Angel
Released: 21.09.85 Highest Chart Position: 5 Weeks on Chart: 9 Total Sales: 205,000
Written by Steve Bray and Madonna, 'Angel' was one of the first songs developed for 'Like A Virgin', the LP from which it came, and according to Madonna, was about a girl who was "in depression over something. An angel appeared and healed her soul, making her fall madly in love with Him. [...] It's something that I felt when I was young. I thought it would make for an interesting story if I wrote that [experience] as a song on my record."
The song was recorded as early as April 1984, but the whole project was held off, much to Madonna's frustration, by the continuing sales of her self-titled debut album, which had by then sold over a million copies in the United States. She had decided to release 'Angel' as the initial single from the album, but changed her mind, after the recording of the title track 'Like a Virgin' was complete.
Madonna had initially planned to release a music video for 'Angel' but decided against it as there were already five of her videos on-rotation in the music channels being broadcast continuously. Hence, Warner Bros. and Madonna felt that adding another video to the already saturated channels, might not be in her favour.
In the UK, where no such music channels existed and videos were only fleetingly aired perhaps just once on the solitary music programme: 'Top Of The Pops', a promotional video was put together by Warner Bros. Records. Surprisingly, the obvious choice to use footage of Madonna performing the track during her 'Virgin Tour' was vetoed by the tour director, Danny Kleinman, who had removed this performance (along with ‘Borderline’ and ‘Burning Up’) from The Virgin Tour video as not being up to standard. Instead a montage consisting of scenes from the tour as well as incongruous snippets from the music videos of "Burning Up", "Borderline", "Lucky Star", "Like a Virgin" and "Material Girl", were cobbled together. The end result was something of a mess and was only ever aired in the UK. Not surprisingly, the video has never been commercially released and is only available on promotion-only releases: 'It's That Girl', 'The Videos' (a top-up to 'It's That Girl') and, 'She's Breathless'.
Angel was released on the 21st September and debuted inside the UK top 10 on its first week of release, peaking at no. 5 the following week. It is a testament to Madonna's success that a Top 5 single could be regarded as relatively lacklustre! There was, however, nothing lacklustre about its performance state-side where it gave Madonna her first co-written No.1 single, having been penned in collaboration with Steve Bray. It's impressive chart placing was no doubt helped by being backed by 'Into The Groove', which had received enormous club and radio play in the US, and was regarded by many as the superior track.
The song was recorded as early as April 1984, but the whole project was held off, much to Madonna's frustration, by the continuing sales of her self-titled debut album, which had by then sold over a million copies in the United States. She had decided to release 'Angel' as the initial single from the album, but changed her mind, after the recording of the title track 'Like a Virgin' was complete.
Madonna had initially planned to release a music video for 'Angel' but decided against it as there were already five of her videos on-rotation in the music channels being broadcast continuously. Hence, Warner Bros. and Madonna felt that adding another video to the already saturated channels, might not be in her favour.
In the UK, where no such music channels existed and videos were only fleetingly aired perhaps just once on the solitary music programme: 'Top Of The Pops', a promotional video was put together by Warner Bros. Records. Surprisingly, the obvious choice to use footage of Madonna performing the track during her 'Virgin Tour' was vetoed by the tour director, Danny Kleinman, who had removed this performance (along with ‘Borderline’ and ‘Burning Up’) from The Virgin Tour video as not being up to standard. Instead a montage consisting of scenes from the tour as well as incongruous snippets from the music videos of "Burning Up", "Borderline", "Lucky Star", "Like a Virgin" and "Material Girl", were cobbled together. The end result was something of a mess and was only ever aired in the UK. Not surprisingly, the video has never been commercially released and is only available on promotion-only releases: 'It's That Girl', 'The Videos' (a top-up to 'It's That Girl') and, 'She's Breathless'.
Angel was released on the 21st September and debuted inside the UK top 10 on its first week of release, peaking at no. 5 the following week. It is a testament to Madonna's success that a Top 5 single could be regarded as relatively lacklustre! There was, however, nothing lacklustre about its performance state-side where it gave Madonna her first co-written No.1 single, having been penned in collaboration with Steve Bray. It's impressive chart placing was no doubt helped by being backed by 'Into The Groove', which had received enormous club and radio play in the US, and was regarded by many as the superior track.
UK Variations and Collectables
'Angel' was issued in standard 7" and 12" formats, supplemented with a limited edition 7" shaped picture disc.
