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Interview
by SashaS
10-9-2004
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More on: Natasha Bedingfield
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| Natasha Bedingfield: newly crowned diva? |
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Binge living
Natasha Bedingfield: real-new girl-power, hopefully
Natasha Bedingfield’s calling card ‘Single’, the ditty that served as a [“happy”, she later explains] “declaration of her single status”, featuring lyrics from the self-help section of a woman’s magazine [not a joke, fact seekers], saw her peak at No. 3 that turned out to be a mere warm-up for her second 45-er landing straight at the top spot with ‘These Words’. Her case for adulation is about to be furthered by wowing audiences with debut album, ‘Unwritten’.
Ms Bedingfield’s a funkier Dido, with a better voice, some vaguely dancified beats and a range of songs. Hers is music that will offend no one as the 22-year-old doesn’t attempt to compete with Britney and Aguilera in - ‘who-can-wear-less’ category. This songtress, of New Zealand parentage, was born in South London and with her devout Christian background will not be fleshing her wares in the name of fame. Natasha’s world is more ‘Kids-from-Fame’ legwarmers than a dirty-diva with a nipple dropping out.
Song diversity on the LP suggests that the young lass fought to be herself against having control wrestled out of an artist’s career, females in particular…
“I’ve been very aware of it,” she speaks sweetly, “and if the sound on a single works they tend to repeat it. I didn’t want that and was lucky to have finished the album before the single’s success. Also, I was very clear what I wanted to do, that I wanted to make my own music, be an artists and… a painter paints his own picture.”
Her own lyrics are much deeper and more insightful, communicating in a slightly odd way.
“I’ve been writing songs since I was 12,” Ms Bedingfield also penned a song for a new US artist, Cherie Amour, as well as having one used by Paul Oakenfold, the known DJ. “I feel it very important that songs on my first album mean something special to me and I try to be different, I try to say something in a different way, not just how it has always been said… I try to look at things from a different angle, like ’Single’: I’ve been single for a year and wanted to write a song about it without being a sad one because there have been too many songs like that. I was happy and wanted to write a happy song.”
This world
‘Single’, as well as ‘I’m A Bomb’ amidst few other tracks, are full of strong, independent-female proclamations, someone called it ‘the new girl power’ that might be repelling to men; is she attempting to remain a single woman?
“No, not really,” her girlie laughter rings around the record company’s office for a dozenth time. “It is all about living the life to the full, enjoying all aspects of life, your working part as well as your partying and romantic relationship, if you happen to have one. The songs are about having right to have fun after working all week long, you don’t need a partner to dance, to party…”
Binging on life, perhaps?
“Hopefully so,“ she smiles charmingly, “but that suggests that you starve at all other times but you shouldn’t, you should live each and every moment. Carpe diem, seize the day, the moment… Everything that’s been happening to me, every day I’m doing something I’ve never done before: only weeks ago I played with Sheryl Crow to up to 12 thousand people, then to a 100,000 crowd…”
“But, the fact is that I have no boyfriend…” she returns to the subject of previous question. “I have no time right now, really, but I’m not anti-men, it’s just that I simply haven‘t got the time and my career comes ahead of everything else. And, I‘m not a man-eater as someone suggested recently…”
Jogging deep
Nastasha’s older brother Daniel, she shares his house in South London, has given her plenty of encouragement and advice.
“He told me to be real, fight off people trying to stick some doll-image on me because it is about music and always about music and you have to be strong to keep on doing it. So, I‘m very happy to have finished the album before having a hit so that nobody could advise me on a direction I should take.”
“I’m very lucky to have such a strong family and I keep them around me, I’m not letting any fame go to my head… I’m very grounded and often ask their advice. As I live with my brother, he is always available…My mum, she was in the car the other day, and my song came on the radio and then my brother’s, and she was ecstatic about it! Not many parents have that happening, it is against the law of probability.”
“It is all exciting but I need time to adjust to it. Now, I have cameras in my face all the time: right now, MTV is following me around because we are doing a diary for one month. It is interesting and I’ve been given a little camera to record interesting events. [Alas, without our participation because she forgot her camcorder at home.] It is exciting but I’m sacrificing my private life for it.”
It‘s been speculated that Ms Bedingfield heralds the arrival of ‘the new girl power‘, but a real one and not manicured apparitions of manufacture such as of ‘that’ girl-group?
“It is just a tag and my only hope is - being for real this time. Being in this business is a very challenging thing and a lot of people end up on anti-depressant pills and prescription drugs… It is because people do get burnt out, it is lonely, there is so much competition and pressure and, with everyone spying, looking at you, you live in a glass house, your own ‘Big Brother‘ situation.”
“You can’t be doing it for fame because you’ll get disillusioned very quickly. It is sad that so much dross makes more money than quality.”
Natasha Bedingfield may do something about changing this set-up, after all.
SashaS
10-9-2004
Natasha Bedingfield’s album ‘Unwritten’ is released 06 September 2004 on BMG
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