Christina Aguilera recalls headline-making kiss with Madonna at the 2003 MTV VMAs

Christina Aguilera has had plenty of major career moments since her hit single, ‘Genie In A Bottle’ first catapulted her into pop diva territory in 1999 (just look at her video for ‘Dirrty’ or ‘Beautiful,’ which earned her a GLAAD Media Award).

But it was Aguilera’s live performance at the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards alongside Britney Spears and Madonna that has become an iconic part of pop culture history.

So much so, that when the now 39-year-old singer FaceTimed with Zane Lowe for the At Home With Apple Music series earlier this week, Lowe asked her about the headline-making moment(s) when Madonna kissed Spears and then kissed Aguilera, too.

“Shock value gets more and more extreme or whatever. But honestly, at the time, yeah, I never thought anything of it,” Aguilera said of the performance, which saw her and Spears dressed as brides singing Madonna’s 1984 hit, ‘Like A Virgin,’ before the pop queen herself popped out of a giant cake dressed in a tuxedo.

“It was like, ‘Okay, it’s two girls kissing,’” Aguilera told Lowe. “It wasn’t shocking back then. It’s not shocking now, to me. But it’s so many things,” she said of the performance, which ended with a kiss (and Missy Elliott rapping along as the trio sang Madonna’s 2003 single, ‘Hollywood’).

Aguilera also shared Madonna’s impact on her own career. “Madonna, first of all, the queen of reinventing herself, was a huge inspiration,” she said. “When I was little, I was not allowed to listen to her or watch her videos or anything. It was just like a no-no, but then whenever you grow up, and I discovered her catalog and her videos and the fact that she had such a message.”

Throughout her 20-plus years in the industry, Aguilera has continued to reinvent herself while staying true to her roots. In 2018, Aguilera released her most recent album, Liberation, embarking on a world tour before taking on a Las Vegas residency with The Xperience. And most recently, she re-recorded ‘Reflection’ for Disney’s Mulan, which she first recorded in 1998 for the animated film.

“You have to keep it fresh and keep it alive for yourself, and the fans feel that energy,” Aguilera said. “I think that you have to be careful, too, and not just be so receptive to... things that [don’t] feel right with you or [don’t] align with you, because that can also really disempower you and make you disconnected with yourself,” she continued of finding the balance.

“Actually, that is what can stray you away from really making music for the reasons of why you got into it in the first place, which is the love.”