After a week of knowing winks and heavy hint-dropping, it’s official: Sam Smith and Madonna are linking up for new collaboration Vulgar.
The Queen of Pop announced their link-up on her Instagram, along with a black and white graphic bearing their two initials: S&M. Though the post is scant on much additional detail, it confirms that the single will be released on June 9. Elsewhere, Smith has also shared what appears to be a snippet of the track, laden with campy, theatrical strings.
The pair previously crossed paths when Madonna presented Smith and Kim Petras with a Grammy for their collaboration Unholy – a hyper-pop tinged dance pop song charting nightly excursions out to some mysterious destination called the body shop. “Mummy don't know daddy's getting hot, at the body shop, doin' something unholy,” they sung, and put it like this, they’re probably not referring to slathering themselves with cocoa butter at a popular high street chain.
Sam Smith previously alluded to some form of collaboration with Madge on their Twitter, posting a mysterious black and white video simply bearing the words “Sam and Madonna”. Shortly afterwards, a post followed reading: “Manchester, we’ve got a surprise for you this evening. ‘Unholy’ won’t be the last song….”
This led fans to believe that Madonna might make a guest appearance at the singer’s Manchester show on May 24, but if there was a surprise appearance planned, it never came to light. Instead, Smith cancelled their gig after performing just four songs, suddenly leaving the stage after apparently experiencing vocal issues in the middle of the gig. Smith also cancelled their planned Glasgow gig.
“Dearest sailors, I don’t know what to say honestly,” Smith later said in a statement “I fought off a virus a few weeks ago and since then we have travelled across Europe and had such incredible shows. Today in soundcheck I felt fine and was so excited to give Manchester an amazing show tonight, with a special surprise at the end.”
They continued: “During my third song, I noticed something wrong with my voice. I prayed it was just my voice waking up for the show but into the fourth song I could feel something was really wrong.
“I came off stage and have tried everything to get my voice back in gear but it won’t. I am honestly heartbroken I couldn’t finish the show tonight for you all. I love you all. I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry x”
