Madonna’s Sticky & Sweet tour wrapped its record-breaking run last month in Israel, but fans can still catch the Material Girl’s incredible Hard Candy stage show on October 30th when EpixHD.com airs footage from her sold-out four-night stand in Buenos Aires from December 2008. As a first look at the footage, Billboard premiered the above video of Madonna and company performing a funky, reworked “Into the Groove” — a song that Madonna herself told RS she feels “retarded singing.”

Sticky & Sweet up close: photos from Madonna’s tour.

This new take on “Into the Groove,” which featured in the “Old School” segment of Madonna’s concert, samples other dance-floor classics like Newcleus’ “Jam On It” and Sugarhill Gang’s “Apache” while characters from late artist (and Madonna pal) Keith Haring dance on dozens of giant screens. But the most awe-inspiring thing about the performance is Madonna herself, as the then-50-year-old jumpropes Double Dutch — while singing. (more…)

Madonna looks back at her epic three-decade career in Rolling Stone’s new issue, on stands now. We’ve relived 50 of her Madgesty’s most iconic moments — from declaring her plans for world domination on American Bandstand in 1984 to inspecting Britney Spears’ tonsils at the 2003 VMAs — and looked back at photos from her record-shattering Sticky & Sweet Tour, and now we’re happy to present exclusive outtakes from her candid interview.

In a Q&A that didn’t make our issue, the Queen of Pop opens up about her relationships with Britney Spears and Michael Jackson, some of her most scandalous moments (naked in Penthouse, the “Like a Prayer” video flap), how she discovers new music, and what she’d like her legacy to be.

• Madonna’s Message: Pop’s Reigning Queen in Her Own Words

Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera stepped up to kiss the Queen of Pop’s ring — well, Madonna herself — at the 2003 VMAs, and Lady Gaga got her chance to pay homage this weekend on Saturday Night Live. But rather than play it straight, SNL cast the two in a mock catfight that pit Gaga (the night’s musical guest) against Madge (in town promoting best-of collection Celebration). It all went down during a “Deep House Dish” sketch when DJ Dynasty Handbag (Kenan Thompson) announced “two exciting entertainers, performing together for the very first time.” The pair of slight blond stars spun around and while Gaga nailed her first lyric — “What’s wrong, Madonna, can’t get into the groove?” — Madonna seemed to blank on her lines, recovering in time to try to yank Gaga’s hair. “What the hell is a disco stick!?” Madonna shouted as the two struggled.

Get a look at Lady Gaga’s wildest wardrobe moments.

When their mock scuffle moved to the couch, Gaga said, “Hey, guess what Madonna, I’m totally hotter than you” to which Madonna retorted, “What kind of name is Lady Gaga, it sounds like baby food.” Touché. The horrified look on T’Shane (Andy Samberg)’s face said it all: WTF. Like many SNL sketches, there was no clear road out of this bizarre scenario, so Thompson suggested the two kiss and make up.

Madonna photos: RS’ complete archive. (more…)

September 30th, 2009 was a historic day for Madonna. After winning countless Grammys, shattering tour records and entering the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the Material Girl did something she’d never accomplished before on the Late Show With David Letterman: She ate a slice of pizza. Yesterday marked Madonna’s eighth appearance on Letterman’s couch, and after Madonna’s revelation that she has never tried perhaps one of New York’s trademark foods, Letterman escorted her to a nearby pizzeria, where flashbulbs and video cameras captured the historic meeting of Madonna, cheese, bread and sauce (and, uh, olives).

Madonna gets Sticky & Sweet on her record-busting tour: photos.

Madonna made an usual entrance into the Ed Sullivan Theatre — she was carried out on the sticks of the New York Rangers — which set the tone for one of the most light-hearted interviews the star has ever had on the Letterman couch. Dave helped bring out her rarely seen funny side, something fans have glimpsed during her Rock Hall acceptance speech and the “Beautiful Stranger” video. Talking about her eight-year marriage to director Guy Ritchie, Madonna said the union and the move to London strategically corresponded with “the Bush Years.” Madonna also, surprisingly, fielded questions about her relationship with New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez, and admitted to smoking a joint backstage before her infamous, expletive-heavy Letterman interview back in 1994 (watch it below). “I didn’t inhale,” Madonna joked. (more…)

Madonna and Lil Wayne’s collabo “Revolver,” the second exclusive new track from the Material Girl’s career-spanning Celebration, leaked in high quality yesterday, roughly two weeks before the collection is released on September 29th. The track had previously appeared in May as a demo recording, but this cleaned-up version with its sirenesque synths is more befitting of the Queen of Pop. The song shares its name with the same titular firearm as Wayne’s supposed Rebirth track “Hot Revolver,” but that’s where the similarities end. “Revolver” sounds more like Britney Spears’ “Radar” than Tha Carter 3.

