Open Your Heart (Madonna song)

Upon release, the song was well received by music critics; in retrospective reviews, it is now considered to be among Madonna's best singles. "Open Your Heart" was also commercially successful, as it reached the top-ten of the charts in Canada, Belgium, Ireland, Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. It also became Madonna's fifth number one single in the US Billboard Hot 100; she became the second female artist – behind Whitney Houston – to score three number ones from one album. The song's accompanying music video, directed by Jean-Baptiste Mondino, depicts Madonna as an exotic dancer at a peep show who befriends a little boy. It was seen as a tribute to some stars of the Golden Age of Hollywood, such as Marlene Dietrich and Liza Minnelli; critical reception towards the clip was generally positive: the singer was praised for presenting women as the dominant sex, but the plot of a child entering a sex club received criticism. "Open Your Heart" has been performed in full on four of Madonna's concert tours—Who's That Girl (1987), Blond Ambition (1990), MDNA (2012), and Celebration (2023)—and was sampled on the Drowned World Tour (2001). It has also been covered by different artists, including Britney Spears in the 2002 film Crossroads.

Composition[edit]

Rikky Rooksby, author of The Complete Guide to the Music of Madonna, noted that "Open Your Heart" has a "continuous" percussion filled structure, and a chorus comparable to the work of Belinda Carlisle.^[11] The main concept of the song places Madonna as a victim of love.^[12] Lyrically, it's been described as a "simple love song";^[13] for Mavis Tsai, one of the authors of A Guide to Functional Analytic Psychotherapy, its lyrics work as a metaphor for being vulnerable while involved in an intimate or close relationship.^[14] The staff of Billboard noted the lyrics are "brimming with sexual innuendo, [Madonna] yearns for a man to open her lock with his key. And yes, that means exactly what you think it does".^[15] The line "If you gave me half a chance you'd see, my desire burning inside of me" put the singer, according to author Santiago Fouz-Hernández, in a more direct position of expressing her sexual desires for a man.^[16]


According to the sheet music published by Alfred Publishing Inc., "Open Your Heart" is written in the time signature of common time, with a medium funk tempo of 112 beats per minute; the music was published in the key of F major, with Madonna's vocals spanning from A₃ to C₅. It follows a basic sequence of F–E♭₉–E♭/G–Gm₇–F as its chord progression.^[17]

Critical reception[edit]

Upon release, "Open Your Heart" was met with generally positive reviews from music critics. On his biography of the singer, J. Randy Taraborrelli deemed it one off her most "earnest" songs, and compared it to Aretha Franklin's "Respect" (1967), and Barbra Streisand's "A House is Not a Home" (1971); Taraborrelli further added that it was a song people could "understand and latch on to, [which is] what makes a pop song memorable".^[18][19] Author Susan McClary, in Culture/power/history, applauded it for being more upbeat than previous single "Live to Tell", and singled out the track's "play with closure [which] creates the image of open ended jouissance – an erotic energy that continually escapes containment".^[20] AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine cited it as one of the highlights from True Blue;^[21] from the same portal, Stewart Mason said it proved the singer hadn't lost her ability to create a "powerful dance song [...] with its newfound rock and roll power (electric guitars join the synthesizers in the front line of instruments, a rarity in Madonna's music to that point), ['Open Your Heart'] was one of [her] most exciting grooves yet".^[22] Robert Christgau expressed that "the generosity she demands in the inexhaustible 'Open Your Heart' is a two-way street and then some".^[23]


Slant's Sal Cinquemani deemed it "robust", and considered it one of Madonna's "biggest, most influential hits".^[24] Erika Wexler from Spin named it an "appealing 'I'm going to get you'" song, and praised the production, which she felt "effectively creates the expansive feel of something magically opening".^[25] More critical was People's Drew Mackie, who said that, despite its "unforgettable" chorus, it's a "minor hit compared to the other major hits of [Madonna's] early career".^[26] One negative review came from Robert Hilburn, for the Los Angeles Times: he dismissed "Open Your Heart" as "uneventful", and one of True Blue's "flat spots".^[27]


Retrospectives reviews have also been positive: for Parade, Samuel R. Murrian named it Madonna's 12th best song, as well as an "essential" cut in her discography.^[28] Gay Star News' Joe Morgan also considered it one of the singer's "classics", and her 37th best song.^[29] For the HuffPost's Matthew Jacobs, it's Madonna's 25th best track.^[30] "Open Your Heart" was referred to as a "quintessential clipped-beat Eighties dance-pop jam" by the staff of Rolling Stone, who also named it the singer's 16th best.^[31] For Entertainment Weekly's Chuck Arnold, it's her 13th best single; "as much as [Madonna] may be known for her more titillating songs, she has also been capable of pure pop bliss. That can be heard on 'Open Your Heart' [...] she has rarely sounded more open-hearted than she does here", Arnold wrote.^[32] For Jude Rogers from The Guardian, and Yahoo!'s Nicole Hogsett, "Open Your Heart" is Madonna's 11th greatest song; the former deemed it one of her "sparkliest imperial-period" singles, while the latter pointed out that "from the opening notes you know that this song is going to be enjoyable".^[33][34] Joel lynch from Billboard wrote: "Few can sing about desire deferred and sound so damn exuberant while doing it, but Madonna provides a masterclass in how it’s done on the defiant 'Open Your Heart'". He placed it on the seventh position of the magazine's ranking of the singer's best songs.^[35] It came in the same position in Slant's ranking; Ed Gonzalez considered it an "unabashedly sincere and playfully metaphoric" love song.^[36] For Stereogum, Tom Breihan deemed it "one of the best singles in a career full of great ones".^[3]