Madonna Speaks About Album Producer Orbit

Fifteen years after her debut, is Madonna still relevant?

The numerous radio and Internet leaks of "Frozen," the lead single from her forthcoming Maverick/Warner Bros. album, Ray Of Light, implies audiences think so.

The set, slated for worldwide release March 3, shows the pop chameleon sewing intense words into edgy electronic backdrops and jagged guitar grooves. More than half of the disc's songs were written with William Orbit, a pioneering techno producer. "I've always found something melancholy about his music," Madonna says of Orbit. "Since I'm attracted to that sound, and since I tend to write a lot ofsad songs, we seemed like a good match."

Orbit is equally pleased with the set's results, primarily because Madonna "insisted upon the purity of [his] arrangements, which worked astonishingly well with her pop songs."

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Song Stories

“Tonight's the Night”

The Shirelles | 1960

The lead cut and title track from this girl group's debut album, "Tonight's the Night" was written by 19-year-old bandmember Shirley Owens, who sings lead, and producer Luther Dixon. The band from Passaic, New Jersey met in high school, first calling themselves the Pequellos. The song's frank thoughts about sexual and emotional surrender was racy for the time, but that didn't stop the Chiffons from cutting a similar version immediately after the original came out. "We were the first female group to write some of our own material," band member Beverly Lee recalls. "We did have some say-so in our writing."

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