We Love Madonna

Last week we debuted the first of two covers for our inaugural April 2011 "Ladies We Love" issue, which features Britney Spears, and today we premiere our other cover girl, Madonna.

While we pretty much love Madonna from every era of her career (OK, OK, there have been a few bumpy patches -- we're looking at you, American Life), we especially love the photos in our April issue shot by Richard Corman in NYC back in 1982, a year before the material girl's first album was released. Of the shoot Corman says:

She was like the Pied Piper of the neighborhood -- [the kids] loved her. They followed her, they danced with her, they sang with her. It was something they did on a daily basis, and it was remarkable. We just walked up and they gathered around. She put the boom box on -- it was her music, though I don't remember which song -- and they just started dancing and singing. She was so alive and unpretentious. She was fierce, determined. Nothing was going to stop her.

Head to Out.com to see read the rest of Corman's account of shooting Madonna almost three decades ago and check out his gorgeous, hitherto unpublished photos of the icon, including 18 web-only images.

Previously > We Love Britney