Bite Autumn 2012

bite music cleb

NELLY F ‘ Turn off the Light’ made the album an

I t’s only been two years since we were last graced with the vocal presence of Nelly Furtado on her Greatest Hits album, but boy doesn’t it feel like a lifetime? Her noticeable absence from our radios, the red carpet and industry events has left our hearts and ears yearning for her eclectic and cultural voice. But with the release of her comeback single ‘Big Hoops (The Bigger The Better)’ in June of this year and most recently her brand new single ‘Parking Lot’, she has well and truly affirmed her return to the international music charts, and it was then we realised just how much we had missed her! Although it may seem like she has been away for forever and a day, Nelly has stuck to her ‘three-year’ rule whereby she pledged that she would release a studio album every three years without fail. During her time away from the bright spotlight that is show business, Nelly has been taking a well-deserved break following the success of her Spanish album, Mi Plan . To the world it would have appeared as if the music industry had become far too eccentric and theatrical for Nelly Furtado to stage a head-turning comeback onto our screens, but not one to disappoint she has returned ‘ the bigger the better’ and even taller (thanks to video technology and stilts in her ‘Big Hoops’ video, presumably) than ever before. She has acknowledged that music trends, performers and the industry has changed but confidently asserts that

her music career has been influenced by a spectrum of genres from drum and bass and world music to folk music and R’n’B. Remember when she burst onto our screens and radio in 2001 with her debut single ‘I’m LikeA Bird’; it was the catchiness of the song and yet the simple message of it that enabled it to become one of the most successful singles of 2001. It not only went to number one in her home country of Canada, but it peaked at number five in the UK singles chart and was then awarded a Juno Award for Single of theYear! Calling it her “freedom song”, Nelly was unaware that the refreshing yet pop-inspired tune would become her signature melody. Her debut album, Whoa Nelly which she co-produced was equally as successful because of the cultural, heartfelt yet upbeat sound it bestowed upon our ears. Songs like ‘Turn off the Light’ made the album an international success. It won four Grammy nominations, with her debut single winning ‘ Best Female Pop Vocal Performance’. Not bad for her first year as a singer! With the release of Nelly’s second studio album, Folklore in 2003, it was then that her fans, critics and industry counterparts realised that her sound could travel deeper, further and edgier than we could have imagined. Rather than stick to one generic resonance, Nelly produced an album that had a rockier and more soulful tone to it. She took inspiration from her parents’ immigration to Canada and her

“ All of my influences are so wide that now I think in the musical climate that we live in, people can understand my influences better and I kind of make more sense in today’s musical world.” It’s fair to say that Nelly Furtado has had a flourishing and glowing career as an artist. She has been professionally dabbling in the world of music for over 10 years now; breaking the industry’s ’10-year-itch’ that sees artists either disappear from our screens or eventually burn out! Over the years, her sound has varied dramatically but that is all part of Nelly’s appeal and it’s something we have come to love and accept. She is especially proud of her heterogeneous sound and claims that she “ never wanted to be a part of corporate music.” Calling Toronto, the city where she grew up,“the most multicultural city in the entire world”, it is no surprise to find that international success. It won four Grammy nominations, with her debut single winning ‘ Best Female Pop Vocal Performance’.