Blu Cantrell - True Blue

Blu Cantrell isn’t your average success story. Never mind the feuds - from top shelf magazines to the top of the charts is a long way, she tells Hattie Collins

A young-ish woman in a barely-there hockey dress uncrosses her long legs, grabs a Marlboro Light and her tumbler of rum, and proceeds to detail the time in her life when she resorted to baring her bits in a second-rate top-shelf magazine. This being a sedately swanky hotel bar in the heart of tourist London, the elderly patrons stare aghast at the loud-mouthed American and, despite themselves, strain to make out the in-depth description amongst the clatter of cocktail making. The hotel guests may not recognise her as the recent owner of a four-week No 1, but they have the nous to realise she must be some kind of VIP. With this seasons must-have Louis Vuitton handbag, a flurry of assistants, mandatory designer shades and baseball cap tightly pulled down in that atypical, I’m-famous-don’t-recognise-me-oh-go-then-I’ll-sign-an-autograph way, it’s obvious this woman is no nobody.

“I told LA,” [Arista Records boss LA Reid to you and I], I said, ‘I’ve done some nude pictures and they might come out,’” squawks Blu Cantrell, much to the bemusement of her fellow guests. “I was 18, it was uncomfortable, but I had to pay my bills. You know, recently I was with Puff, [as in Daddy, er Diddy] and some comment was made about nudity. He was like, ‘Well, I’ve seen you nude. And you looked cute, babe.’” Big groan. It’s all different now. I’m more in shape now - I’m more toned. But you know what,” she lowers the volume a little, “it’s kept me in the press, so it’s really helped. Controversy sells!” she exclaims of the media fixation with her pre-Brazilian wax, front-bum baring days.

A perfect antidote to the saccharine blandness of most No 1 pop stars, Blu Cantrell, owner of the Sean Paul-assisted smash single, Breathe, is vociferous both on and off the record. Before the interview’s official start, Blu indulges her gathered audience in a stream of scandalous gossip concerning her peers, herself and music industry types. Upon realising that the Guide journalist has been in attendance throughout the tittle-tattle session, Cantrell merely giggles a carefree ‘Opps!’ and an ‘Are you taping?’ One subject she’ll discuss off, and on, record is an apparent “beef” with R&B dreamboat Beyoncé - well, no R&B story would be complete without a little backbiting. It was reported around the release of Blu’s first single, the brilliant man-bashing Hit Em Up Style (Oops) that she had been enjoying “liaisons” with uber ugly rap God Jay-Z, the now-boyfriend of Beyoncé: “Me and Jay-Z were said to have been dating, it was major press. I have to say to you that we weren’t,” she says enunciating every word and sounding a little like a French & Saunders impression of an R&B singer. “It seems people are saying ‘She [Beyoncé] took him away from you,’ but that’s not true because there was nothing to take. We were just friends,” she says peering forcefully over the top of her Chanel’s.

After much prodding, persuasion and a bit more Bacardi, Blu slowly admits there maybe certain grounds for the gossip: Yes, Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s Bonnie & Clyde video is incredibly similar to her Round Up promo (Blu’s came out first); yup, both have collaborated with dancehall don Paul (again Blu beat Beyoncé to it with Breathe); and indeed on her forthcoming single - Baby Boy- Beyoncé says the line, ‘let me breathe’ (see what she did there?). Furthermore, when we hear Beyoncé murmur, “I was in love with a Sagittarius …I've been hurt by a Pisces,” on her album track Signs, (“Yes, Jay-Z’s a Sagittarius and I’m a Pisces,”) - well it doesn’t take Agatha Christie to get knickers in a tittle-tattle twist.

A sigh. “I’m an adult. She’s younger and if she’s doing what you’re saying, then she’s being a little immature. Maybe she’s trying to do it to get press, but I want to make her understand, if she goes there with me it’s the wrong move. She needs to understand what’s she’s doing and what she’s getting into. I’m a master at singing,” (immodest maybe, but Blu does have one phenomenal voice), “I don’t have any animosity towards Beyoncé, and I don’t like that whole rivalry type of thing. Maybe we should get onstage and battle it out live - each sing a song – in true beef style. But she doesn’t want to do that,” she says, ordering another drink and pursing her glossed-to-within-an-inch-of their-lives lips. “If she is being negative, she doesn’t need to be, because she’s a beautiful girl. But if you have issues with your man - and I don’t know what the situation is with them, I don’t want to speak on that - but if you have issues, address it with the guy, don’t take it out on the girl. It’s never the way to go,” is her final “go Ricky, go Ricky” word. (Beyoncé’s record company offered only a ‘no comment’ on Ms Knowles’ behalf.)

With the deluge of toothy pop stars having dominated our lives with their bland baby talk for too long, Blu is as refreshing as a lemon-infused hand towel on a long haul flight. From her bushy bush (it’s like, ‘big deal,’ we’ve all seen it now”), to turning down a Missy track (“ it was a hot song but too risqué - like, I know I did the whole nudity thing, but I want the public to take me seriously”), nothing, it would seem is off-limits. She’ll merely arch a perfectly plucked eyebrow at rumours regarding her bisexuality, (“sure” she’s considered a same-sex relationship but “no comment” on whether she’s acted on it), and deny rumours that she’s about to pose for Playboy with typical aplomb (“they offered me a lot of money, but I don’t need to do that. My talent is extraordinary”).

It’s no surprise African American-German-Italian Blu Cantrell has a far more interesting story to tell than Gareth Gates and his ongoing stutter. Born in Rhode Island 28 or sp years ago, (like all good singers Blu is sketchy about her age), she was named the more Annie-alike Tiffany Cobb by her single parent mother – Suzi – herself a singer and occasional Playboy model. Unfortunately, Suzi “had issues”, and following Suzi’s, “I can’t even tell you how many” many marriages after chucking out Blu’s abusive pro-basketball father, the youngster found herself the only mixed-race child of six siblings. Not that this bothered Blu one bit. “I hear a lot of people saying, ‘it was so hard for me growing up the only one’” she says mock-moaning, “but c’maaaan- – it’s not that serious. Just because we’re different races- we’re all blood. The way I see it, you can be Chinese, honey. If you’re hot, you’re hot,” she says with a salacious giggle.

Having followed her mother from jazz cafés to photo shoots, Blu, like all wannabe singers since the dawn of Madonna, headed to New York as 16 to seek her fortune. Unfortunately, the closet she got to a camera in that time was the superbly named Black Tail, the mag she posed for nude at 18. Finally, a chance meeting with a record executive 10 years on in the lobby of an Atlanta hotel (told you the numbers don’t add up) saw Blu signed to Arista Records and the American dream was born. The 2001 release of debut album So Blu went platinum, and this year’s Bittersweet has so far spawned a No 1 single.

Blu’s future tale will apparently include a stab at stand-up comedy (she writes skits), a possible collaboration with another grande dame, Elton John (there’s a mutual fan club afoot) and hopefully more hype and hullabaloo. Whether Blu will kick off with Beyoncé at the MOBO’s, or whether they’ll realise how ugly Jay-Z actually is and run off together is uncertain but it’ll make for interesting watching. The patron’s of that hotel bar certainly had a night to remember.


A version of this article appeared in the Guardian Guide