The 7" single would, as usual, come with a variety of collectables. Thankfully, UK Sire had maintained their increased budget as 'Angel' now followed 'Holiday' in being pressed in sturdy gloss sleeves although for the assiduous collector of sleeve variations, there is also a rare matt card version. In terms of label variations, the standard yellow label appeared with both 'A' small logo and large logo labels. 'Angel' appears to have the rarest of the 'A' small logo labels as it can prove particularly hard to track down. It also appears to be the only 'A' label that was not pressed with an indentation.
In addition to the yellow labels, there are also some scarce colour top-ups to collect; apart from the common silver label, there are limited pressings available in blue and, for the first time, teal (pale silvery blue).
For the obligatory limited edition, Sire reverted back to a 7" shaped picture disc, this one housed in a double-stickered sleeve with the added bonus of coming with a cardboard plinth in which to stand the picture disc for display purposes!
Unlike all other shaped picture discs, there does not seem to be an uncut pressing for 'Angel'. This has not stopped 'Record Collector' including it in its last discography, valuing it as equal to the 'Crazy For You' uncut. This would seem overly optimistic as while the 'Crazy For You' uncut is indisputably rare, it does at least exist. No 'Angel' uncut picture disc has ever been listed for save (it would have been included in the Popsike listings if it had) nor has it been seen by anyone contributing to this site. One collector has stated that he was so desperate to get a copy he placed repeated adverts in 'Record Collector' to no avail. The only jocular conclusion seems to be that security must have been particularly high in the pressing plant that day resulting in no test pressings being smuggled out!
There are also two versions of the 12", the second being a German-style top up label. Although the rarest 12" is the very limited Irish pressing.
The lack of an uncut disc means the shaped picture disc itself is the most collectable item particularly in it's original double-stickered sleeve with an (unfolded) plinth. To make it more desirable as a centrepiece item, it can also be paired with its far more limited promotional display flat - see promotional section.
There is now a new contender for rarest 'Angel' item as a recently discovered variant has been submitted by Jason Scott Shergold:
UPDATE FROM JASON SCOTT SHERGOLD:
There is a third variant of the Angel 12", one which I have. It is listed on the Discogs website as a German release, but it is actually an export copy for the UK, as the only version of "Angel" officially available in Germany were the copies backed with Into The Groove, as far as I know. It therefore has a numeric German style catalogue number on the back of the sleeve, but also has the UK catalogue number in brackets underneath. It plays "Burning Up" (of course) on the flip.I picked this up second hand, so that rip on the first image is where I couldn't get the price sticker to come off cleanly! It has an HMV Import sticker, but I think that, technically, it shouldn't have been marked up as such, because not only does it play the same tracks as the UK edition (unlike the standard German copies), but you clearly see the W 8881 T cat number on the rear cover and spine.
The UK cat number doesn't appear on either of the labels, but it seems to me as though it was pressed specifically for the UK market, although whether or not any turned up that weren't being sold as imports at a premium price, well, it's just a little bit before my time!
UPDATE FROM TERAL
There is a rare variation of the 7" single silver label with a different credit design. This has now been added to the gallery below.
The 7" single would, as usual, come with a variety of collectables. Thankfully, UK Sire had maintained their increased budget as 'Angel' now followed 'Holiday' in being pressed in sturdy gloss sleeves although for the assiduous collector of sleeve variations, there is also a rare matt card version. In terms of label variations, the standard yellow label appeared with both 'A' small logo and large logo labels. 'Angel' appears to have the rarest of the 'A' small logo labels as it can prove particularly hard to track down. It also appears to be the only 'A' label that was not pressed with an indentation.
In addition to the yellow labels, there are also some scarce colour top-ups to collect; apart from the common silver label, there are limited pressings available in blue and, for the first time, teal (pale silvery blue).
For the obligatory limited edition, Sire reverted back to a 7" shaped picture disc, this one housed in a double-stickered sleeve with the added bonus of coming with a cardboard plinth in which to stand the picture disc for display purposes!
Unlike all other shaped picture discs, there does not seem to be an uncut pressing for 'Angel'. This has not stopped 'Record Collector' including it in its last discography, valuing it as equal to the 'Crazy For You' uncut. This would seem overly optimistic as while the 'Crazy For You' uncut is indisputably rare, it does at least exist. No 'Angel' uncut picture disc has ever been listed for save (it would have been included in the Popsike listings if it had) nor has it been seen by anyone contributing to this site. One collector has stated that he was so desperate to get a copy he placed repeated adverts in 'Record Collector' to no avail. The only jocular conclusion seems to be that security must have been particularly high in the pressing plant that day resulting in no test pressings being smuggled out!
