The other day as I was blogging the Peter Cunningham photographs of Madonna, I put 1982 in the tags. 1982 - as I've done a gazillion times before - ! - But it's 2011! Wow, in one year Madonna has professionally been with music for 30 years! Those pics are older than most of her fans! It's unbelievable. She's unbelievable.
For Madonna, she's been at it since 1980. And this gem was on the demo tape that got her signed to Sire Records in 1982. Its the early version of Stay (the Virgin version produced by Nile Rodgers is a mixture of this and Don't You Know?) and it was recorded in 1981.
It was mentioned in both Rolling Stone (Madonna Goes All the Way - November 1984) and in Michael McKenzie's Lucky Star book.
Ever since I knew there were early versions, I was dying to hear them. I didn't get to hear them until 1996 when Stephen Bray released them, but it was well worth the wait and one of my all-time favorite Madonna recordings.
