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Fact #118111

When:

Short story:

The single Ray Of Light by Madonna enters the Billboard singles chart in the USA, where it will peak at No5.

Full article:

Christine Leach (singer/songwriter) : My uncle, Clive Muldoon, and his partner, Dave Curtiss, wrote songs in the 70s, and one of those was called Sepharin, which became Ray Of Light.

By the 90s, I was writing music myself and had my own band, Baby Fox. I was also working with William Orbit in his Strange Cargo band until 1996.

I had already worked on my uncle’s song and changed the chorus to something more upbeat. I kept my uncle’s verse as it was, but changed the chorus, which Dave Curtiss had written, because it felt too downbeat and didn’t seem to fit the uplifting theme of the song. I intended to do the song with Baby Fox.

One fateful night in 1996, I was at William Orbit’s Guerilla Studio in London, and he played me a backing track that fitted so well with the lyric to Seraphin that I just started singing it, it just slid out.

We both knew we had something and continued working together, gigging the song out at the London Astoria and the Phoenix Festival 96.

I said to Will that, whatever happened with the song, I wanted my uncle to get his credit.

One evening, William got a call from Madonna, who was about to do a new album, asking if he had any material. He’d remixed Justify My Love for her some time earlier. He played her his demos for the next Strange Cargo record, one of which was Seraphin, which we had now re-named as Ray Of Light, and which eventually became the title of Madonna’s album.

They speeded it up a fraction.

Some time later, I was sent a cassette in the post, of Madonna’s version of the track and I nearly fainted, it was so spooky and exciting. I love Madonna’s music, and I’m very proud of my connection to her. She really must have loved the track because she affects an English accent when she sings it, and even her ad libs are the same as mine.

They were very keen to get the go-ahead to put it out. At first, they wanted the credit to show just Madonna, William and me, but I was determined that my uncle and his partner should get their shares. My manager worked hard to find the original publishers, and it turned out to be Purple Music, Deep Purple’s company. They never heard my original version. All they heard was Madonna’s cover of it on her forthcoming LP. In the end, it was agreed that everybody’s names would be shown on the album credit, and I gave the go-ahead to William.

I wasn’t allowed to play my version to anybody because my manager was afraid that if I did, Madonna would come down on top of me.

I didn’t do very well out of it, except that I ended up getting my uncle’s cut. My family very kindly gave it to me.