It's 35 years since the release of 'Express Yourself', the second single released from 'Like a Prayer'. The song pays tribute to funk/soul band Sly and the Family Stone and lyrically encourages female empowerment in relationships. Shep Pettibone gave the song a house upgrade for its single release and it became a Top 5 success across the world, including #2 in the US and #1 in Canada, Italy and Switzerland. The David Fincher directed video drew influence from Fritz Lang's 1927 film Metropolis and saw Madonna on top of a skyscraper ruling over her topless male workers; the video's $5 million production value making it the most expensive at the time.

 

 

Still a surprise this only reached number 5 !! Cherish and Dear Jessie outsold this song in the UK!

 

The opening of the BA tour is iconic and i have watched it a million times.

 

A Madonna staple and should have featured more on the Celebration tour!

Wow that's amazing. :cheer:

Still a surprise this only reached number 5 !! Cherish and Dear Jessie outsold this song in the UK!

Agreed! As a kid it was one of them songs I assumed would have been a massive number one. The sales don’t give the status of the song justice. I wonder what went wrong? Follow-up to an incredibly successful single, big budget iconic music video, new remix for the single release..:

 

That Shep Pettibone remix really does make the song. The original is fine but doesn’t do the empowering nature of the lyrics justice; Shep transforms it into a rousing anthem. The video is one of her best, so much iconic imagery and really kicks off Madonna using Hollywood to influence her visuals (of course there was ‘Material Girl’ before it but I think it’s much more frequent from here on).

If I recall correctly the single version was the same as the album version. The remix didn't appear anywhere until it was on the "Immaculate Collection" a year later. Helps to explain why the single suffered slightly.

I'm going to correct myself slightly. There is a shep remix on the cd version but the 7 remix is pretty much the album version and certainly not the IC version. I think to most ears it would sound the same on the radio and radio certainly played the "normal" version for want off a better phrase. You also have to recall that in 1989 pop singles were still seeking predominantly in vinyl, or certainly ones that were bought by teenagers.