With the premiere of the Confessions Tour just a week away, MadonnaTribe has decided to do a final recap of the exclusive tour news we brought to M fans out there so far. With the reminder that the info from rehearsals we were provided with, was correct at time of posting, here’s what you first heard from M-Tribe… as usual, with no Hocus Pocus.

• Friday March 03
MadonnaTribe has heard Madonna is currently planning a new portfolio with Steven Klein for W Magazine and… photos from that session will be used for the upcoming “Confessions World Tour” tourbook. Madonna will be shooting this new “cover story” sometime next week.

• Saturday March 11
Yitzhak Sinwani, who contributed additional vocals and lyrics to Madonna’s “Isaac” is supposed to join the “Confessions World Tour” cast for rehearsals next week. This is obviously more than a hint that “Isaac” will be one of the songs included in the tour setlist, although it is not known at the moment how the song will be used.

• Monday March 27
“Isaac” is indeed part of the currently rehearsed set list. The song is part of the second and more “serious” part of the concert, and is performed live by Madonna joined on stage by Yitzhak Sinwani.
Sinwani also appears later in the show, when Madonna performs a live acoustic version of her “Paradise Not For Me” in the third segment of the concert, the one that somehow brings back some of the intimate feel of her “Drowned World” and “Re-Invention” tour moments, and preceeds the fourth, and final part of the show.

• Tuesday March 28
First real news from the actual setlist. The current set list being heavily based on “Confessions On A Dance Floor”.
The non-Confessions tracks in the current setlist are highlights from her First Album, “Ray Of Light”, and “Music”, one song from “True Blue” and one from the “Erotica” album. The opening section is very energetic and mixes strong anthems from “Confessions” to a totally reworked dance version of one of Madonna’s signature hits.
A more serious part of the show then follows, this one also includes the live version of “Isaac” with Yitzhak Sinwani on stage we previously reported about.
A third section sees once again Madonna playing guitar, bringing back both the rock feel and the intimate moments of her “Drowned World” and “re-Invention” tours. This is the section where the new live acoustic version of “Paradise (Not For Me/” Madonna is currenly rehearsing is including.
“Music” mixed with “Disco Inferno” is exactly the version that’s she’s doing on stage for this tour. The closing number of the current setlist, just like the opening one, is again one song from “Confessions”.

• Wednesday March 29
We’ve just heard about the opening section of the concert that is currently being rehearsed, that is one of the most amazing and strong moments of the entire show.
It starts with “Future Lovers” from “Confessions On A Dance Floor”, filled with elements strongly reminiscent of the vibe of Giorgio Moroder and Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love”, an amazing, full of energy number and a great opening. In the current setlist a regular album version of Madonna’s next single “Get Together” is following, and after that the long-awaited “Like A Virgin” is performed in a totally reworked dance version – to die for.
Then goes “Jump”, again rehearsed just like the album version, that ends the first part of the show. We’ve just learned that in the current revised setlist one of the songs we were hinting about, the very awesome “Deeper And Deeper”, is not the song from “Erotica” performed in the show anymore.

• Wednesday March 29 More exclusives news from the setlist first posted online. Two songs, that are quite loved by fans, are at the moment part of the show. A brand new acoustic version of Drowned World – Substitute For Love, is being considered for the third section of the show while a classic track from her 1983 selftitled first album, Lucky Star, is rehearsed and “re-invented” as one of the closing numbers.

• Thursday March 30

MadonnaTribe can exclusively anticipate that the new tour will have indeed an Italian stop. While we are all waiting for an official announcement to arrive soon, that will bring details on the actual date, we have heard that Madonna is expected to perform at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome at the beginning of August.

• Friday March 31
The European leg of the tour should kick off at the Millenium Stadium in Cardiff before moving to London.

• Tuesday April 11
A new artist has just joined the cast as a backing singer.
MadonnaTribe can report that her full name is Nicky Richards and she is a young black performer who has never worked with the Queen of Pop before.

