LISTEN: You might not know Kylie Minogue has a sister. But she does! And this mashup she did with Madonna is a total bop

Dannii Minogue might not be an international superstar like her sister, Kylie, but when it comes to cranking out dance floor bangers, she can certainly hold her own.

In the summer of 2003, Dannii was riding high on the success of her fourth studio album Neon Nights, which had produced three hit singles: “Who Do You Love Now?”, “Put the Needle on It”, and “I Begin To Wonder”, all of which made a notable impact in the European club scene and on various dance charts around the world.

For the album’s fourth and final single, she decided to switch things up by releasing a remix. While working on Neon Nights, Dannii co-wrote “Don’t Want To Lose This Feeling” with long-time collaborator Terry Ronald and a team of other writers. For the single, however, she had the track mashed up with Madonna‘s “Into The Groove” by Al Stone of production team Smoothside.

As the story goes, Dannii initially didn’t think Madonna would give her permission to sample her 1985 bop. After all, she was just a dance-pop singer with a few club hits under her belt and who was arguably more famous for being someone’s sister than for her own music, and Madonna was the reigning Queen of Pop.

As luck would have it, however, Madge was in the middle of promoting her album American Life in Europe when the ask came in and so she signed off on it, giving Dannii her blessing to use both a sample of the music and her vocals from the “Into The Groove.” (For a fee, of course.)

As a longtime admirer of Madonna, Dannii later described getting her permission as “the biggest, most amazing thing.” (Fun fact: As a teenager, Dannii performed Madonna’s song “Angel” on the Australian variety show Young Talent Time. See the performance here.)

“Don’t Wanna Lose This Groove” was released in the summer of 2003, along with an accompanying music video filmed in Spain. The entire thing was purportedly produced over a 24 hour period, with Dannii starting dance rehearsals at 8 AM, and finishing her shots around 8 AM the following day.

Watch.

Upon its release in the UK, “Don’t Wanna Lose This Groove” debuted at No. 5 and spent an impressive nine weeks in the top 75. (Meanwhile, in the US, where Dannii was far less known, it spent nine weeks on Billboard’s Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart, peaking at No. 8.)

To help promote the song, she performed it on Top Of The Pops along with a team of backup dancers.

Watch.

In June of this year, the “I Kissed A Boy” host re-released Neon Nights as an expanded 33-track edition to mark the album’s twentieth anniversary. The reissue includes three different edits of “Don’t Wanna Lose This Feeling” and the mashup “Don’t Wanna Lose This Groove”, which holds up surprisingly well even after all these years.

As Dannii’s sister Kylie prepares to release her highly-anticipated sixteenth studio album Tension, featuring 2023’s official song of the summer “Padam Padam”, on September 22, revisiting “Don’t Wanna Lose This Groove” and Neon Nights is a welcome reminder that musical talent certainly runs in the Minogue family.

Listen.