Blonde, Grammy award winning singers... did we mention super hot

Britney Spears
She got her mojo back with Circus, but her jaw-dropping Womanizer video did the impossible by wiping out images of the mad, bad (and bald) Britney Spears.

With your latest album Circus you have become the first female ever to have five no.1 album debut. Tell us something about the album?
Well, this is something that I’ve worked a really long time for, almost a year now. The timing of the release couldn’t have been more perfect — it was on my birthday! I can’t thank my fans enough for the amazing response. The making of the album was cool because I got to write a lot of the songs. I experimented with a lot of pop producers, with whom I have worked on my earlier albums. I went old school, which was a lot of fun.

What was it like winning a whopping three Video Music Awards this year? Have you recovered yet?
Going to the VMAs each year is so exciting because it’s one of the most fun award shows. It’s the coolest. It’s the edgiest. Like every year, I was really excited about it and definitely didn’t expect anything at all. I’ve never won a VMA, so of course I wasn’t expecting to win this time round too. And I ended up winning three! I was so excited that I was in shock.  

Your new single Womanizer is already a hit and we just loved the video. Tell us something about it...
Well, the song is basically about a guy, who's into a bunch of different women and he can't help himself; he's just a womaniser. Just a complete as****le, and he gets away with it.  In the video, I play a bunch of different girls. He doesn’t know it’s the same girl throughout the video. So, it’s a cool song, I like it because it’s empowering for girls to know to stick up for themselves. Let them know where they stand.

Who came up with the concept for the Womanizer video?
I had the concept for the video because I wanted to play different characters. I love doing videos where I get to have different looks and stuff like that. So, I wanted to go all out with it and I love Joseph (Kahn, video director). He’s done some of my favourite videos so, he had to be definitely on board.

Tell us about the tilte track Circus and the album's theme. Why the quirky name?
The song from the album that I really like is called Circus and that’s why I wanted the theme of it that way. The song is about me as an entertainer, what I do and what I bring to a show; which is basically like a circus. I bring costumes and fun; theatrical things that people are at awe with, and everything tells a story in stage and makes people want to watch more. So, there won’t be elephants on stage at my show, but to a certain degree it has the same feel as a circus.

Tell us more about this circus concept...
You know how you're always on the edge of your seat when you’re at circus, you always want to know what’s going to happen next, and you’re never bored. You’re so entertained you’re just really engulfed in what’s going on around you and you want to know what’s going to happen next. That’s the feeling I want them to get when they come to my show. 

Blackout was a pretty dark album. How would you compare Circus to Blackout?
Circus is certainly lighter than Blackout. I think a lot of the songs I did at that time, were when I was going through a very dark phase in my life, and the songs did reflect that. But it’s really interesting because I didn’t go on tour with that album. So, I’m going to bring some of those songs from that album to this tour that I do. I’m excited because there would be a lot of new material to play around with. But they’re two totally different vibes. Circus has a much lighter feel and is more pop than Blackout. Blackout’s a bit darker and edgier and little bit more urban.

What are some of your other favourite songs on the album? We really liked Circus and Womanizer.
I like Mannequin a lot, it’s a fun song. Well, the song is basically about being in a relationship and then letting go of the relationship and never being with that person again. Obviously in the song it doesn’t really say what happens but he’s done something wrong to hurt her and emotionally the song goes there and you can feel it. So it’s a deep song it’s cool.

Anastaisa
She says she’s been “feeling the love” from her toes to her head, and Anastacia’s album after four years, Heavy Rotation, makes us more in love with her.

After a four year hiatus, how did it feel to get back into the recording studio?
Being back in a recording studio after four years is pretty overwhelming, since this album has taken such a short period of time to come from its beginning stage to the finished product. I’m still trying to absorb the fact that I actually do have an album and we have finished it, so it’s exciting.

Tell us about working with Ne-Yo.
Apart from being a great artist, he’s also a great producer. My A&R David Massey told me that Ne-Yo and Chuck Harmony has written a song for you. And I’m like, ‘Ok.’ I listened to “I Can Feel You, and it was so funny because he really did sing my verses a bit like I would have sung them. He even threw in a couple of, “Yeah-eah-eah,” like my harmonies. It was wonderful to get a song that was so complete. The song is really what I’m feeling in my life right now, I’m feeling the love, the happiness, I’m feeling great from my toes to my head. So, it was really fun that the song itself emulated how I feel inside and expressed it in words. I was really lucky to get that one.

Who are your musical influences?
I never really listened to music while growing up. Music for me is my vessel but, I don’t use it the same way most people use music. I use it to get my thoughts out and I have fun singing when I’m onstage. I don’t really have influences in music, the way that people have used even me as their influence. I wish I did, because it probably would be a better... probably would be a better answer too, huh. (Laughs).

