Katie Melua blossomed with a ninth album “Love & Money”

Katie Melua is a singer, songwriter and musician with a velvet voice. The public and critics discovered the Briton of Georgian origin with a first album, Call Off The Search in 2003, which reached first place in the charts UK. Two years later there was Peace by Peace with his title become world Nine Million Bicycles. In 20 years of career, she has received 56 platinum certifications, she is also one of the British artists selling the most records and eight of her albums have entered the Top 10 consecutively.

In March 2023, she released a ninth album, Love & Money.

franceinfo: Love & Money, these are ten titles that tell what you have been through over the past two years. Is it an album of awareness that you have to lighten up to be happy?

Katie Melua: Yes. For a long time in my life, I compartmentalised my work. I wanted to create, to be successful, to be independent, to make money. And then in my mid-thirties, I had no home life and I realized that I was proud of everything I had done, but I wondered: what is the meaning of the life ? Why am I doing this? Shouldn’t I stop at some point and have fun, spend time with my family, make a home? Of course, the pandemic has helped crystallize these questions.

‘Love & Money’ is about the idea of ​​how I can combine my personal life with my work.

Katie Melua

at franceinfo

And then I was very lucky because I met someone. I fell in love. I have invested a lot in my life at home. I spent a long time, in my head, to know how to create the best relationship with this person and now, we have a baby! So the pandemic has accelerated things. But during this period, I was also making my ninth album and I wanted to make a happy album that represented those years. I said to myself: either I can lock myself in the studio for hours, or else I live and I create through the experiences I have had. So it’s about that. Naturally, I wanted to rest. In fact, it’s just the idea of ​​being a perfectionist, of working a lot and how you find a balance in that. After eight or nine albums, I’m so happy. After so many platinum records. What more could I want? Now it’s time to say:OK, now I’m spending time for my life“.

It’s a very positive album. In your first single, you reflect on the place you occupy in this world and therefore on the chance that you actually have to do this passion job. This music has been with you since your earliest childhood. Today, you are a mother, but you were first a child. You were born in Kutaisi, Georgia, you spent your childhood in Tbilisi, in the capital, then in Batumi. Your father worked as a cardiologist, but the fall of the Soviet bloc damaged the living conditions of the Georgian population. What do you keep from this childhood?

My childhood in Georgia formed me completely and I cling to my memories and also very strongly to my culture.

Katie Melua

at franceinfo

I try to go to Georgia at least twice a year. I’m taking my son there, we’re going to baptize him there and that means everything to me. Living and working in England gives me an incredible perspective of Georgia. Georgia is a small nation on the edge of Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Turkey. It really is a unique place. But it’s true that people can lose a little hope because we don’t have the same opportunities as in the West. There is a lot of immigration to Georgia. I know at least one person in every family who moved to a wealthier nation to work terrible jobs, to send money home. And that is something that I also experienced personally. Me, my experience is an exaggerated version of that because I became a popstar, which is incredible and really unrealistic, but it happened. I also take care of my family and that’s a subject I talk about in this new album, in the song Love & Moneythe title track of the album.

I would like to know what this album ultimately represents for you. It feels like a new page in your life is turning, that you’ve started to write a new story.

I’m proud to be on my ninth album. I am proud to be with an extraordinary team with whom we really have a very ethical quality of work. For example, I can tour and perform here at the Olympia and in all these wonderful places in Europe with my son. There is also a member of my team who is a sound engineer, she is wonderful at her job and also has a two and a half year old son who tours with us. So I’m not just interested in superficial successes, I also want quality of work and life for my team and myself. I’m so proud of this record that I hope we can continue to make these works of art.

SO Love & Money to say that Katie Melua is happy!

Very happy, yes!