Songfacts®:

• This is the second official single and opening track for Madonna's twelfth studio album, titled MDNA. The singer produced the song with the Italian DJ and electro house music producer Benny Benassi and his cousin Alle Benassi.
• This was only the second single released by Madonna after she signed a lucrative record deal with Universal Music Group's Interscope, but the singer found herself straight away stirring up beef with one of her new label mates: Rapper 50 Cent had been recording a single with the same title and he took to twitter to publicly voice his anger at what he saw as a snub from his label.
• There was also another hullabaloo stirred up by the song title. Joe Francis, who owns the libidinous video franchise Girls Gone Wild, threatened to sue Madonna if she sang the song during her performance at the Super Bowl XLVI halftime show. The NFL later announced that the song would not be performed but it was mission accomplished for Francis, having succeeded in creating some publicity for his videos.
• The song was co-written with the young Vancouver-based songwriter Jenson Vaughan, who has worked with UK producer Ian Carey, on collaborations with such artists as Timbaland, Kelly Rowland and Snoop Dogg. Both Vaughan and the Benassi cousins are signed with Patrick Moxey's dance music label Ultra Music. Speaking with Billboard magazine, Moxey traced the song's beginning back to early 2011, when he suggested to Benny Benassi that his aggressive style might, "work well with some of the major American superstar artists," so he requested additional tracks from the Italian producer and his cousin.
  
  Moxey selected a few tracks and shared them with Vaughan. "I was really attracted to his lyrics," said the label owner, "and I feel Benassi in my bones, because those bass-driven tracks are so inspiring. It's a bit like cooking, like, 'Ooh, what would this sound like together?'"
  
  Vaughn returned a demo just a week later, which Moxey passed onto Benassi's European co-manager Paul Sears. He in turn sent it to Guy Oseary, Madonna's manager, who loved the tracks. Both "Girl" and "I'm Addicted" made it onto MDNA.
• This was originally titled "Girls Gone Wild." There were claims that Madonna changed its name because of threats from Joe Francis. However, her manager, Guy Oseary, told TMZ that they decided to make the word "Girl" singular because that's the way Madonna sings it in the song. He added that Billboard had published a story that claims there are around 50 songs called "Girls Gone Wild," including records by Ludacris, Jagged Edge, T Mills, and Lil Rick.
• The steamy black-and-white video was directed by fashion photographers Mert and Marcus, who also did MDNA's artwork. It finds Madonna going wild as she gets raunchy with several shirtless, hot male dancers. Critics said it is an homage to the Queen of Pop's '90s-era sexually explicit style, referencing such erotic clips as the one for "Justify My Love."