Interview/Review

[kat_4eva2]

'FINALLY I'M ENJOYING IT'

Marco Ursi, Times Colonist
Published: Tuesday, 25th July 2006
Six years after the release of her smash debut Whoa, Nelly!, Nelly Furtado says she's finally comfortable with being a pop superstar.

The former Mount Doug student called from Vancouver, where she was about to board a flight to visit family in Victoria. She had just come off a tour of North America to promote her new album, Loose, and will soon be back on the road, this time in Asia.

The massive success of Loose makes Furtado reminisce about being thrust into the spotlight back when her only hit was I'm Like A Bird.

"I was a bit like a deer caught in the headlights. I didn't grow up in the Mickey Mouse Club," she said before breaking into laughter. "I mean, I wish I had when I started because all my musical peers at the time were all so well-trained in television and performance.

"It was after I signed a record deal that I finally had my own set, and my own band. I didn't know what to do with myself up there.

"Now I've become more seasoned. It's been seven years and finally I'm enjoying it because I can navigate it a little bit better.

"You know when your first interview is Vanity Fair and your first TV performance is Saturday Night Live, that's a lot of pressure."

Furtado was faced with a different kind of pressure after her sophomore effort, Folklore, barely made it to the Billboard Top 40. She needed a hit.

With Loose, Furtado swung for the fences and with the album flying to the top of the Billboard charts, it appears she has cracked a homer. The album's success has come largely on the strength of hit single Promiscuous, a club-friendly duet with famed hip-hop producer Timbaland, who worked with Furtado on the recordings in Miami.

Timbaland is to hip-pop what Phil Spector was to pop in the '50s and '60s, a producer who created a sound and style so distinct that it redefined his genre. Timbaland perfected this sound -- a mash of syncopated snares, booming bass drums, world music instrumentation and vocoded voices -- working with hip-hop and R&B royalty such as Jay-Z, Aaliyah, Missy Elliot and Ludacris.

"He's a bit of a mad genius," Furtado said. "I really think he stimulates the powerful side of me as an artist, the dark and mysterious side."

The new album, and accompanying videos, also showed a side of Furtado that some fans didn't want to see. The new album features racy lyrics such as "You're standing at the door/I'm falling to the floor," while the videos for Promiscuous and Maneater showcase Furtado's curves more than her voice, although she does not get quite as down and dirty as ex-Mouseketeers Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera did when they began using sex to sell their music.

Nevertheless, when Loose hit record stores and the web, the word "sellout" was on the minds and message boards of many former fans.

"I've always been a big fan of Nelly Furtado," writes the author of a blog called Worship the Glitch. "She occupied a unique place in popular music as a bright, individualistic artist in a sea of no-talent teenagers. But her stint on the season finale of SNL was extremely disappointing. The performance and the music, itself, were dismal failures. The tunes weren't just bad. They were dumb."

In recent interviews, Furtado has defended the shift by talking about artistic growth and reminding everyone that she was always enamoured with hip-hop and R&B.

"I almost see it like holding your deck of cards close to you, you know, like a close hand," she said. "And I like that because when you wield your weapons, or your cards, it's when people least expect it and it really feels spontaneous."

When asked about the hostile response of some fans to new material, she laughed. "Luckily motherhood has also made me a lot more tough and it's given me less time to worry about what everybody's saying.

"Luckily there's been tons of positive feedback as well, and I try to focus on that. And you have to laugh, because they do say all media is good media."

[sayitright]

Thanks for posting, great read I'm glad that Nelly is able to focus on the positives and not worry about the negativity.

[Beaxarr]

Thanks

[Jose_XO]

thnx u very mux !

[Do-Rithm]

Thank you.