Billboard’s Greatest Pop Star of 1989: Madonna

(In 2018, the Billboard staff released a list project of its choices for the Greatest Pop Star of every year, going back to 1981. Read our entry below on why Madonna was our Greatest Pop Star of 1989 — with our ’89 Honorable Mention runner-ups, Rookie of the Year and Comeback of the Year pop stars at the bottom — and find the rest of our picks for every year up to present day here.)

With guitars starting to give ground and hip-hop not yet fully crossed over to a wider audience, the 1980s were the biggest decade for dance-based pop in the American mainstream. And as it came to a close, the era’s biggest female pop star — and arguably the biggest female pop star of all time — reached a new apex in terms of artistry and impact.

The year 1989 didn’t start out on a high note for Madonna: After three years of marriage to Sean Penn (and a nullified 1987 divorce filing), she again filed for divorce from the actor in early January citing irreconcilable differences. But no matter: Soon thereafter, Madonna was back to topping charts, rankling pearl-clutchers and raking in the dough. She signed a $5 million deal with Pepsi in January, culminating in a two-minute ad that would eventually get pulled due to a religious backlash to her latest music video. Released March 3, the day after the Pepsi ad first aired, the controversial clip featured cross-burning, stigmata and an erotic encounter with a saint. Regardless, Madge still pocketed the soda money, and the video became an MTV staple.

And oh, what was the name of that song again? “Like a Prayer”? Yes, this is the year where Madonna went from dance-pop purveyor with an iron-grip on American teens to a capital-A Artist, someone who could deliver an album every bit as geared toward the charts as to critics’ tastes. Universally acclaimed, the song’s parent album (also called Like a Prayer) topped the Billboard 200 for six consecutive weeks and was eventually certified 4x platinum by the RIAA. 

The title track brilliantly mixed the secular and the sacred both lyrically (“I’m down on my knees” works both ways) and musically (a transcendent gospel choir takes the hard-hitting pop-rock anthem into the heavens), and the result was a sing-along for the ages that even non-fans are likely to know damn near every word to. It topped the Billboard Hot 100 for three weeks, while follow-up singles “Cherish” and “Express Yourself” both reached No. 2 (as the David Fincher-directed video for the latter, inspired by Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, became one of the most instantly iconic of the era). This was a release so stuffed with hits that Madonna could afford to not release a duet with Prince as a single.

Five years after her game-changing “Like a Virgin” at the inaugural MTV Video Music Awards, Madonna was courting controversy at the 1989 VMAs once again with a performance of the Motown-flavored “Express Yourself” that featured her simulating masturbation. That song’s video would nab three VMAs and “Like a Prayer” the viewer’s choice award, although inexplicably, the latter lost video of the year to Neil Young’s “This Note’s for You”  — a decision that has not aged particularly well. 

While Madonna would go on to notch bigger hits on the Billboard Hot 100 and reach more idiosyncratic artistic heights, Like a Prayer was the last proper studio album where she would enjoy such universal adoration. As the ’90s set in, her detractors would get louder, but in 1989, Madonna was able to own the charts, charm the critics and –- even though she released a video so controversial Pepsi decided to scrap something they paid $5 million for — reign as the most celebrated female artist in pop.

Honorable mentions: Janet Jackson (Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation 1814, “Miss You Much,” “Rhythm Nation”); Bobby Brown (“My Prerogative,” “Every Little Step,” “On Our Own”); New Kids on the Block (“You Got It (The Right Stuff),” “I’ll Be Loving You (Forever)”, “Hangin’ Tough”)

Rookie of the Year: Paula Abdul

After choreographing videos for Janet Jackson, Debbie Gibson, and, err, ZZ Top, Paula Abdul gave singing a shot – literally taking vocal lessons. As it turns out, the girl could sing, and her dance-pop-meets-new-jack debut LP Forever Your Girl became an unexpected blockbuster — taking off in ’89, with “Straight Up” topping the Hot 100 for three weeks, “Forever Your Girl” for two and “Cold Hearted” for one. Abdul nabbed four VMAs at the ‘89 ceremony (hosted by then-BF Arsenio Hall), not only for her music but for her choreography. She rounded off ’89 by dropping the “Opposites Attract” single, a fourth No. 1 in early ‘90, whose MC Skat Kat-featuring video gave us the greatest cartoon animal/human dance-off since Anchors Aweigh.

Comeback of the Year: The B-52s

After AIDS claimed the life of founding member Ricky Wilson in 1985, and 1986’s Bouncing Off the Satellites failed to maintain an orbit even in the previously supportive college rock realm, the B-52’s seemed tired of their own antics and ready to call it quits. But a relocation to Woodstock for primary musical composer Keith Strickland resulted in a renewed vigor and focus, fueling out-of-the-blue comeback album Cosmic Thing — the Athens, GA new wavers’ first top 10 LP on the Billboard 200. It also gave the now-quartet of unrepentant oddballs two unexpected radio smashes, with the gloriously loose party anthem “Love Shack” and the uplifting, jangly “Roam,” both No. 3 Hot 100 hits. And even if no one knew what “TIN ROOF… RUSTED” meant in 1989, that didn’t stop people from screaming it everywhere from keggers to weddings. 

(Read on to our Greatest Pop Star of 1990 here, or head back to the full list here.)