“My love’s a revolver, my sex is a killer, do you wanna die happy?” Madonna sings in the chorus. Weezy continues the barrage of ammunition references during his brief cameo toward the end of the song, rapping “My love-using weapon, and yes I use it well. Then I let the rose petals cover up the bullet shells. I never shoot and tell, I only shoot to kill. And the vest ain’t gonna help it even if you’re laying still.” (more…)

Photo: Lovekin/FilmMagic

Madonna surprised MTV’s VMAs tonight by opening the show with a long speech about Michael Jackson that was followed by a performance by Janet Jackson. The show closed with a spectacular look at This Is It, the film assembled from Jackson’s concert rehearsals. Read Madonna’s entire tribute here:

Michael Jackson. [Cheers] I have a little bit more to say than that. OK, here we go again. Michael Jackson was born in August 1958. So was I. Michael Jackson grew up in the suburbs of the Midwest. So did I. Michael Jackson had eight brothers and sisters. So do I. When Michael Jackson was six, he became a superstar, and was perhaps the world’s most beloved child. When I was six, my mother died. I think he got the shorter end of the stick. I never had a mother, but he never had a childhood. And when you never get to have something, you become obsessed by it.

I spent my childhood searching for my mother figures. Sometimes I was successful, but how do you recreate your childhood when you are under the magnifying glass of the world? (more…)

Photo: Polk/Getty

What was billed as a special tribute to Michael Jackson starring his sister, Janet, turned into an even more epic performance: Madonna took the stage at tonight’s MTV Video Music Awards to honor an artist she has called “one of the greats.”

In a long, heartfelt speech about her personal relationship to Jackson, Madonna called the King of Pop “a hero,” and reflected on how his early stardom led him to forever search for his childhood. Recalling the moment she learned that he had died, Madonna said, “All I could think about in that moment was I had abandoned him. That we had abandoned him. That we had let this magnificent creature who had once set the world on fire slip through the cracks. Most of us had turned our backs on him. … There will never be anyone like him again. He was a king.”

Madonna added, “There’s a whole lot of crotch-grabbing and Moonwalking going on in my house,” revealing her two songs are huge MJ fans. She ended with a statement that roused the crowd into a standing ovation: “Long live the King!” (Read Madonna’s full speech here.) (more…)

Photo: Guez/AFP/Getty

After 85 shows performing songs from Hard Candy and her 26-year catalog, Madonna has wrapped her Sticky & Sweet tour with a pair of gigs at Israel’s Yehoshua Gardens. All told, the numbers for the singer’s year-long global trek are jaw-dropping: $408 million grossed, more than 3.5 million fans attended and 32 countries hit, according to Live Nation, the tour’s producer. The figures make Sticky & Sweet the highest-grossing tour every by a solo act, and the second-highest grossing trek of all time. Madonna even broke her own record: 2006’s Confessions tour held the honor of most successful solo tour with a $194 million gross. Take a bow, indeed.

Sticky & Sweet up close: photos from Madonna’s tour.

“Sometimes getting onstage is the easiest thing in the world,” Madonna tells Rolling Stone in our new issue. “Other times, it’s like, ‘Can someone please hit me with a stun gun?’ ” (more…)

Photo: Weiss/WireImage
Madonna’s 25-year tenure with Warner Music will come to an end with a new greatest hits compilation due out in September, the Material Girl’s management told People. “Madonna does have plans to go into the studio to record a few new songs for this album,” says Madonna’s publicist Liz Rosenberg. “We’re hoping to have a greatest hits package come out in September. We’re all very excited about it.”

(For Madonna’s greatest hits with us, check out our gallery of her RS covers.)

