results use to be a mess. Madonna has written her own lyrics for years, it's stupid this situation and surely it obeys to some weird thing that in the end will be tied to save taxes or something like that.

who cares if they're 200,000 if the songs are gorgeous?

and don't forget that, for ex, the avicii songs are written together by a team, so it's normal there are multiple names....

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Thank you, this definitely breaks it down into laymens terms on how a song is crafted these days.

I've never doubted Madonna's lyrical input when she's inspired (and clearly she was in RH, whereas not so much in Revolver). So it sounds like while she might have had an additional songwriter or two in writing the lyrics (since she doesn't compose music) in most of the songs, it seems each track went through a lot of production changes which I imagine affects the musical composition -- ultimately leading to many songwriting credits.

I think you're confusing the terms "songwriter" and "producer". A songwriter is anyone who is involved in the composition of the song, including music and lyrics (your comment suggested that you thought everyone listed was involved in writing the lyrics). A producer is responsible for determining how the song sounds. In the old days, most producers weren't involved in the songwriting process - they simply took a song and determined how it would sound. Jellybean produced "Holiday", "Crazy For You" and "Gambler", but he wasn't involved in writing any of those songs - he determined how they sounded, though. Two different producers could take the same song and make it sound completely different (see "American Pie", for example - same song, but the two versions sound completely different).

If a producer changes/adds a melodic line, a new synth arrangement, a guitar riff etc. etc., then they can claim a songwriter's credit (which, it seems, almost everyone involved in the production of RH has done). Even a minor addition/change can be worthy of a credit (see Madonna's input on "Revolver", which consists of minor lyrical changes and the addition of a vocal riff - "faaaaaaaaaallllllllllll").

Hope this helps! :)

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  • 1 month later...

Hold Tight is poorly produced and mixed.

Its like shes singing from a cave. Sucs.

Yeah i dont see madonna producing Hold Tight alone - seems very strange to me. Not that i dont think she could, but just that i dont think she's ever wanted to be a lone producer. she's all about collaboration.

What i found really interesting about hold tight was this:

Additional recording in The Ritz (Moscow), Grand Marina Hotel (Barcelona), Patriot Studios (Denver, CO/Venice, CA)

Why all these extra weird locations? Made me wonder if the initial demo was Madonna's and was recorded while on tour or something?

The best parts of the HT demo were the full backing vocals (hers and feat. MNEK ). It seems they weren't well prepared on this song in particular. I'm really wondering why these had to be cut if for no other reason than to make it different after the hacking and leaks.

Edited by elayman
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Oh, surely she didn't like it and was forced to do it. You are right, sorry.

No, go and run a bit with the bulls.

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Madonna is on record herself that there were demos she liked but that the leaks changed absolutely everything about the song selection process and started her second guessing everything rather than choosing for herself and putting it out as normal. When she told MNEK that his version of LFL was not used due to the leak, whether that was the actual reason or not, HT was most likely also affected as it would have looked strange to then leave him with a feature credit on another track. At least whoever produced Hold Tight did add an additional layer of instrumentals to the final version compared with demo 4 which does give it a more finished sound and fits better with the vocals. ;/

Edited by elayman
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Madonna is on record herself that there were demos she liked but that the leaks changed absolutely everything about the song selection process and started her second guessing everything rather than choosing for herself and putting it out as normal. When she told MNEK that his version of LFL was not used due to the leak, whether that was the actual reason or not, HT was most likely also affected as it would have looked strange to then leave him with a feature credit on another track. At least whoever produced Hold Tight did add an additional layer of instrumentals to the final version compared with demo 4 which does give it a more finished sound and fits better with the vocals. ;/

Oh god shut up. Why she didn't change anything for Unapologetic Bitch? Bitch I'm Madonna? Body Shop? Veni Vedi Vici? All those demos were done a full year before the album's original release date. Things would've been changed regardless of the leaks.

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Oh god shut up. Why she didn't change anything for Unapologetic Bitch? Bitch I'm Madonna? Body Shop? Veni Vedi Vici? All those demos were done a full year before the album's original release date. Things would've been changed regardless of the leaks.

