Tina Arena gets back to basics in new studio album

Australian singer, Tina Arena, has sold more than 10 million records around the world, made more than 100 million streams and released 12 studio albums consisting of tracks that have become hits such as: Go higher (1999), Love even the impossible (2005), My name is Baghdad (2006) or even I Want to Spend My Lifetime Loving You with Marc Anthony on the film’s soundtrack The Mask of Zorro in 1998. She is undoubtedly one of the most popular singers in the world and has become, over time, an icon and a source of pride for Australia.

She returns, after five years of absence, with Love Savesa new album in English with a song in French and she is on a world tour with a visit to the Salle Pleyel in Paris on November 16.

franceinfo: Isn’t this new album a nice summary of your entire career?

Tina Arena: Yes, I think that’s a good summary of this whole career. In fact, it comes back to the basics. It’s not some kind of reinvention, really, it’s just doing the things that matter.

Let’s talk about the cover! It’s a one-on-one, it’s a way of looking in the mirror, in the mirror. It took you a while to accept this.

Of course. I think it’s a privilege if we can get to a point where we can look in the mirror and say, ” OK, there were some great things, some very difficult things too, so how are we going to unpack these bags a little?“

Indeed, you talk about demons inside this album. What were your demons?

There are lots of fears. The show business world is not easy. It’s a very aggressive environment and in fact, it doesn’t suit me. So I had to do a monumental sorting out in my way of thinking, of doing things, and of saying to myself: ” Okay, there’s this, do I want to be a part of this?“Ultimately, no, I don’t want to.

“I want to be surrounded by people who I like and suit me. I’m the one driving the car and it’s super important to have fun. I couldn’t have survived 48 years in the profession without knowing how to laugh!”

In this album, there is more softness, notably with the song Mother To Her Child. I feel like this song has a dimension that goes beyond all that.

Yes. It’s not easy being a mother when you have a public life. You definitely don’t want your children to be exposed to that. Gabriel’s adolescence was a very difficult time with this pandemic. He suffered a lot. So for me, this song explains that I had to talk to him, to tell him something, that I was there, even if I have the feeling that he may have put a distance because I think that kids do that. And that was very painful for me because I lost my son, I lost my baby, I get up one morning and I have a boy bigger than me, who has his pains, his questions and all that. It was very painful to write Mother To Her Child. I cried a lot, a lot, a lot. It took me months to be able to listen to it.

We’ve been waiting for this new album for five years. How did you manage to live without it?

I lived. You have to live to be able to write something.

“I say this with a lot of love but I needed to step away, because the impression the French have of me as the most French of Australians doesn’t sit well with me.”

For what ?

I know it’s true, but there you go, I’m a woman who had a chance and who has a rather special relationship with France. But they don’t really know me. The wife of Go higher is no longer the same woman. I don’t have a problem with my past at all, but I need to move forward. I think that after a while, people either want to really get to know the being in front of them, or they don’t have that desire.

I would like to tell you about the song Church. It’s a story of belief, yes, but not the one we necessarily think of. There is no Church behind all this at all. There is a belief that is simply lived.

It’s about redemption. We absolutely must forgive ourselves before we forgive others. I had to forgive myself for a lot of things.

And there?

How are you. I got there, I’m good now! Two years of psychotherapy is good, it’s great! It helped me enormously. You cannot love others without self-love.