In a new twist, fans might get to have a say in what makes the final cut of the greatest hits compilation. Madonna’s manager Guy Oseary took to Twitter yesterday to ask fans what songs they’d want on the upcoming collection. “Thank you to everyone that gave me there pick of song ideas for Madonna’s greatest hits. I will pass along all your thoughts,” Oseary tweeted.  The upcoming greatest hits will be the Madge’s fourth best-of compilation, following 1990’s The Immaculate Collection, the ballad-bunching Something to Remember and 2001’s GHV2. (more…)

Photo:Mabromatoa/AFP/Getty

The divorce settlement between Madonna and her ex-husband Guy Ritchie has finally been confirmed by the singer’s rep. The deal calls for Ritchie to receive roughly $75 million of Madonna’s estimated $490 million worth. Part of the $75 million sum includes the couple’s country home in western England as well as a pub that was co-owned by the couple. The sum is also about twice what Paul McCartney had to pay when he divorced Heather Mills, and stands on record as perhaps the highest divorce settlement in U.K. history.

“I’d assume it’s one of the largest payouts ever in a divorce settlement,” Madonna’s rep Liz Rosenberg said. (more…)

Photo: Getty

Madonna’s Sticky & Sweet tour grossed $91.5 million during its recently concluded U.S. run. According to Live Nation, which signed the Material Girl to a massive 360 contract, Madonna’s U.S. jaunt sold about 550,000 tickets over the course of 28 shows. The tour wrapped up its American itinerary last Wednesday with a show at Miami’s Dolphin Stadium. Including the European concerts that preceded the American dates, the Sticky & Sweet tour has thus far grossed $207.5 million in ticket sales alone. (more…)

As rumored, both Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake joined Madonna onstage last night during the Material Girl’s Sticky & Sweet stop at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. During “Human Nature,” the third song of the evening, Madonna handled the bulk of the Bedtime Stories track while the video of Spears freaking out in an elevator played in the background as usual. During the final chorus, Spears finally emerged, sharing the singing duties with Madonna before being lowered into center stage to make her grand exit. Shaky YouTube footage of the performance can be seen here. Justin Timberlake also showed up later in the night, joining Madonna as he often does for Hard Candy’s “4 Minutes.” Check the video here. Rumors abound that Brit might show up again during Madonna’s Las Vegas shows this weekend, but nothing’s been confirmed as of yet. Spears’ new album, Circus, is due December 2nd.

Related Stories:

• Madonna’s Sticky & Sweet Tour Rolls Into New York With Reworked Hits, Virtual Britney

• Madonna Kicks Off North American Tour With Top Hats, Double Dutch

• Madonna and Guy Ritchie Announce Divorce

Photo: Lovekin/Getty

An unreleased tape featuring some of Madonna’s earliest recordings has been unearthed. The tape, which was recorded roughly 27 years ago, captures the era in Madonna’s life when she was living in the basement of a Queens, New York synagogue with Ed and Dan Gilroy, who was her boyfriend at the time. Madonna spoke about the brothers in her reflective induction speech at this year’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame ceremony. Snippets of that speech are interspersed with the old recording, which features one of her early songs “Born To Be A Dancer.” The tape also features Madonna playing guitar and drums on the “first song” she’d ever written, “Tell the Truth.” (more…)

Photo: Getty
After seven years of marriage and countless rumors, Madonna’s spokesperson announced today that the singer and her husband, director Guy Ritchie, have agreed to divorce. The statement was co-signed by representatives of both Madonna and Ritchie. The pair have not agreed on a settlement on their combined $525 million worth, the majority of which is the Material Girl’s. The couple had two children, Rocco and David Banda, who was adopted from Malawi in 2006. Rumors of an imminent split have been a gossip page favorite for the past few years but reached a crescendo in July with allegations that Madonna was having an affair with New York Yankee slugger Alex Rodriguez. (more…)

Photo: LeSegretain/AFP/Getty

Madonna may have toyed with dominance and submission on this year’s Hard Candy, but there was no question who was carrying the cane at the first New York City date on her Sticky & Sweet Tour last night (the trek’s second stop in the States). Emerging on a throne to the thumpy sound of “Candy Shop,” the 50-year-old singer kicked off a tightly choreographed two-hour set designed to accentuate her physical and musical strength and flexibility.

(Check out photos from Madonna’s opening-night show here.)

Skipping rope during a section evoking the 1980s New York where she began her career, Madonna pranced on the DJ’s table during a beefier “Into the Groove” as colorful Keith Haring figures spelled out the lyrics on giant video screens. With some chunky power chords, “Borderline” became a Cheap Trick-style power-pop song, “Vogue” was mashed up with the funky brass of “4 Minutes” and “La Isla Bonita” morphed into a Gogol Bordello-esque hoe-down featuring fiddle and accordion.

“You know who’s not invited to my party? Sarah fucking Palin” Madonna shouted after a montage of images that included Oprah and Bono urged “Get up – it’s time – your life – your choice.” (more…)