{"id":937942,"date":"2026-10-18T19:04:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-18T19:04:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/937942\/"},"modified":"2026-10-18T19:04:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-18T19:04:09","slug":"making-madonnas-confessions-ii-producer-stuart-price-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/937942\/","title":{"rendered":"Making Madonna’s ‘Confessions II’ — Producer Stuart Price Interview"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tMadonna<\/a> was as ambitious as she\u2019s ever been in the studio sessions for July 3\u2019s Confessions II<\/a>, which is saying a lot. For the sequel to 2005\u2019s Confessions on a Dance Floor, she reunited with that album\u2019s producer, Stuart Price<\/a>, and crafted a relentless DJ set of an album that also includes some of her most emotionally bare songs: a duet with her daughter Lola (\u201cThe Test\u201d)\u00a0and wrenching songs about her late stepmother (\u201cBetrayal\u201d) and her late brother, Christopher Ciccone (\u201cFragile\u201d). She brings her full pop firepower, too, on songs from the Sabrina Carpenter duet \u201cBring Your Love\u201d to the Eighties reminiscence of \u201cDanceteria.\u201d It all helped win Madonna Artist of the Year at this year\u2019s VMAs, where she opened the show with a guest-star-packed performance, her first on the awards show in 23 years.<\/p>\n

\n

\n\tIn the new episode of Rolling Stone Music Now, Price breaks down the making of Confessions II, and goes deep on the stories behind \u201cThe Test,\u201d \u201cFragile,\u201d and \u201cI Feel So Free,\u201d his decades-long creative partnership with Madonna, and much more. To hear the whole episode, listen on Apple Podcasts<\/a> or Spotify<\/a>, or just press play above. Here are some highlights from the discussion:<\/p>\n

\t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n

\n\tMadonna and Price wrote \u201cGood for the Soul\u201d on their first day back in the studio, and it set the tone for everything that followed. \u201cWe came to London to my studio here, and we just said, \u2018Let\u2019s do a week and see what happens,’\u201d says Price. \u201cAnd it was just from the very first day, we just immediately had a new song. I think it was \u2018Good for the Soul.\u2019 And I don\u2019t think either of us really acknowledged what a great thing that was. We just acted in the moment and made the music that felt right.\u201d The song, he says, \u201creally emerged as a simple song about how touch feels good, about how connection feels good, about how letting your hair down just feels good. And that really just opened up a new chapter of songwriting, I think, which was gonna be based a lot more on Madonna\u2019s psyche at this moment in time. \u2026 I actually feel like her most powerful art is created when she just has that direct frankness about life.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tCalling the album Confessions II was a natural progression from the duo\u2019s renewed collaboration. \u201cI think the most notable thing is just how natural the continuation was,\u201d he says. \u201cI think that the sense of time just was a complete non-factor. I just loved how she was writing, how she sounded, how the songs were coming together, how much fun it was to do. It was pretty clear from early on, maybe in the second week of working, that actually the Confessions sound, amongst other things, is really a sound of our collaboration. A lot of music making is so non-verbal. \u2026 You\u2019re not discussing what you\u2019re gonna do before you do it. You just do it. And having that kind of non-verbal shorthand together allows you to move kind of quickly through ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMadonna was determined not to look backwards. \u201cConfessions One is 2005, and I think looking back only gets you so far,\u201d says Price. \u201cSo really you have to come up with a new spin on what that is, and I think that this is a record that defiantly looks forward. If Confessions One is really about dancing as freedom, Confessions II is much more about confrontation and acceptance. \u2026 It suggests the idea of vulnerability as strength. \u2026 Confession is associated with shame. But Confessions II for us, it reframes that idea as actually power and strength and the courage to \u2026 the, you know, daring to share as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