There are also two versions of the 12", the second being a German-style top up label. Although the rarest 12" is the very limited Irish pressing.
The lack of an uncut disc means the shaped picture disc itself is the most collectable item particularly in it's original double-stickered sleeve with an (unfolded) plinth. To make it more desirable as a centrepiece item, it can also be paired with its far more limited promotional display flat - see promotional section.
There is now a new contender for rarest 'Angel' item as a recently discovered variant has been submitted by Jason Scott Shergold:
UPDATE FROM JASON SCOTT SHERGOLD:
There is a third variant of the Angel 12", one which I have. It is listed on the Discogs website as a German release, but it is actually an export copy for the UK, as the only version of "Angel" officially available in Germany were the copies backed with Into The Groove, as far as I know. It therefore has a numeric German style catalogue number on the back of the sleeve, but also has the UK catalogue number in brackets underneath. It plays "Burning Up" (of course) on the flip.I picked this up second hand, so that rip on the first image is where I couldn't get the price sticker to come off cleanly! It has an HMV Import sticker, but I think that, technically, it shouldn't have been marked up as such, because not only does it play the same tracks as the UK edition (unlike the standard German copies), but you clearly see the W 8881 T cat number on the rear cover and spine.
The UK cat number doesn't appear on either of the labels, but it seems to me as though it was pressed specifically for the UK market, although whether or not any turned up that weren't being sold as imports at a premium price, well, it's just a little bit before my time!
UPDATE FROM TERAL
There is a rare variation of the 7" single silver label with a different credit design. This has now been added to the gallery below.
Promotional Items
Once again there is a 12" white label but of more interest from a visual point of view are various paper-based items. Firstly, included here is a counterstand which may or may not relate to when 'Angel' was originally released. The counterstand refers to the reissue of the early singles up to and including 'Angel' but there is no other reference to these singles being reissued at this time. Given that the albums 'Like A Virgin' and the debut 'Madonna' were both also reissued around this time, this counterstand is perhaps part of a general marketing push. In addition to the counterstand there is also a display flat and the counterstand came with empty sleeves relating to the appropriate singles. All of which makes for a nice display.
There are two other additional marketing display flats that are specifically for 'Angel' namely a 'New Single' display, and a rarer 'picture disc' display. The former sells for as little as £10 while the latter can sell for £50+.
Normally, this section would be rounded off with an advert - in this case a full page b/w advert which appeared in Smash Hits - but occasionally other collectable items come to light that are neither standard issues or promotional items. For ease of reference they will be included in this section. Therefore, included below is a printer proof for the picture disc artwork. Printer proofs are extremely rare as they are normally one-off test pressings that are usually destroyed. The one included in the promotional section is printed on stiff cardboard and so is a particularly nice example.
ALL PROMOTIONAL ITEMS CAN BE VIEWED IN THE PROMO SECTION - FOR ITEMS RELATING TO THIS RELEASE CLICK HERE
There are two other additional marketing display flats that are specifically for 'Angel' namely a 'New Single' display, and a rarer 'picture disc' display. The former sells for as little as £10 while the latter can sell for £50+.
Normally, this section would be rounded off with an advert - in this case a full page b/w advert which appeared in Smash Hits - but occasionally other collectable items come to light that are neither standard issues or promotional items. For ease of reference they will be included in this section. Therefore, included below is a printer proof for the picture disc artwork. Printer proofs are extremely rare as they are normally one-off test pressings that are usually destroyed. The one included in the promotional section is printed on stiff cardboard and so is a particularly nice example.
ALL PROMOTIONAL ITEMS CAN BE VIEWED IN THE PROMO SECTION - FOR ITEMS RELATING TO THIS RELEASE CLICK HERE
7" Single - Standard Release
7" Single - Standard Release with indented labels
7" Single - Very limited release with small 'Sire' logo label
7" Singles - Coloured plastic top-up labels: silver / blue / teal
7" Single - Irish pressing
7" Single - limited edition shaped picture disc with plinth in stickered sleeve
12" Single - Standard release with full rim copyright around edge of label
12" Single - Alternate release with half rim copyright around edge of label
12" Single - Irish release with half rim copyright around edge of label
12" Single - German 'UK Import Only' release with unique sleeve with spine number
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© madonna-decade 2013
© madonna-decade 2013