Nile Rodgers recalls working with David Bowie, Diana Ross, Daft Punk and an ingenue by the name of...Madonna:
"I don’t think anybody has ever made a bigger production deal than I did for Like A Virgin. It was an absurd deal. I was very confident that I could sell…I don’t remember exactly what the figure was, but let’s say it was five million. The attorney and the record company thought that was impossible, as she’d already had some big hits but hadn’t sold one million yet.
"So they thought: if he can sell five million, we’ll give him that amount of money, and we’ll give him those points… And I said, well, it also has to be retroactive from record one. So they said sure, and were laughing. And then the album sold 21 million. (Laughs)
"And after I got to know Madonna, I’ve never met anyone else in my life, to this day, who’s more driven. Who’s more of a hard worker. She would beat me to the studio every day. She was always there 10 minutes before me.
"It was amazing, and when I saw that in her… I mean, you can see who she is now, and it didn’t take me long to spot that quality. I just kept thinking: this is going to be huge! I didn’t think it’d be that huge, but I thought I could easily give her that five million [sold], or whatever I said, that the label obviously thought was impossible.”
