Madonna is going ‘back to her roots’ on Madame X

Madonna is going "back to her roots" on new album ‘Madame X’ and gives "zero you-know-whats" on the record.
The 60-year-old singer says her career has come "full circle" with her upcoming 14th studio album, which will drop on June 14th, because the title is based on the moniker she was given when she was 19, during a time when she "didn’t care" what people thought of her music.
She said: "I still don’t care. Madame X is back to her roots, OK? She doesn’t care. Zero you-know-whats."
"I wanted to be able to go back to that time in my life when I was just starting out in New York and I didn’t care what people thought and my music really came without listening to all the noise or recommendations or suggestions, or whatever.
"That is also the time in my life, when I was 19, when I was given the name Madame X. So the whole story comes full circle."
Madonna released ‘Medellín’, her first single from the album, last week, and she says part of the song focuses on a time when she was "naive" during her early days in the industry and was "free and pure in [her] expression".
When asked about her ‘Medellín’ lyric, "I took a pill to be naive, to be someone I’ve never been", she said: "What I mean by that line is naive in terms of not caring what people think.
"I feel like when I started my career, as an artist, I was naive.
"There was a good thing about being naive because you don’t think about judgement, you don’t think about what people are going to say, or think about what you’re doing, and you’re free and pure in your expression."
Madonna has reunited with French producer Mirwais – who she recruited to help with song writing and production on three of her albums, ‘Music’, ‘American Life’ and 2005’s ‘Confessions on a Dance Floor’ – for ‘Madame X’, but "wasn’t sure" he would like the direction she wanted the record to go in.
Speaking at an MTV Q&A in London on Wednesday night (23.04.19) ahead of the music video premiere of her latest single, she added: "It was amazing. I hadn’t worked with him probably in about seven years and so I wasn’t sure whether he was going to like the direction that I wanted to go in.
"I’m very inspired by his intelligence and hopefully vice-versa."