Who would you like to work with in the future?
Interesting. I actually don’t really think about that any more. I did when I first started, there were a lot of different names that came up. And I think that organically, whatever ends up happening, if a unity between an artist and me happens because it’s right, that’s probably gonna be the right thing to do, but I don’t know what I wanna do in the future. I wanna do a covers album in the future, may be ten years down the line, I wanna cover some really great songs, you know, more than I wanna do a Christmas album. 

What have you enjoyed the most about having time off?
(Laughs) Having a little bit of alcohol, to be honest! I don’t drink when I work because of my voice. It might sound silly... I’m not talking bottles of vodka... I just don’t do a glass of wine or a sip of alcohol or I don’t go out to dinners and talk in crowded rooms. I have a very isolated life when I work, so I think being able to hang out with my husband and eat three meals a day and have glasses of wine when I felt like it, and get up and go to sleep when I wanted to and not worry about singing the next day. It was just nice to be in that peace of mind. 

How would you describe your personal style?
I’m very comfortable in jeans and a T-shirt. However, what I’m trying to just get across is more of the femininity in my personal style. So, if I’m gonna wear a pair of jeans, most of the time I’ll throw it on with a Chanel jacket. If I’m gonna wear a leather pants, then it’s gonna be a really yummy cashmere sweater with a gorgeous belt around it. It’s sort of juxtapositioning the soft and the hard together, where before I think really did a lot more of the hard-edged look. Cavalli, Versace, Armani, I’m there with you. (Laughs)

How do you stay in such great shape?
(Laughs) I definitely took some time off recently while I was being in the “time off” mode and didn’t do anything, and actually got bigger for my wedding day rather than being smaller, which was hilarious. After which we had to do an album cover and we do pictures and I gotta get back into shape in no time. I find that yoga and running on a treadmill are the two things that I really like a lot. My sister is a personal trainer and when it comes to trying to get a certain look, she’ll get me in the gym and kinda beat me up a little. “You are what you eat” phrase is very true. When I’m not working a lot, if I continue eating a lot of food, it’ll just, you know, incur a bigger pant size.

Why do you think that your music has connected so well in the international marketplace?
I pretty much wear my heart on my sleeve and I’m down to earth, yet kind of quirky. But I also have a voice that people really like, and the package just seems to work.

Duffy
We’re getting goose bumps as we write this, for Duffy’s time has come - and how! She’s got three Grammy nominations for her album Rockferry

As we welcome the New Year, tell us Duffy, how would you sum up your last year?
Well, the last 12 months have been the most important year of my life, really. I never ever thought I’d have a no.1 record, but it’s just been a bit of a whirlwind.

We’d like to know more about Duffy, the person…
I was brought up in Neven, North Whales, Kimp at the Chilla. My childhood was spent in a really safe, lovely remote environment. At that time, I did appreciate that, but in hindsight going to London, I really realised how little there was around me growing up.

When did you start performing?
In Whales, I used to do lots of really random gigs. But I clearly remember performing in front of a rugby team, which trust me, was not an easy crowd. Otherwise I did all the other normal gigs. I think that any musician has to go through kind of down and out, bars and things.

What inspires you the most, when you are writing lyrics for your songs?
My lyrics are inspired by many things, sometimes I’d like to say they are observational, because then that saves me from being directly involved in the songs, you know. I’m not a self-indulgent writer, I don’t like to write and sometimes songwriting helps me avenge some hidden angst that I’ve never discussed with anyone. I just like to write stories and put them into songs. But then I’m sure somehow or somewhere if I stop the denial, there’s an element of truth in those songs, but I don’t really, haven’t identified it with myself and I think it’s better not to and I don’t really know where my songs come from really, it just kind of happens.

You have worked with different writers. How is to have an additional writer on board?
I worked with three different writers on the records and I think each of them brought something really individual to the table. When one of the writers, Bernard Butler and I look back and talk about the process of making the records, I realise how little conversation we had. We’d go in the recording room and there is no further chats beyond the formal ‘Good mornings.’ So, we’d just go into the piano and start making songs.

With other co-writers that I worked with, the whole atmosphere of the day was about hanging out and laughing and telling stories and getting to the bottom of the song. I worked with Jimmy Hilgraf and that was sort of a bit more… chatty. I had different elements, different relationships with each writer that I worked with. There was Steve Booker and that was a real moment for me. I met him by accident and we ended having two songs on the record together. I was looking for somewhere to live and he had a flat, a couple of doors from where I was living, and then we ended with those songs so all the experiences have been really valuable to everything on the record really.

Were you nervous before the release of Rockferry?
No, not at all! For Rockferry, I focused so hard on the record for four years that there was no rush for me. For someone to appreciate it, it takes them four years to buy it, love it, hate it or whatever. It’s totally fine by me.