Madonna – Veronica Electronica · Album Review ⟋ RAAlthough the Queen of Pop’s long-awaited remix album of her 1998 opus Ray Of Light disappoints with a scarcity of new material, it’s still a pleasant exercise in nostalgia.
On June 5th, I heard from gays I hadn’t been in touch with in years. The coalition of DMs I amassed throughout the day was multinational, flitting across time zones like zephyrs in the sky. They rejoiced in the only news more exciting than a new Madonna album: a long-rumoured remix album to her greatest record, 1998’s Ray Of Light. For acolytes of the Queen of Pop, this was a blessing of umpteen importance. It seemed like Mother was opening the vault to present us with a lost treasure. However, the tragic reality is, Madonna came home from work late and gave us a plate of reheated nachos.

Veronica Electronica is a highlights reel of long-available remixes misleadingly repackaged under a title rich in Madonna mythology. It’s not like Ray Of Light even needed an addendum—the album’s status as a sacrosanct masterpiece was established from the get-go. Featuring techno, house, trip-hop and new-age, it reflected the burgeoning spiritual practices in The Material Girl’s personal life—yoga, meditation, Kabbalah—that led her towards music with a sense of religious-like ecstasy.

Ray Of Light’s genius lies in synthesising wobbly trance, arpeggiated melodies, classic house, and ambient synth pads with clear-eyed lyrical introspection. In singing about motherhood, ageing and finding purpose amid the transience of the human experience, Madonna delivered a bracing portrait of vulnerability and maturity that starkly contrasted the infamously aloof posture of her past work. Netting four Grammys, it was so successful that it deferred the initial 1988 release of Veronica Electronica, which got indefinitely put on hold in favour of further Ray of Light promotional singles.

Speculation over the years grew rampant on what Veronica contained. The final result? A compilation that eschews the enveloping new age lull of Ray Of Light for full hyper trance mania. Where its predecessor struck a balance between Madonna: Dancefloor Queen and Madonna: Goddess of the Hearth and Home, Veronica is all dark, twisty rave-outs and hypnotic beat journeys that emphasise the electronica influences that first inspired her sonic reinvention.

The only catch is that, substantially, the project consists of six previously released remixes, which have been butchered into new edits half their original size, one remastered demo track leaked online 15 years ago (“Gone Gone Gone”) and one new remix (“Frozen” (Widescreen Mix and Drums)). The long-rumoured companion album to a masterpiece feels like a stinging disappointment to fans expecting a game-changer.

Veronica Electronica is essentially a love-letter to ’90s trance. Kicking things off is the “Bucklodge Ashram New Edit” remix of “Drowned World/Substitute For Love” from progressive house mavens Sasha and BT, which Madonna included on the 12-inch single release back in 1998. Sasha and BT swap her album version’s new-age swirl for the bubble and froth of wriggly acid house synths. The new version included on Veronica condenses the scope of the “Bucklodge Ashram” remix by half, but the DJ duo’s groove is insistent enough to lose none of its cathartic power.

Sasha was a key collaborator in the Ray Of Light era. The Welsh DJ and producer had three separate remixes appear on the title track’s single release, including the “Twilo” mix now repurposed on Veronica. Named for the legendary downtown New York club where Sasha frequently DJed, this version wisely strays far from the near-perfection of its source material, retooling it as hypnotic, tribal-laden euphoria that Twilo patrons loved. Shorn of its epic length by half, Sasha’s power still shines through.

Veronica’s middle section is devoted to two of her most crucial partners in dance music: Club 69, AKA Peter Rauhofer, the Austrian DJ and mainstay of NYC’s gay club circuit, and Victor Calderone, a Brooklyn native and house legend famous for remixing many of Madonna’s tracks after her falling out with her former hit remixer Junior Vasquez. Club 69’s mix of “Nothing Really Matters” has been beloved for years. Madonna included various edits of Club 69’s edit back in 1998 and on her 2022 remix retrospective Finally Enough Love).

Together, Calderone and Rauhofer’s “Collaboration Remix” of “Skin,” Veronica’s lead single, is something of a cult classic for fans of the DJs—Calderone included this remix on his own 2001 album E=VC2, and the way it teases out the shimmering synths of the original with an insurgent house beat typifies the clubby sounds Veronica hones in on.

Fans might be similarly pleased to find the demo “Gone Gone Gone,” which has been circulating online since 2010, given a studio remaster. Its luxuriantly mellow synth pads immediately evoke the watery world of Ray Of Light but with the added bonus of drum & bass that creates a kinetic sense of unease. Drum & bass also powers Fabien Waltmann’s “Good God” mix of “The Power of Goodbye” and flavours Veronica’s only new release, a drum-focused rework of “Frozen.” It’s interesting hearing Ray of Light’s mellower tracks reimagined into the foreboding drones of Mezzanine-era Massive Attack, though it’s not as compelling as recent trap-adjacent versions.

It makes sense that Madonna is still exploring the world she created with Ray Of Light. The rest of the world is, too. This year alone has seen pop divas like FKA twigs and Addison Rae summon its spirit both reverentially and referentially. It feels like a missed opportunity to not capitalise on its cultural relevance moment by sharing the full extent of Madonna’s compositions.

This may not be the Veronica we wanted, but the Veronica we have is a pleasant enough nostalgia exercise for the golden era of late ’90s dance music. This would have been a release of stupendous proportions if Madonna had actually opened up the vault and delivered whatever cache of demos and remixes her fans had never heard before. Without these unheard tracks, Veronica fails to meet the moment of a culture ready to embrace every piece of the journey that makes Ray Of Light such an indelible cultural document.Tracklist01. Drowned World/Substitute For Love (BT & Sasha’s Bucklodge Ashram New Edit)
02. Ray Of Light (Sasha Twilo Mix Edit)
03. Skin (The Collaboration Remix Edit)
04. Nothing Really Matters (Club 69 Speed Mix Meets The Dub)
05. Sky Fits Heaven (Victor Calderone Future New Edit)
06. Frozen (Widescreen Mix and Drums)
07. The Power Of GoodBye (Fabiens Good God Mix Edit)
08. Gone Gone Gone (Original Demo Version)