Just week’s after releasing rare remixes of her song Frozen, Madonna has made another one of her classic songs available digitally with a stack of previously hard-to-get remixes.
Bedtime Story is from the singer’s sixth album Bedtime Stories which was released in 1994. It was the third single lifted from the album, coming out in February 1995.
While the CD single of the song featured remixes by Junior Vasquez and British electronic duo Orbital, some of the other remixes that are now available were previously hard to track down. The digital release includes the ‘Lush’ vocal and dub mixes, the ‘Percapella Mix’, and the ‘Unconscious in the Jungle Mix’.
While the majority of the album saw Madonna move into soul and new jack swing genres working with producers Babyface, Dave ‘Jam’ Hall and Dallas Austin, she also turned her sights to the UK and took inspiration from the growing trip-hop scene and acid house movement.
Madonna reportedly was a fan of Bjork’s Debut album that came out in 1993. She engaged the producer of that record Nellee Hooper, who in turn reached out to Bjork to ask if she’d like to collaborate with Madonna.
Bjork turned down the offer of a duet but wrote a song for Madonna. Bedtime Story sees the singer chanting “Let’s Get Unconscious Honey” but many people heard the lyric as “Let’s Get Unconscious on E”, a reference to party drug ecstasy.
The song was originally called Let’s Get Unconscious, and Bjork later reworked her demo version of the track releasing it as a b-side under the name Sweet Intuition, and later created a remix version called Sweet Sweet Institution.
The song was a big hit in Australia and the UK, but failed to do any damage to the charts in the USA. It stalled at number 43, becoming the first Madonna song since Burning Up in 1983 that didn’t make it into the Top 40.
For the song’s video Madonna turned to Mark Romanek. The clip, which was inspired by female surrealist painters, took six days to shoot. While the song has been used as an interlude in Madonna’s concerts she’s never added it to her set-list.
You can download 14 different mixes of Bedtime Story from iTunes. You can also find Bjork’s version on iTunes.
OIP Staff
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