From the album Madonna (1983)
Featured on You Can Dance (1987), Ciao Italia: Live from Italy (1988), The Immaculate Collection (1990), The Girlie Show ~ Live Down Under (1994), Drowned World Tour 2001, I’m Going to Tell You a Secret (2006), Celebration (2009)
Written by Curtis Hudson/Lisa Stevens
Produced by John “Jellybean” Benitez

Madonna’s first big hit and breakthrough single - could it be any more obvious why? Holiday’s perfect combination of groove (the bassline is truly a work of art) and catchy melody makes it a defining work in the dance-pop genre. It was great enough that the “assembly-line” hit single factory Stock Aitken Waterman would even use near-identical chord progressions in many of their songs four years later, from Kylie Minogue’s I Should Be So Lucky (just the first time she’d follow in Madonna’s footsteps, hah) to Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up. Holiday’s lightweight, breezy feel allows it to spread its universal “let love shine” message of celebration with as much sincerity as the likes of We Are the World, with many times the subtlety. At the same time, this makes it more inherently disposable than ANY other Madonna song, partly due to having been written by outside songwriters. Yet this only seems to have increased its appeal - for the song’s significance to her career now extends far beyond the original single. As a near-staple of her live tours, the way she performs it generally reflects her feelings at the time - see the oddly commanding, militaristic Re-Invention Tour version documented on I’m Going to Tell You a Secret. Still, in its disposability, the studio recording says next to nothing about Madonna as an artist, except that she adapted herself rather well to a song intended for/rejected by Mary Wilson of the Supremes. But who cares? - Holiday is an undisputed classic, regardless.

The music video, however, is tragically bad, and never officially released for that reason - Madonna and her backup dancers (including brother Christopher) simply perform rather daggy dance moves through an absurdly exaggerated psychedelic filter. Much more interesting is Madonna’s 1983 appearance on American Bandstand - her first ever televised live performance. Though it’s lipsynced as usual for such shows at the time, Madonna is genuinely captivating as, alone without choreography, she struts her stuff surrounded by a studio audience. A natural center of attention, her energy is infectious; the resulting cheers actually disproportionately enthusiastic for the kind of performers one would usually get on such shows. The interview afterwards is the source of one of THE classic Madonna quotes, as shown in a slightly edited form at her Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction:

“We are a couple of weeks into the new year; what do you hope will happen, not only in 1984, but for the rest of your professional life - what are your dreams, what’s left?”
“To rule the world.”

For a twenty-five-year-old then-one-hit-wonder, that’s either an admirably courageous or absurdly egotistic statement, but to actually achieve, maintain and surpass it for another twenty-five years is what makes that moment the stuff of legend. Perhaps, considering all that was to follow, it wasn’t so pretentious at all. Many other popstars who followed in Madonna’s wake talked the talk, but could they walk the walk?