Kelis - Well Tasty

It’s taken Kelis five years and three albums to reach R&B Princess plateau. Now all she wants to do, she tells Hattie Collins, is to get married and bake cakes.

With her finger-in-the-socket untamed mane of hair, Kelis Rogers cuts a pretty auspicious figure – even without the gleaming gold teeth she’s taken to sporting recently. “Character,” is her one-word summation of self-image. Strutting confidently about her hotel lobby wearing a bright blue and white striped top, and pink striped trainers, the 5’9 singer attracts an array of admiring glances from the milling patrons. Whether or not they recognise Rogers from her mischievous Milkshake video, one imagines the stares would be forthcoming anyway. It’s little surprise celebrated British fashion designer Matthew Williamson recently made the 24 year old his muse.

Born in Harlem, New York to African-American jazz musician father Kenneth, and Chinese/Puerto Rican mother Eveliss, Kelis (her name a curious combination of both parents), has had her eye on the entertainment world since a child singing in the Girls Choir of Harlem. Eveliss, encouraged by her daughters’ creative streak enrolled her at LaGuardia School for the Arts -a.k.a ‘Fame.’ A short spell as a model and a stint in the R&B trio BLU (Black Girls United) followed, before a chance encounter with a fledging producer put Kelis firmly on the path to stardom as a singer.

In 1999 the wild-haired woman quite literally burst onto the music scene with the single Caught Out There, (the one where she screamed about hating you so much right now). Produced by ex-boyfriend Pharrell Williams, one half of then-unknown production powerhouse The Neptune’s, the song catapulted Kelis into the charts. The singer can now be credited as being one of the first associated with Williams and his sonic sibling Chad Hugo - way before everyone from Justin Timberlake to Janet Jackson jumped aboard the bandwagon.

Working exclusively with the super-duo on her first two albums, Kaleidoscope and Wanderland respectively, was a brave move – although not one that was to pay off immediately. Five years ago their stripped-back, syncopated sonics were still a little too weird for most ears. While her rock-tinged debut managed fairly decent sales, its esoteric follow-up failed to make much of an impression outside of Europe and indeed never saw release in her homeland. Caught Out There became her solitary big-hit and, despite BRIT awards, a faithful fan-base and renowned live set, Kelis found herself uncomfortably close to residing in One Hit Wonder Land. “It’s stupid,” she sighs today of the limiting ‘man-hating’ category she found herself lumped in. “People are unable to associate you with anything else. It’s one thing for it to be a big song and another for people to assume that’s your whole character. It’s asinine,” she sneers. People also, perhaps, had a problem with a black girl doing what was ostensibly rock – or else guitar-heavy R&B? “Perhaps. I mean look at Skin from Skunk Anansie – don’t you think she’s real talented? Don’t you think she should be bigger? Ok, well, she’s not because she’s black,” she states flatly. “It’s not like she’s a new artist. It doesn’t change; it’s a racist world. And it’s sexist. Welcome to it,” she shrugs.

Whether conscious or not (Kelis thinks probably not), the singer steers stolidly towards more soulful sounds on her third album, Tasty. Having solely used the Neptune’s for her last two projects, Kelis decided to alter the aurals when it came to recording what many feel is her finest album to date. Enlisting the help of everyone from hip hop producers Rockwilder (Redman) and Dame Grease (DMX), to Outkast’s Andre 3000, Tasty has been her biggest success so far – on both sides of the Atlantic. Flitting between buzzsaw bass and heart-stopping soul, the album is a tight 14 tracks set off supremely by Kelis’ minx-filled musings of outdoor sex and the like. But why not so much Neptune’s? “Just time,” she says in her lazy drawl. Their time or hers? “I’m always on my time. I don’t know anybody else’s time- I’m totally oblivious to anybody else’s time,” she says with throaty chuckle. “But not time as in ‘time’ more as in, like, change. I believe in change. You can’t work with the same people for the rest of your life.” Of recent reports that there has been a falling out between herself and her former sound-creators and Kelis is dismissive – sort of. “Not really. I mean I love them, I have a lot of respect for them musically,” she says. “But they haven’t been in my life for awhile.” Why? “Too many people involved, too many egos involved and not enough knowledge of the industry,” is the evasive reply.

Less Neptune’s wasn’t the only part of the formula tinkered with for Tasty. Rogers also dropped manager Rob Walker, (who looks after The Neptune’s) because he was “just a horrible manager.” Furthermore, while she remains signed to Virgin UK (“cos they wouldn’t let me go”), she has swapped record companies from Virgin USA to Arista, because they too “were horrible on every level.”

Clearly a change of management and more diverse production roster hasn’t hindered her career – although it was the electro-exploding first single, Milkshake, produced by Williams and Hugo that bought all the boys to the yard. After peaking at No 2, she now finds herself Grammy nominated, performing in front of Prince Charles, collaborating with Enrique Iglesias and supporting Britney Spears on tour; a simple “it’s cool” her thrifty conclusion of success. Kelis, it seems, isn’t one for over-analysis. Interviews are a part of the job description she finds occasionally uncomfortable, she explains. It’s either “too tabloidy or too analytical,” she moans when, she thinks, there’s just not always so much to say. “Sometimes people want these big, deep answers, when it’s really just very simple,” she laughs. “I mean it just is what it is.”

The one part of music she unexpectedly talks endlessly about is performing; she’s currently mid-way through a short UK tour called Hip Hop Don’t Stop, with Missy Elliott and rapper Talib Kweli. “Being onstage is one of my favourite places to be,” she reveals. “You have sex cos you wanna come at the end, right? I think being onstage is the same feeling. Being onstage, if the night’s right, it’s like a great big orgasm. For me.” Blimey. So she tours a lot? Cue huge laughter. “I love it, I can’t tell you how much I love it.”

Another thing Kelis loves is her fiancée, New York rapper Nas, whom she now lives with in Atlanta. They met in a nightclub two years ago when he reportedly told Kelis he had been looking for her ‘for years’ and that he wanted to marry her, no less. They’ve been fairly inseparable ever since – appearing on each other’s albums and in each other’s videos. Nowadays, while making music is “cool”, Kelis is at her happiest donning a pinny and wielding a rolling pin. “My mum was a chef so I grew up in a house where there was loads of food and in a household where food was a really big deal. So, yeah, I like to cook,” she says before pointing out how portly her penchant for baking has made her betrothed to be. While not liking terribly to talk too much about her relationship -“I just don’t want every interview to be centred on that,” - she does reveal they will “eventually” get married “maybe” this year and it will be “quiet.”

In the meantime, she has a clothing line to design, maybe some acting work to audition for and the occasionally painful promotion of her album to keep her busy. “I want people to buy Tasty because I’m way over budget and I want them to help me out a little bit,” she laughs again, before finally allowing a little introspection. “It’s real music. I put a lot into it, I believe in it,” she decides. “I stand by it regardless who likes it and I think it’s…” Yes, go on? “Um. Good?” Perhaps we should leave Tasty to do the talking.


Tasty is out now on Virgin Records.
A version of this article appeared inthe Glasgow Herald