SHE COULD have been just another poppet off the production lineof pretty young American singers, scheduled to be a one-hit wonderat most, but from the moment she Kissed a Girl, Katy Perry wasdestined to be different.
Depending on which version of her life you prefer, Perry iseither the most carefully constructed pop star of recent years, orshe is a supremely talented singer-songwriter who is defining thezeitgeist for young America with her clever lyrics and chic,colourful, retro fashions. She's not as bananas as 1950s film starCarmen Miranda, but anyone who saw Perry's appearance at the Grammyawards earlier this year will confirm she wears a lot of fruit-inspired attire - kooky and kitsch, but somehow endearing, too.There's also something of the 1950s pin-up about her - the sametension between wholesomeness and sexuality.
Next weekend Perry appears at T in the Park, Scotland's premierrock music festival which is not exactly known as a popular haunt ofAmerican popstrels. You might think an audience in love with indierock might give Perry the sort of reaction English comedians used toget at the Glasgow Empire, but there is enough edge in Perry'sappeal to suggest the savvy crowd at Balado will be singing along toher recent mammoth hits, Hot 'n' Cold and especially I Kissed AGirl.
The latter song, the first single to be released off her two-million-selling album One of the Boys, took the charts by storm lastyear, spending seven weeks at number one in America and going to thetop in more than 20 countries, selling more than six million unitsand earning Perry a best female pop vocal performance nomination atthe Grammy awards.
Based - she insists - on a true incident, the song tells of Perrywith "drink in hand, lost my discretion... I kissed a girl and Iliked it, I kissed a girl just to try it, I hope my boyfriend don'tmind."
The catchy tune and the suggestive lyrics - they were dubbed'lezploitation' - proved a winning combination for the iPodgeneration, but outraged middle America. Some conservativecommentators went ballistic at what they thought was promotion oflesbianism. One church noticeboard carried the slogan: "I kissed agirl - and went straight to hell." The result was that the curiousbought the single to find out what all the fuss was about - bingofor Ms Perry and the Capitol record label, which had the courage toproduce her records after a previous label dropped her.
It was her bosses at Capitol who set Perry's career on fire afterseveral false starts. Claims that they manufactured her seem wellwide of the mark, however, not least because surely nobody in themusic business would have selected Perry's Japanese-inspired fruit-loaded fashions when the trend - take Lady Gaga - is for femalesingers to look like pole dancers, not skiffle-era beauty queens.
Capitol did insist that Perry co-write much of her album withhighly successful songwriters such as her collaborator on I Kissed aGirl, Britain's Cathy Dennis - she wrote Kylie Minogue's Can't GetYou Out of my Head - which led to allegations that she was beingcreated, rather than creative.
Yet the song works because of Perry's voice and her delivery ofthose lyrics. Older music followers will have realised immediatelywhat Perry was doing. Like Marc Bolan, David Bowie, Freddie Mercury,Marc Almond and a host of others, she was toying with sexual mores.
Nevertheless, the appearance of being caught in two minds abouther sexuality might well be a reflection of a more general dualityin Perry's life. At just 24, Perry can be said to have lived twolives already.
Born in California, her parents, Keith and Mary, were both born-again Christians and ministers who tried to get their children tolive an avowedly Christian lifestyle that included singing inchurch, an activity at which Perry excelled. The singer says thatshe was the black sheep of the family but insists that her parentswere always supportive of her determination to make a career inmusic, even after she discovered Queen and was transformed overnightinto a wannabe pop singer.
Perry went along with overt Christianity up to a point - the ageof 17, in fact. By that time she had gone to Nashville and learnedsome basics about the music business before recording a gospel-style album for a Christian music label. It did not sell, and Perrydisappeared from view.
For the next few years she worked with various producers onseveral projects, none of which came to fruition. In 2007, shesigned to Capitol, and with clever marketing on the internet, theyprepared the world for Katy Perry.
Contradictions abound. Her natural hair colour is fair, yet in areversal of the usual trend, she dyes it black. She loves to party,but professes to want to just spend time with her cat. She says shehates conflict, but had a well-publicised spat with British singerLily Allen. Perry suggested that she was a "skinnier version" ofAllen which the Brit took to mean she was calling her fat - cue thesort of catfight insults you would hear in primary school. Perryapologised, it should be said. Perry recently told one reporter ofher love for her staid home town and yearning for a quiet life: "Iwant to be married and buried there. In Santa Barbara, people livelonger; they live at a more paced pace." Yet she has happilyindulged in a high-profile on-off relationship with one of Americanmusic's lesser bad boys, Travis McCoy of the hip-hop band Gym ClassHeroes.
A child of the internet age, her Twitter utterances and websiteblog showcase a young woman with determined views, but also a loveof distinctive fashion and downright bizarre videos.
She can certainly play the pop diva and garner publicity. Herlatest wheeze was to post on the internet a self-taken picture ofherself posing naked in her bath underneath a strategically-placedpizza, and she showed that she knows how to please a male audience -at the San Remo festival in Italy in February she stripped on stageto show off a basque in the colours of Italian football championsInter Milan.
Perry's biggest rock hero is Freddy Mercury, a perfect example ofwhat can go wrong for those who destroy themselves with themagnificent triviality that is celebrity. Perry says she wants to be"an entertainer" like Mercury, but will she survive the concomitantpressures of fame?
She is intelligent, of that there is no doubt, but will Perry besmart enough to walk away from celebrity before it burns her, or canshe ape that chameleon of renewability, Madonna?
At T in the Park, as happens at every other gig she plays, theaudience won't be able to help themselves and will soon be dancingalong to Perry's music. Resistance, it seems, is futile.
You've been Googled
Perry's real name is Katheryn Elizabeth Hudson, but she changedher stage name to Perry - her mother's maiden name - to avoidconfusion with the actress Kate Hudson.
* Her born-again Christian parents would not have been ideal rolemodels for Perry had they not found religion. Before theirtransformation, her mother dated Jimi Hendrix and her father tradeddrugs with LSD champion Timothy Leary.
* This year her younger brother played an April Fool joke bytexting her to say he had got a girl pregnant. Perry fell for it andblasted him. But as her blog admitted, she had used the same jokeabout herself the previous year.
* Perry has been known to swear like a trooper. Yet she claims tosay her prayers to God every night.
* An American tabloid reported just before last Christmas thatPerry had got engaged to boyfriend Travis McCoy, lead singer of theGym Class Heroes band. Perry, who wore a 'promise' ring given byMcCoy used her website to say "NOT engaged".
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