Music

The song was inspired by a Sting concert at the Beacon Theatre in New York in November 1999, and Madonna told Rolling Stone's Jancee Dunn, That's what music does to people. She wrote it with Mirwais Ahmadzaï in sessions that began in September 1999 at Sarm West Studios in London. An EMS 2000 vocoder is used on her voice. Mark Spike Stent recorded it and mixed it at Olympic Studios. It is in G minor at 120 beats per minute, and Stuart Price said its rhythmic structure was inspired by Kraftwerk's Trans-Europe Express.

An unfinished demo leaked online on 2 June 2000, and the single went on sale on 21 August. It reached number one on the Hot 100, her twelfth and her first since Take a Bow in February 1995, and topped the charts in 25 countries. In the UK it debuted at number one with 115,000 copies, beating Spiller's Groovejet by 1,000 sales and making her the first solo female artist with ten UK number ones. Jonas Åkerlund directed the video, with Niki Haris, Debi Mazar and Sacha Baron Cohen as Ali G. It earned Grammy nominations for Record of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. Rolling Stone ranked it 66th among the best songs of the 2000s.

Live

She sang it at the Roseland Ballroom on 5 November 2000 and at the MTV Europe Music Awards in Stockholm on 16 November. She opened the 43rd Grammy Awards with it on 21 February 2001. It was the final encore of the Drowned World Tour, and on 19 July 2026 she performed it at the World Cup final halftime show.