Like a Prayer (album) ante as a serious artist". Annie Zaleski, from the entertainment website "The A.V. Club", praised the album for "being bold enough to delve into her parental issues", and called it "Madonna's first truly substantial record, the dividing line between her chirpy club-kid days and the mature sounds and themes that increasingly marked her '90s work". In "Rolling Stone", reviewer J. D. Considine wrote that Madonna's fame up to that point had been built more on "image than artistry", but that with "Like a Prayer" Madonna was asking, successfully, to be taken seriously; "Daring in its lyrics, ambitious in its sonics,
I Say a Little Prayer by the RIAA. "Prayer" became Franklin's ninth and last consecutive Hot 100 top 10 hit on the Atlantic label. Franklin's "Prayer" has a special significance in her UK career, as with its September 1968 No. 4 peak it became Franklin's biggest UK hit; subsequently Franklin has surpassed that track's UK peak only with her No. 1 collaboration with George Michael, "I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)". In February 1987, UK music weekly "New Musical Express" published its critics' top 150 singles of all time, with Franklin's "I Say a Little Prayer" ranked at No. 1, followed by Al Green's