Rita Ora took over the Live Lounge and paid homage to Madonna

It's no secret that Live Lounge Month is in full swing; since September 1st, Radio 1 have opened the studio doors and propped up the mics for everyone from Harry Styles to P!nk, Thirty Seconds To Mars to London Grammar. If this is news to you, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?!?!

Thankfully you can catch up on the all the epic performances so far by clicking the link below. You are so very welcome.

But, before that, listen to Clara dish up some very important news for Rita ahead of her Live Lounge performance...

The time has arrived: please be upstanding for the dizzyingly dreamy acoustic session that was Rita Ora's Live Lounge.

Spoiling us with I Will Never Let You Down, Your Song and cover of Madonna's Like A Virgin, Rita talked us through the feels an artist experiences when they get the call: "When I get asked to do Live Lounge I get so excited and then I get nervous. I'm like 'YES, ANOTHER LIVE LOUNGE! What am I going to do?!' and then everything starts coming down. But it's always OK."

In Rita's case, the results were a bit more than just OK (we're gonna go with 'ridiculously good'). But don't just take our word for it. See for yourself...

This isn't Rita's first trip to the Live Lounge and we're certain that it won't be her last because the star seems pretty enamoured with the concept:

"Live Lounge is one of those things where you can really do what you want musically and I think as an artist that loves experimenting and for all artists in general you can really show off for a second. Pay respect to things that you love, do cover of songs that you may love that are old or new and I guess sing your own songs in a way that no one's heard them before.

"Without Live Lounge, for me personally, I don't think I'd be able to experiment musically. I'm so grateful that there's a platform for us as singers to really let ourselves go and I really hope it lasts forever because it really is one of the only old school ways you can show off music."

Anytime, Rita. (No, really. Please come by ANYTIME. ANYTIME AT ALL.)

Rita Ora is a busy woman and Ed Sheeran is a busy man, but that didn't stop either of them penning a slammin' track, Your Song, together. But what exactly doing a Ora and Sheeran studio session look like? A little like this...

"This was towards the end of my album process. I'd kind of been in and out of the studio making my second record and Ed was like the last person to join the team - the Rita writing team - and he was on tour and I just said 'Hey man, I'd love you to somehow be involved. It wouldn't be the same without you!' and he sent me that as an idea on the guitar. It really was that simple.

Then I recorded it and we went into the studio for two hours - we just vibed for two hours - and then we went to Camden and watched Stormzy. It was a good night."

OK, hands up who wants an invite to the next post-session night-out? Us, plz!

Sheeran story time aside, Rita put a spin on her own tracks with some sweet switch-ups and some sweeter synths.

"For my own songs, Your Song and I Will Never Let You Down, obviously I've done versions of them that you can see online but I wanted to give Radio 1 something special and have a way of singing my songs but in a different way.

"So I paid a little nod to Prince for I Will Never Let You Down with the synths and [for] Your Song I really wanted to take people to Ibiza, to the beach and really calm it down. That's what you can do in Live Lounge - you can really take control."

Radio 1 is celebrating its 50th anniversary so this year's Live Lounge guests have been gifted the extra special task of picking a song to cover from the last 50 years. We're not entirely sure where we'd start, TBH, and that vibe seems to pretty common among our class of 2K17.

"To celebrate 50 years of Radio 1 obviously I had a massive choice of music to pick from and I didn't know what to do. I was like, where do I start?!"

We hear you, Rita. Landing on Madonna's Like A Virgin, with a smattering of Travis Scott's Goosebumps, we reckon Rita picked a winner.

"I wanted to really support women and I wanted to really have the moment where I was showing my love for female artists in general, so Madonna kind of came to my head instantly because, for me, that's one of my idols. I wanted to sing Like A Virgin because I think for her that was a big moment and Like A Virgin is great and I love the lyrics. It was cheeky. I wanted to sonically add an urban track beat underneath and then I went into a trap song by Travis Scott called Goosebumps."

And how does it feel when that feeling is flipped and someone covers, ahem, your song? Unsurprisingly, pretty cool.

"It's a huge compliment when someone covers your song on Live Lounge and I think I Will Never Let You Down was covered by Catfish and the Bottlemen. I remember that was the most recent. I was like 'that's so nice!' - it's really nice because it's usually the [bands] that are not something you'd expect that do songs that they don't usually do. It was really cool."

Watch Rita Ora's entire Live Lounge set here...