Madonna's Confessions II: pop icon bares all on album 'engineered to make you sweat' – and settles scores with ex Sean Penn

Seven years after Madame X, Madonna has returned with her first album in seven years – the longest gap in her 43-year career – and it is a confessional tour de force. Confessions II, a follow-up to her much-lauded 2005 dance-pop opus, sees the Queen of Pop addressing everything from her failed daughter Lourdes to her late brother Christopher Ciccone, and even launching a venomous attack on ex-husband Sean Penn.

The most venom-tongued track is titled 'Bizarre', in which she squarely attacks the Hollywood A-lister, to whom she was married from 1985 to 1989. She references the 1968 Shelby GT500 convertible she gave him as a wedding gift and his conviction for reckless driving in 1987, singing: "Movie star, deep blue eyes. In Hollywood, we're a perfect prize. He drove way too fast, Shelby Cobra wasn't meant to last." She also claims Penn resented her: "All 'cause you're threatened by me, you won't admit it. The little things that you do don't make me want you. Who knew love could be so bizarre?"

“Madonna returns after seven years with Confessions II, attacking ex Sean Penn and stepmother Joan in a five-star dance-floor confessional.”

The A-list ex isn't the only subject of her scorn. 'Betrayal' appears to be about her stepmother Joan, who died in 2024 while the album was being made – Madonna did not attend her funeral. The singer was five when she lost her mother to breast cancer; three years later, in 1966, her father married Joan, who worked briefly as a housekeeper. In the opening verse, Madonna sings: "This is a story of betrayal. You couldn't see your fall from grace. So take the hammer, hit the nail. You'll never take my mother's place." Later she adds: "You betrayed me, you enslaved me."

But there is also joy. Produced with trusted collaborator Stuart Price – who also helmed the original Confessions on a Dance Floor – the album is a celebration of the dance floor incorporating tributes to her earliest days on New York's club scene. The Independent hails it as her best in 20 years, calling it "engineered to make you move, or indeed, sweat". It opens with 'I Feel So Free', sampling Chicago house pioneer Lil Louis, and a swell of synths like a door opening into a dark, heady underground. "Sometimes I like to just hide in the shadows," she whispers. "Create a new persona… a different identity. I can be whoever I wanna be." Then: "Come and meet me on the dancefloor."

From there, Madonna and Price lead listeners through a labyrinth. A track called 'Danceteria' tributes the iconic Manhattan club where her first single 'Everybody' was played by DJ Mark Kamins in 1982. It features intentional nods to hits like 'Vogue', and is co-produced with Andrew Watt, who helped reinvigorate the Rolling Stones and Paul McCartney. Enlisting Sabrina Carpenter for the dazzling house track 'Bring Your Love', Madonna seemingly hits back at misogynist attempts to keep women in pop in a box: "Don't comment on my ideas / I don't want your judgement or your expectations / Don't wind me up like a toy / Your vision of me is a killer of joy."

The Sun gives it five stars, declaring: "Rather than playing it safe, Confessions II sees her doing just that – confessing." At a playback attended by journalists, Price explained the nods to some of Madonna's most iconic hits. Younger women in pop – Chappell Roan, Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish, Sabrina Carpenter and Charli XCX – have been killing it of late, all disproving the tired industry notion that there can only be one on top. With this album, Madonna reminds the world why she remains the queen of reinvention.