Madonna can buy any house she wants now, but before she became the queen of pop, she was sleeping on floors, bouncing between buildings in New York City, and surviving freezing winters with space heaters surrounding her sleeping bag.
© GettyThe 67-year-old has lit up the dance floor for decades, but back in the 70s, she almost lit up an apartment complex.
In a recent interview with Bilt founder and CEO Ankur Jain, Madonna opened up about one terrifying moment from her early days in Manhattan that could have changed the course of her life and maybe even gotten her in some legal trouble.
© GettyAccording to the "Like a Virgin" singer, she was living illegally in a building in the Garment District in the late ’70s, enduring brutal winters without heat.
“There was no heat in the dead of winter,” she explained. “I was sleeping on the floor with a sleeping bag, and I surrounded myself with some space heaters.”
That setup quickly turned dangerous. “I started an electrical fire, but I was sleeping, so I woke up, and I was surrounded by flames,” Madonna shared.
Before she became a chart-topping legend, Madonna was a teenager hustling through New York after leaving her boyfriend because he refused to let her sing in his band.
© GettyWith nowhere else to go, she found refuge at the legendary Music Building on Eighth Avenue, a chaotic creative hub packed with aspiring artists trying to make it.
“The Music Building was full of people grinding to have a music career,” she recalled, describing cramped rehearsal rooms shared by multiple bands and nights spent sleeping beside instruments.
© GettyIt was there that Madonna spent about a year building toward the moment that would ultimately launch her career.
That breakthrough came at the iconic Danceteria nightclub, where she handed DJ Mark Kamins a demo tape that would eventually help her land a deal with Sire Records in 1982. From there, the rest became music history.
The singer partnered with Bilt on a campaign supporting musicians currently living in the same Music Building where she once struggled to survive.
© GettyThe company is covering one month of rent for musicians in the building while also giving members a chance to win up to $2,500 toward rent.
Madonna also teased her upcoming project, Confessions On A Dance Floor: Part II, which is set to arrive July 3.
The album serves as a follow-up to her beloved 2005 disco-inspired record and is expected to revisit stories from her early New York years, including a track titled “Danceteria.”
