When hotpress first sets sights on the diminutive acoustic princess Katie Melua, she is standing at the end of a red carpet having her photograph taken with Radio 1 DJ Mike Read. You’d think she’d be pretty sick of it by now – she has posed with virtually all of the 450 guests (PRs, label folk, journalists and other total strangers) in attendance tonight at London’s Hammersmith Palais to celebrate her 21st birthday – but the smile is broad and unflinching. “I feel like a bride,” she gushes, before flitting back into the spotlight ready for the next face in the queue.
One week and one mother of a hangover later (cheers for the champagne, Katie) and Ms Melua, curled up on a couch at Hammersmith’s Westbourne Park Studios, is working her way through a stack of photographs from the red carpet, marker in hand, busily scribbling personalised messages on each one. She’s not going to all this trouble just to thank people for coming to her party, though. There is a new album to be launched: Piece By Piece, the follow up to 2003’s hugely successful Call Off The Search. Terry Wogan has been a big fan from the start, and was given the honour of selecting the first single from the new album, ‘Nine Million Bicycles’, which is currently charting at number five in the UK.
The sweet, airy single might be a bit deceptive though, as the majority of the new material is a little less wholesome than her earlier stuff and sees Melua steering a bluesier path – a direction she claims is influenced by her own Georgian roots. “Georgian folk music is really stunning,” she says. “It comes close to jazz and blues, which you can hear creeping in on my new album.”
Katie was born in the former Soviet republic and lived there until she was eight, but rampant corruption and instability following the country’s independence forced her and her family to emigrate to Belfast, and later to London. “The move to Belfast was a move to the West,” she says. “It was the most amazing thing that could ever happen to anyone in Georgia at the time. It was a bit bizarre, because people thought of Belfast as a really dangerous place, but from our point of view, coming from where we’d come from, it wasn’t dangerous at all.
“My dad got a job in the Royal Victoria Hospital, and we lived in the hospital accommodations just off the Falls Road. I really enjoyed my time there. I found the Irish people to be so kind and warm and welcoming. It was quite weird, because the only experience or knowledge I had of the Protestant/Catholic thing was from the news. I was quite young at the time, so I wasn’t out after 12am to see the cars being burnt out or anything. I’d see policemen driving by in their tanks but that was the extent of it. They’d come out with their guns, have a look around and go back in – that was it. It was certainly mild compared to the impression given on TV. And the quality of life was much better than in Georgia, just simple things like electricity and hot water!”
Growing up in places where the politics is a part of daily life has instilled an awareness in Katie which has stayed with her until this day. “Most of my friends don’t care about politics because they don’t see the direct effect it has on their lives, whereas I’ve lived in places where it has. I’m no politician, but I’m definitely interested in it.” She has spoken out in support of the banned Make Poverty History television campaign, and has been made Education Ambassador by Save The Children. “It sounds really posh, doesn’t it?” she laughs. “It’s a really responsible role, I don’t know why they gave it to me! We were meant to go and see Tony Blair and talk to him about the Millennium goals to put all the children in the world into schools, and the fact that targets weren’t being met. But he cancelled it because apparently a certain President of America doesn’t want to talk about any of these things, he wants to focus on the terrorist issue. The Americans seem to think that poverty and terrorism aren’t at all linked.”
When it comes to her own success, Katie admits she is still amazed at how she went from the “spotty teenager sitting in front of my computer messing around on recording software” to the slick, million-selling songstress she has become. “It’s fucking weird,” she observes, bluntly. “I wanted to do well but I was never convinced, and I don’t know that I still am convinced by my own talents, in terms of how good it is. Yeah, I think I can sing and I love doing it and I’m passionate about it and it gives me something, but I still rely on other people’s opinions, and I’m not just talking about the people around me. I really didn’t think it was going to be as big as it became.”
'Big' is a bit of an understatement – Call Off The Search went multi-platinum.
“I would like to say that it was just because it was good music. There has to be an element of that to it, although people do sometimes buy crap. But I don’t sell my image or how big my bum is or my personality, it is just selling the music so that is what people are buying, they’re not buying Katie Melua’s brand new whatever. It’s a sad fact that if, say, I was 55 and something else, I probably wouldn’t have been successful. But there are tons of gorgeous people out there ten times more pretty than me and they’re not selling records, and there’s a reason for that. There are women in the industry who use their looks and sexuality to sell the music, but I’m not into that. I think I’m perceived as an oldie young girl that sings weird acoustic stuff, but I might not be being too optimistic! I don’t really care about being edgy or cool, I just want to make music that I’m passionate about, not be scared of making music that is emotionally involving, and put it out there.”
When it comes to creativity, Katie insists that, in terms of skill, she is still “very much at the beginning” and that she has a lot to learn if she’s to make the kind of long term career music she longs for. “I feel like the success that I’ve had isn’t at the same level I’m at musically speaking,” she explains. “From being an outsider, listening to music, you can see that how good and talented someone is and how they develop doesn’t go hand in hand with how successful they are. I hope they will in my case. I am completely aware of the fact that all this could be gone tomorrow. I think once you accept the fact that you can’t be scared of losing it all, you see that there’s not that much to lose. Maybe respect among your peers. But as far as money or fame goes, as far as I’m concerned that’s not a lot to lose. And once you accept that, that’s when true music will shine out and hopefully do good. If I do what’s best for me as an artist, the success becomes irrelevant. It’s only time that will tell though. At the moment my music is successful but in 50 years time, no one might give a shit. I hope they don’t and I hope I make music that will last through the ages, but that’s being a bit up myself, so we’ll see.”