Those are actually her words verbatim from an interview, the Edge one I believe....only she emphasized EVERYTHING so sorry but you'll have to go directly to the source for further details...I'm not even saying that was why LFL was changed necessarily.

Edited by elayman
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Guest bluejean

This is a cool diagram, but it doesn't actually account for the music (i.e. the instrumental that's left behind when the vocals are taken away). Melody and lyrics constitute what the singer sings, whereas the music is what backs the singer. As I said, though, it's a cool (and interesting) diagram - thank you for sharing!!

You're actually wrong. Melody, lyrics and structure is what constitutes songwriting. The instruments (bass, guitar, synths etc) is considered part of the musical arrangement and wouldn't automatically entitle all the musicians that played on the song to a songwriting credit. Unless it were a guitar or synth riff or something of that nature that had a distinct melody of its own and was considered an essential part of the song (example the guitar riff in Rolling Stones Satisfaction or the recognisable synth line in A-ha's Take on Me.) Unfortunately the line between what is "songwriting" and what is "arrangement" can get blurry which is why there has been so many disputes with this sort of thing. I don't necessarily think it's fair and I think there are plenty of cases where all musicians get credited equally (especially in the case of bands getting together in one room and writing as a group.) But those diagrams are technically correct.

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Guest bluejean

Madonna is on record herself that there were demos she liked but that the leaks changed absolutely everything about the song selection process and started her second guessing everything rather than choosing for herself and putting it out as normal. When she told MNEK that his version of LFL was not used due to the leak, whether that was the actual reason or not, HT was most likely also affected as it would have looked strange to then leave him with a feature credit on another track. At least whoever produced Hold Tight did add an additional layer of instrumentals to the final version compared with demo 4 which does give it a more finished sound and fits better with the vocals. ;/

I don't think she was ever going to release that demo of Hold Tight regardless of the leaks. It sounds amateur to my ears. Like a demo.

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Trust No Bitch appeared at Warner Chappell, apparently DJ Dahi & Blood Diamonds got a credit for it...

http://www.warnerchappell.com/song-details/WW010507122000

The songwriting credits granted to DJ Dahi and Blood Diamonds indicate that "Trust No Bitch" did make it past the demo stage and was perhaps at some point considered for inclusion on the album.

Before the album was released, someone claimed that it had been reworked by Diplo for inclusion on his next solo album. Obviously, this wasn't true.

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I don't think she was ever going to release that demo of Hold Tight regardless of the leaks. It sounds amateur to my ears. Like a demo.

Well it was too stripped down and needed work for sure, maybe also shortened, which would do away with MNEK.

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You're actually wrong. Melody, lyrics and structure is what constitutes songwriting. The instruments (bass, guitar, synths etc) is considered part of the musical arrangement and wouldn't automatically entitle all the musicians that played on the song to a songwriting credit. Unless it were a guitar or synth riff or something of that nature that had a distinct melody of its own and was considered an essential part of the song (example the guitar riff in Rolling Stones Satisfaction or the recognisable synth line in A-ha's Take on Me.) Unfortunately the line between what is "songwriting" and what is "arrangement" can get blurry which is why there has been so many disputes with this sort of thing. I don't necessarily think it's fair and I think there are plenty of cases where all musicians get credited equally (especially in the case of bands getting together in one room and writing as a group.) But those diagrams are technically correct.

I beg to differ, as you've misunderstood what I said. I wasn't talking about the individual instruments - I was talking about the musical backing itself (i.e. the chordal structure and the non-vocal melodic lines, which would include your a-ha and Rolling Stones examples). Madonna's collaborators have often mentioned that she will compose a melody line over a backing track that he/she has written (i.e. the basic chords....the music, if you will). In simple terms, the music is what is left of a song when you take away the sung melody. An arranger decides how the music will be structured/arranged. A producer decides how it will sound (instruments used etc.). The songwriter creates the song (music, melody, lyrics).

A concrete example - Pat Leonard bashes out on the piano a series of chords that he has put together (the backing track of a song). Madonna sings a melody over the top of them and then writes words to fit the melody. A classic is born :-).

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