• Monday, April 17
Donna Delory and her assistant Paul Yanez wanted to give MadonnaTribe readers the opportunity to have an exclusive advance look at the press release announcing Donna touring with Madonna again. Paul Yanez, says “Donna is excited to be touring with Madonna again… it gives her the chance to connect with her fans and Madonna’s fans around the world. Donna plans on performing several solo gigs on her days off on the Madonna tour… in various venues and yoga centers.

• Wednesday April 19
We promised to keep you posted if we had learnt that something was changing in the setlist for the show, and this indeed happened, as two of the songs we reported about a few weeks ago are no longer part of the tour. “Deeper and Deeper” and “Everybody” have both been replaced by two other songs. But also, there’s definetly no “Where’s the Party” nor “Secret” as being rumoured on forums lately.

• Saturday April 29
MadonnaTribe exclusively announces the Coachella setlist adding that that would be
the very last chance to witness “Everybody – the Tour version” as the song is no longer a part of the Confession Tour as an uptempo tribal version of “La Isla Bonita” replaced “Everybody” in the tour. “Erotica/You Thrill Me” has now replaced “Deeper and Deeper”, this is interesting as “You Thrill Me” was never released, so it’s the first time Madonna is doing a Demo version of the known song on tour. We’ve been told it’s much more “You Thrill Me” than “Erotica”.

• Monday May 01
MadonnaTribe exclusively reports about the release date of the W magazine portfolio by Steven Klein. Photos of the set will also be used in the new tour book. The June issue of W will reach newstands on Friday May 05.The portfolio shows the love for horses that both Madonna and Steven Klein share, and see her photographed along with various horses, posing as if she identifies herself with them. More than 50 images are apparenlty being used in this new W cover story, including some black and white shots, while a blue light will be dominant in some of the colour ones. There are also strong reminiscences of Madonna’s past works, from the re-Invention tour book photo session up to the Sex book.

A couple of shots see Madonna on the back, wearing a long black wig that recalls a horse tail while in other shots the Queen of Pop wears a platinum blond wig while she caresses a black stallion lying on the floor of a stable. Another set of photos see Madonna with her own hair pulled back, wearing a horse muzzle.

• Tuesday May 02

An amazing video of “Future Lovers“, using the footage shot by Steven Klein on the set of the upcoming W Magazine story with horses is opening the show. Madonna will be singing live Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love”

The live version of “Sorry” starts with the Pet Shop Boys intro “I’m sorry, so sorry” vocals, and then goes into the album version we know. “Sorry” is also used as an interlude in a remixed version. It has a very “American-Life” kinda video with
war and biological disasters images on screen and the vocals there are spoken, not sung.

As previously reported by MadonnaTribe, “Paradise Not For Me” is indeed an acoustic version with the presence of vocoder. Yitzhak Sinwani does not sing the French part of the song, but actually sings a part of the song in Hebrew. At some point the songs turns into a duet and the strings from the original version are present in the performance too.

News on other tour songs are that “Music“, as reported earlier by MadonnaTribe, starts with “Disco Inferno” intro but Madonna sings the song live and it’s not an interlude then.

“Lucky Star” is different the song we all know and love, being mixed with the final tour number “Hung Up“. Just try to sing the lyrics of “Lucky Star” over an instrumental bit of “Hung Up” and you’ll get an idea of how the song is being rehearsed.

As for the two new songs added, we hear that “La Isla Bonita” is a really guitar-driven dance version with tribal elements and nothing acoustic there. “Erotica/You Thrill Me” is an uptempo version, very dancey, and sounds nothing like the “Erotica” we know.

• Friday May 12

If you are familiar with Madonna Tribe’s Tour Forum you already know the latest updates that fellow Tribers have been discussing since the past week.

Apparently the dates set for Prague are those of September 6 and 7. Following the layout of the European leg of the tour, that alternates stadium and arena shows with the sole exception of Germany – the Czech venue should be the awesome Sazka Arena.

But the most exciting news is that the location of the first Madonna concert ever in Russia will be no other that Moscow’s Red Square – which is considered – needless to say – the top location of the entire tour.

All we need now, as usual, is the official announcement from Madonna’s camp for the final dates of the Confessions Tour to be revealed.

MadonnaTribe.com – The place where you got real quality exclusives about the new tour… with NO “Hocus Pocus”.