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The Virgin Tour 1985 is the debut concert tour by American singer-songwriter Madonna, which visited major United States and Canadian cities.

About the tour

Madonna's first concert tour was strictly one of the U.S. and Canada, it didn't cross over to Europe or Asia. Early on there were plans to schedule dates in England and Japan due to Madonna's large fanbase in both countries, however the final schedule didn't reflect the idea. Madonna later toured these countries during her 1987 Who's That Girl Tour. In the end several U.S. dates were added and moved to larger concert venues due to overwhelmingly strong ticket sales. Madonna notably performed every date on the tour with no cancellations.

In San Francisco, tour shirts were selling at a clocked rate of one every six seconds. All 17,672 tickets for Madonna's show at New York City's prestigious Radio City Music Hall were completely sold out in a record-breaking 34 minutes. The same happened for the rest of the shows as most other shows were sold out in almost the same record-breaking time. Demand for tickets was so high that all initial booked venues had to be re-scheduled so Madonna could perform in larger arenas.

Madonna used a short segment of Michael Jackson's hit song "Billie Jean" during her performance of "Like a Virgin".

Opening Act

• The Beastie Boys

Set list

1. "Dress You Up"
2. "Holiday"
3. "Into the Groove"
4. "Everybody"
5. "Angel"
6. "Gambler"
7. "Borderline"
8. "Lucky Star"
9. "Crazy for You"
10. "Over and Over"
11. "Burning Up"
12. "Like a Virgin" (contains excerpts from "Billie Jean")
13. "Material Girl"

Source:

Tour dates

Personnel

• Vocals: Madonna
• Set Designer: Ian Knight
• Choreographed / Staged by: Brad Jeffries
• Keyboards: Patrick Leonard and Billy Meyers
• Drums: Jonathan P. Moffet
• Bass: Bill Lanphier
• Guitars: James Harrah and Paul Pesco
• Dancers: Michael Perea and Lyndon B. Johnson
• Personal Management: Freddy DeMann for Weisner-DeMann Entertainment
• Show Mix: Dave Kob
• Music Produced by: Madonna and Patrick Leonard

Tour reviews

Music critics were not enthused:

• Robert Palmer, The New York Times — "Madonna... simply didn't sing very well. Her intonation was atrocious; she sang sharp and she sang flat, and the combination of her unsure pitch and thin, quavery vocal timbre made the held notes at the end of her phrases sound like they were crawling off somewhere to die."
• Paul Grein, Billboard — "Cyndi Lauper will be around for a long time. Madonna will be out of business in six months. Her image has completely overshadowed her music."
• Paul Evans, Record — "Perhaps every generation needs reminding that rock and sex are sometimes indistinguishable. At the moment, Madonna's the apostle of the body gospel, and, as her show makes apparent, it's hard to recall a more fetching zealot."

In response, Madonna said: "I ignored the critics because I knew deep down in my heart that it was good and ... I always will meet up with a certain amount of controversy, a certain amount of opposition to what I'm doing."

Broadcasts and recordings

The 1985 Live - The Virgin Tour VHS documents a Detroit, Michigan stop on the tour. "Angel", "Borderline" and "Burning Up" were part of the tour set list but were not included on the official VHS release. In addition, bootleg video of the Dallas and New York dates have surfaced over the years, primarily on the internet.

The complete audio from a Los Angeles date was professionally recorded directly off the soundboard and soon leaked as a bootleg LP in the United States. It has been speculated that this recording was originally meant to be an official live album for The Virgin Tour that never materialized.

References

1. madonna-online.ch :: madonna's tours; the virgin tour
2. madonna-online.ch :: madonna's tours; the virgin tour
3. madonna-online.ch :: madonna's tours; the virgin tour
4. Mad-Eyes - Madonna Tours - The Virgin Tour
5. madonna-online.ch :: madonna's tours; the virgin tour
6. madonna-online.ch :: madonna's tours; the virgin tour
7. madonna-online.ch :: madonna's tours; the virgin tour
8. madonna-online.ch :: madonna's tours; the virgin tour

• 1985 concert tours
• Madonna concert tours