She hired him for her eleventh studio album ―which would be her last with Warner Bros.― alongside rapper Timbaland, producer Nate "Danja" Hills, and recording duo The Neptunes, made up of Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo.

[3] Madonna decided to "follow in the footsteps of the new generation of female stars ―the Britneys, the Nelly Furtados, and the Gwen Stefanis", and "work her magic" on the sound of urban contemporary music.

[19][22] Set to "double-time heavy breathing" and a conga beat that give it an "almost tribal" sound, the song's lyrics use candy as a metaphor for sex, referencing Turkish delight, with phrases such as say which flavor you like and I’ll have it for you, and my sugar is raw.

[26] Second track "4 Minutes" incorporates the aesthetic of a marching band, a clanging beat, instrumentation from a brass that is played in a "scale-like riff", and Timberlake emulating the sound of vinyl scratches.

They appear to be about sex and dancing, but are actually a "manifesto of sorts" in which Madonna explains that she does not want to retire from her career and still possesses the ability to continue, as noted in the lines Don't stop me now, no need to catch my breath, I can go on and on and on.

[11] The production is characteristic to that of Williams and the Neptunes' previous works, featuring "voices interrupting one another and switching in and out of double time, sudden key changes and style shifts from electro to rock to stark percussion".

[14] Included only on the Japanese edition of the album, in "Ring My Bell" Madonna's determined to withhold intimacy from a lover who won't be upfront, apologize or show any grattitute to her.

[38] In an interview with MTV Australia, Madonna revealed that she initially considered naming the record Candy Shop, and then Give It To Me, but changed her mind as those are the titles of songs by 50 Cent and Timbaland.

[39] Taken during a photoshoot for Interview magazine, the cover depicts the singer sitting in front of a background of pink peppermint swirls, wearing knee-high boots and a championship belt.

[56] Prior to the episode, a video in which main character Betty Suarez (America Ferrera) asks Madonna for an autographed copy of the album for her nephew's birthday was aired.

[79] The accompanying black and white music video was directed by Tom Munro and Nathan Rissman, shows Madonna in cowboy hat and "hipster workout gear", and has an appearance by Williams.

[90] Despite not being issued as singles, the songs "Heartbeat", "Beat Goes On" and "Candy Shop" received certifications by Pro-Música Brasil for digital downloads reported as sales in the country.

Positive feedback came from Blender magazine, where Tony Power wrote: "Album 11 is good-naturedly smutty, not confrontationally nasty, but it's a veritable filth bath compared to the C-SPAN sermons and confessional strumming of 2003's dreadful American Life or the woozily self-actualized club trance of 2005's Confessions on a Dance Floor".

[30] Rolling Stone's Caryn Ganz wrote: "A songwriting team of American chart royalty helps Madonna revisit her roots as an urban-disco queen [...] Even when she wrestles with Pharrell’s abrupt stylistic changes or lets herself get absorbed in a Timberlake melody, [she] still finds her way back on top".

[99] In this vein, Mark Beech, writing for Bloomberg News, felt Hard Candy was more consistent than Confessions on a Dance Floor, but pointed out that, "occasionally [the producers'] beats overwhelm her pop tunes and the music sounds uncomfortably like their past work.

[101] In more critical reviews, Kerri Mason, writing for Billboard, thought Hard Candy was too similar to its producers' own work and, for a "vanguard artist like Madonna, feels like a bit of a concession".

[102] Samuel Murrian from Instinct magazine expressed that, "Justin Timberlake, Pharrell, Kanye West and Timbaland bring exactly what you’d expect from them to the table, but as a result this barely feels like a Madonna record".

Club wrote: "[A]mid forceful guest spots by Justin Timberlake and Kanye West, and self-identifying moves by producers Pharrell Williams and Timbaland, Madonna spends a lot of time in hiding [...] sound[ing] strangely out of place; like a hostage reading into a camera more than a creature of the dancefloor".

[96] This sentiment was echoed by the Hartford Courant's Eric R. Danton, who pointed out that, for someone who's "built a career out of being the center of attention", Madonna sounds "outmatched" in Hard Candy, "where the best and most danceable songs would work just as well without her".

[105] Negative criticism came from AllMusic, where Stephen Thomas Erlewine perceived a "disinterest" from the singer's part, "as if she just handed the reins over to Pharrell and Timba-Lake, trusting them to polish up this piece of stale candy".

Describing the production as, "[sounding] a couple years old at best, and at worst [...] like Nelly Furtado's Loose hand-me-downs", Erlewine concluded that, "[Hard Candy] is a rare thing: a lifeless Madonna album".

[73] Spin magazine's Al Shipley also felt the production came across as dated, and declared Hard Candy the only Madonna album where, "it truly feels like she's just riding the wave of her collaborators and adding as little of her own personality as possible".

[89] Mark Savage felt that, had it been done by producers with "a touch more subtlety, [Hard Candy] could have ranked alongside Madonna's best", and compared it unfavorably to her sixth studio album, Bedtime Stories (1994).

[19] WhatCulture's Reece Shrewsbury concluded that, "mixing the R&B sensibilities that were dominating the charts with [Madonna’s] solid musical foundation as a pop artist, [Hard Candy] sounds like it should have worked... but it just isn't very good".

[107] Slant Magazine's Sal Cinquemani expressed disappointment: "[Madonna] hasn’t delivered this many vapid floor fillers on one disc since her debut, and maybe not even then [...] there are few confessions here—nothing political, nothing too spiritual, no talk of fame, war, or the media.

[95] A writer from the Telegram & Gazette deemed Hard Candy an "uneven" album that, "unintentionally and constantly, reminds us when [Madonna] was so much more interesting, so much more appealing, so much more original, and alas, so much younger".

[128][129] In France, Hard Candy sold 37,963 units in its first two-days, and was later certified platinum by the Syndicat National de l'Édition Phonographique (SNEP) for shipment of 200,000 copies in French territory.

[34] The author concluded: "In the end, Hard Candy was a sweet victory lap for Madonna as her last of 11 studio albums for Warner Bros., the label where she became the most famous female artist on the planet".

[147][52] Writing for Billboard, Leila Cobo said Madonna was one of the artists "at the forefront of the mobile revolution" in Latin America, the "most active region in the world as far as preloaded content" at the time.

[148] Also writing for Billboard, Andre Paine said Sony Ericsson achieved Latin American sales of 650,000 units of their W760 model, which came preloaded Hard Candy, obtaining a symbolic gold disc from Warner Music.