Madonna drops contemporary midtempo promo single ‘I Rise’
Madonna made her long awaited return last month with her Maluma collaboration ‘Medellín’. It was the first cut taken from her upcoming album Madame X, to be released on the 14th of June. After the first live performance of the tune at the Billboard Music Awards last night, she now premieres the brand new buzz single ‘I Rise’. The track opens with a fragment of a speech by Emma Gonzalez, a young activist who uses her voice for gun control. On the midtempo tune with a guitar driven contemporary production, Madonna sings about rising above negativity and people that are trying to get her down. The lyrics about running from bullets and guns get a more political meaning due to the spoken intro by Gonzalez, while the ‘we call BS’ part of her speech echoes throughout the track. In similar fashion to the lead single, Madonna’s vocals are heavily autotuned. The chorus itself is quite repetitive and there isn’t much of a climax towards the end. It is a decent enough track that was probably selected as a promo single for its lyrics and message rather than its melodies or style.