Madonna’s ‘Hard Candy’ Turns 5: Stan & Deliver

Bradley Stern | April 24, 2013 5:30 am

Name: Conor Behan | Location: Ireland | Twitter: @platinumjones

3. Give It 2 Me: Despite what critics said at the time, Hard Candy features plenty of moments where Madonna gets to be as cheeky and empowering as ever. Not least on this track, the album’s second single, the lyrics to which read both as Madonna urging to keep pushing on as usual and as a tribute to her own time in the pop universe.

A clattering, loping beat underpins Madonna singing in a husky register before brashly instructing the listener to grab life by proverbial hard candies as a truckload of synths skitter across the chorus. Of all the production Pharrell supplied for this album, this is his crowning glory, the jerky “Get Stupid” segment a welcome bit of experimentation on a track that is catchy, quirky and quintessentially Madonna (and if you’ve heard his current single with Robin Thicke, you might think P is paying tribute to with the funk stomp of “Blurred Lines”).