The album\u2019s house-music DNA came from mixtapes Price made for Madonna on the road, and a mixtape with Lil Louis\u2019 \u201cFrench Kiss\u201d on it sparked \u201cI Feel So Free.\u201d On the Celebration Tour, Price says, \u201cI would just make her mixtapes for parties or for her to work out to. And in those were the sort of references that we started using. A lot of them were based around just house records that I love, house artists that I love\u2026 It\u2019s Kevin Saunderson, it\u2019s DJ Pierre, it\u2019s Frankie Knuckles, it\u2019s Mr. Fingers\u2026. We went to New York\u2026 Madonna had come in from home and she\u2019d been listening to a mixtape there that had \u2018French Kiss\u2019 on it. \u2026 And so she brought that in and she was like, \u2018I really love this vocal in it,’\u201d Price says. That got combined with a track \u201cthat had this kinda hypnotic feel to it, that was built back in London before we\u2019d gone to New York,\u201d Price says. \u201cAnd so in New York what happened was we combined those two pieces of music together, which is really just typical of the way that Madonna kind of ideates, which is just colliding ideas together, things that she loves, things that create a feel in the studio. And then she said, \u2018Just put the mic on. Let me just start recording.’\u201d \u201cAnd so she got into this headspace of how dance music makes her feel, the sort of safety in numbers and representing what sanctuary the dance floor kinda is, that\u2019s where those ideas started to come about.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\t\u201cBetrayal\u201d grew out of an Erik Satie piece that was nearly used for Madonna\u2019s daughter Mercy\u2019s piano spotlight on the Celebration Tour, and became one of the album\u2019s songs about loss. \u201cBefore \u2018Bad Girl\u2019 on the Celebration Tour, there was a moment where Madonna\u2019s daughter Mercy played piano,\u201d Price says.\u00a0\u201dThat was an incredible moment of the show. Satie had been one idea of something to play there, but \u2026 it wasn\u2019t the right feel for that moment,\u201d Price says. \u201cBut the love of that piece had always stayed around. \u2026 That piece became a starting point for a song. And so just by chopping it up a little, rearranging it, and then \u2026 in that style of \u2018Hung Up\u2019 as well, like, it\u2019s not good enough just to rest on a sample. How can you extend it?\u2026 Throughout this album, she went through a lot. She said this music is good for the soul, right? She felt that it was healing to make music in a room where she\u2019s not second-guessing. But also she had things going on in her life that involved loss as well, and that happened with \u2018Betrayal.\u2019 She had a family member that she lost, and she turned that into the seed of a lyrical idea\u2026 One of Madonna\u2019s great gifts is that she\u2019s able to be very specific and at the same time very universal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMadonna and Price wrote \u201cFragile\u201d the week her brother Christopher\u2019s illness took a turn for the worse. \u201c\u2018Fragile\u2019 as an idea, I think, was also in the week where she had another loss,\u201d Price says. \u201cAnd again, this is this thing I think for writers, for artists, that the job part of it, the showing up for it is a real commitment to yourself. Like, no matter what\u2019s going on, I\u2019m gonna go into that studio. You know, there are some days that you just don\u2019t feel like it and it\u2019s very important to show up, because that reason that you didn\u2019t feel like it may actually be the number one reason why you should go into the studio that day\u2026. That week when we were working, her brother had been very sick, and things got worse, and we were writing a song at the time\u2026. Originally, \u2018Fragile,\u2019 I think lyrically was kind of speaking a little bit to the self. \u2026 But then it was just the way the stars lined up, I think, that what was going on that week became a much more current and appropriate subject.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMadonna\u2019s duet with her daughter Lola, \u201cThe Test,\u201d still gives Price chills. \u201cLola had said to her mother, like, \u2018I\u2019d like to do a song together,’\u201d Price says. \u201cLola and Madonna took a completely different perspective on that, which is that they looked at it as a healing opportunity, as a moment to be together and just be very \u2026 honest about things. \u2026 Lola prepared some lyrics to come in, Madonna prepared some lyrics to come in, but it wasn\u2019t until the microphone was on and we recorded it that those lyrics were really heard, and that was \u2026 of everything on the record, probably, you know, it gives me some chills thinking about it, because it\u2019s one of the most beautiful things I think I\u2019ve seen. And I have children of my own, like, thinking about the power of those bonds and of those connections, \u2026 and seeing it from a third party was a very emotional thing.\u201d Lola, he adds, \u201cis a completely exceptional artist in her own right.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tThe VMAs required a \u201ctour-level\u201d amount of preparation, and each live performance of this album\u2019s music was approached just as deliberately. For the free Pride concert in Times Square in June, Price says, \u201cyou are inside this little jewel box perched up high on top of the square, and it has these really thick bank vault-like steel doors with LED screens on the front.\u201d Then came \u201cthe metaphor of these kind of vault doors just opening and this new music just suddenly spills out onto the streets of Times Square, which is so important to Madonna in her life and her relationship with that city.\u201d For the VMAs, he explains, \u201cthat was a performance where we ambitiously put almost tour-level preparation into the work and compressed that all into a two-week time schedule.\u201d MTV, he adds, was \u201cvery supportive and accommodating in allowing her to really create and to not restrict.\u201d<\/p>\n

Madonna recorded eight or so songs that didn\u2019t make Confessions II. Will they come out? \u201cWell, you just never know, do you? The best thing about good songs is they never die. They just find a way to present themselves at the right time,\u201d Price says. \u201cAnd yes, I\u2019m being cryptic, but that\u2019s because I think that we still love this continuum idea that Confessions is really an extended moment of time that has different elements to the performance of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDownload and subscribe to Rolling Stone Music Now, hosted by Brian Hiatt, on Apple Podcasts<\/a> or Spotify<\/a> (or wherever you get your podcasts). Check out 10 years\u2019 worth of episodes in the archive, including in-depth interviews with Mariah Carey, Bruce Springsteen, Questlove, Halsey, Neil Young, Snoop Dogg, Brandi Carlile, Phoebe Bridgers, Rick Ross, Alicia Keys, the National, Ice Cube, Taylor Hawkins, Willow, Keith Richards, Robert Plant, Dua Lipa, Killer Mike, Julian Casablancas, Sheryl Crow, Johnny Marr, Scott Weiland, Liam Gallagher, Alice Cooper, Fleetwood Mac, Elvis Costello, John Legend, Donald Fagen, Charlie Puth, Phil Collins, Justin Townes Earle, Stephen Malkmus, Sebastian Bach, Tom Petty, Eddie Van Halen, Kelly Clarkson, Pete Townshend, Bob Seger, the Zombies, and Gary Clark Jr. And look for dozens of episodes featuring genre-spanning discussions, debates, and explainers with Rolling Stone\u2019s critics and reporters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Madonna was as ambitious as she\u2019s ever been in the studio sessions for July 3\u2019s Confessions II, which…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":937943,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[49,48,267731,75,1543,341,321278],"class_list":["post-937942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-confessions-ii","tag-entertainment","tag-madonna","tag-music","tag-stuart-price"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=937942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/937942\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/937943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=937942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=937942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=937942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}