The evolution of Katy Perry – The Hindu

In 2012, American pop singer Katy Perry arrived on an ornate palanquin at Chennais YMCA College of Physical Education stage. Leading a group of dancers dressed in shiny I Dream of Jeanie and Aladdins Jasmine-esque costumes, the then 27-year-old made her India debut kick-starting the Indian Premier League season. With a brief interlude featuring Hindustani beats, she seductively, lovingly even, crooned California Girls, rife with double entendre lyrics like So hot/Well melt your popsicle. Perhaps hotter than the April Indian summer, her performance, with its lavish costumes and props, raised the bar for live music concerts in the country.

Now, shes back to headline the first edition of the OnePlus Music Festival in Mumbai this evening. It has been seven years since Ive been to India, and Ive got lots of new songs and visuals to share, says the 35-year-old. It will be a blast getting to reconnect. She will be sharing the stage with the likes of British pop singer Dua Lipa, Indian EDM artiste Ritviz, and post-rock band, aswekeepsearching.

Age of streaming

In the time since Perry was last here, the global music industry has completely changed. The amount of content thats created to keep up with the average persons attention span is enough to make your head spin, she says. For one, artistes are dissing the album route to drop singles with plenty of social media push. Take American singer Charli XCX for instance, who, several months before releasing her album in September, dropped a string of stand-alone tracks to guarantee sales. Shed even tweeted, Angels, your mother is about to feed you new music for five months straight. You deserve it and youre welcome.

The petite brunette isnt the only one capitalising on the potential of streaming music. Billie Eilish, The Chainsmokers, Camila Cabello and almost anyone making music today are all following suit, including Perry. I love technology because it allows me to give to my fans as well as get their feedback much quicker, she says, about streaming platforms. I agree that in this age of constant content, youre also told about algorithm-this and algorithm-that, but, at the end of the day, I think that the authentic artiste and their content will always rise to the top. Theres a balance to be struck between data and intuition.

Perry for your thoughts

In true Katy Perry style, reinvention is always round the corner. Shes held her own, and more, amid changing trends. This year alone shes released Harleys in Hawaii, Small Talk, and Never Really Over, among others. For the latter, she created alternate endings to the music video, to feature on Spotify Canvas (a new feature on the app that allows artistes to add a full screen, and three to eight-second moving visual to tracks). I love the opportunity to hide Easter eggs for my biggest fans and keep them constantly engaged with new content to get back to the song, she says, touching upon TikTok as a powerful platform to market music. I think you should always keep your toolbox full. But you should also know which tool is right for each job.

It has been an eventful year for the singer, who, after more-than-a-decade of making music and touring the world, is kicking back to maintain a work-life balance. Im enjoying this experiment [releasing music one single at a time, to allow each song to shine on its own] in my career, but Ill not dismiss a larger body of work in the near future, says Perry, who has just been booked to perform at the 2020 ICC Womens T20 World Cup finals, with a concert during both the pre-game show and the post-match celebration, in Australia.

Headline makers

Then and now

But the singer who, in February, got engaged to actor Orlando Bloom has a less than exemplary side, too, that continues to court controversies. This August, she recalled two products from her line of footwear, a loafer called the Rue Face and a sandal titled the Ora Face, which brought blackface to mind. She has also been accused of sexual misconduct more than once. Model Josh Kloss, who starred in her video for Teenage Dream, alleged that shed sexually assaulted him at a party; Russian journalist Tina Kandelaki claimed that a drunk Perry tried to kiss her without consent; and, last year, Perry kissed a then-19-year-old Benjamin Glaze during his American Idol audition.

This is quite a contrast to her upbringing. Born to Pentecostal pastors, shes previously revealed how shed handed out How to Find God pamphlets at a Marilyn Manson concert. And before blowing up on the global pop musical radar with I Kissed a Girl, she made Christian rock and gospel music even releasing her debut album, Katy Hudson, in 2001.

A commercial failure at the time, she later collaborated with Glen Ballard, the producer of Canadian singer Alanis Morissettes 1995 album, Jagged Little Pill (of which she was a fan), to write new music and reinvent herself. In 2008, she released the sexually-fuelled One of the Boys. But it was Teenage Dream in 2010 that cemented her meteoric rise, replete with an album cover that had her lying nude on a fluffy pink cloud.

Three years later, Prism earned her a nomination for Best Pop Vocal Album at the 57th Annual Grammy Awards, featuring the arena banger Roar. And in 2015, she took things a notch higher with a memorable Superbowl half-time performance alongside Missy Elliot and Lenny Kravitz. The 12-minute show, with Perry straddling a metal tesseract-ed lion, snagged the highest Super Bowl ratings ever, with 118 million people tuning in. Perry had arrived, and in grand style.

Birth of a liberation

Perrys transformation be it her looks or her music wasnt as drastic as Britney Spears, writhing to Im a Slave for You, or Christina Aguileras muddy Dirrty. But with her 2017 album Witness, it was evident shed broken away from her upbringing. During this time, a short pixie cut her hair had fried out translated shifting visual aesthetics, from a scintillating pin-up girl to pastels tones with candy colours, and eventually an edgy look. It directly mirrored the evolution of her sound.

Open about her fear of intimacy and oversexualising herself, the 2017 album was also a breaking of the shackles of expectations, a liberation. Ive never been one to follow trends, and I always strive to tell my story and my truth on the best sonic wave that matches it. That is my most authentic sound, she admits. Im just putting out music on my own timeline.

Standing Witness

The statement rings true with the sonic transitions of Witness, which featured a heavy electronica influence, a marked shift from her previous work. Perry continued to sing about love and romance, but strategic collaborations made sure the music was never frothy and frilly. The likes of Nicky Minhaj, Migos and Skip Marley, coupled with plenty of explicit lyrics, ensured that the singer transcended the tweeny demographic she long associated with. This time, there was also an emphasis on being a strong woman, a theme shed been skirting in the past. When prodded about using her art as a tool feminism, she says music is genderless. Music and lyrics can resonate with you if they come from the heart of the artiste and reach out to the listeners heart, states Perry. I hope being a strong, empathetic female is a general good influence for other strong, empathetic females to succeed.

Perry has come a long way since side gigs like starring in Gym Class Heroes Cupids Chokehold video in 2005 and delivering back-up vocals to Mick Jaggers Old Habits Die Hard in 2004. She has gone from demure spiritual music to sexually-charged bubblegum pop to a new, easy sound in 2019. And despite her several ups and downs, she continues to remain one of the most bankable and successful musical artistes of all time as KatyCats will reaffirm today, at the DY Patil Stadium, rocking to Roar and Harleys in Hawaii.

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The evolution of Katy Perry - The Hindu