HER Madgesty is receiving visitors and they're coming in their hundreds of thousands. Last week, Madonna kicked off her 53-date world tour with a show at the Los Angeles Forum, the latest chapter in the singer's ceaseless quest to remain the first, the last, the everything of modern pop.

The two gay men tottering towards the venue in drag - one wears a sparkling foil headpiece, white high-heeled boots and a Pucci dress - flick V signs at a passing pick-up truck full of wolf-whistling jocks with a defiance the material girl herself would be proud of.

They get what they've come for, and a little bit they might feel they could have done without. In a thrilling but uneven show, Madonna gets most things right. The few occasions where the momentum sags will no doubt be tightened up. During the acoustic sections, you can hear the audience deflate as one. They'd heard her promise - "I'm going to turn the world into one big dance floor" - and they wanted to hold her to it.

Famously perfectionist, the singer will have noticed these niggles, not least when her beturbaned and arguably superfluous backing singer, Isaac Sinwanhy, accompanied her on Paradise (Not for Me) and sang horribly sharp

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