Kelly Clarkson has a new album — “Meaning of Life” — coming out on Friday, and she sat down with Apple Music’s Beats 1 to talk about her new music and much more, ranging from the types of jobs she’s held before becoming famous to her first celebrity crush to her dream music collaborations.
“I’ve had a plethora of jobs,” admits Clarkson in the video, above. “Not just ‘From Justin to Kelly’, I know what you’re thinking, my Oscar-winning performance. I’ve worked at the zoo, I’ve been a telemarketer. You hate me then, you might hate me now, I don’t know.”
She also reveals that her first celebrity crush was Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler. “I thought he was just so cool. And I was too young to even know he was sexy, you know, I just thought he was fun and cool and all over the stage and he was the fan before Beyonce had the fans, he had the fans,” she says. “And it was just like ‘Whoo ka ka ka kow!’ Like it was everywhere.”
Clarkson also demonstrates her eclectic musical tastes when asked to single out her dream musical collaboration. “Ah, I’m gonna pick two. I’m a tool that can’t just pick one,” she admits. “I would say either Chris Stapleton or Sam Smith. I like — I love both of them as vocalists and I just like what they do for their genres. I’m just a huge fan of hearing someone singing a song about a woman or a man or somebody they love and you feel every part, you feel their heart breaking. Like I love that.”
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Naturally, she also talks about “Meaning of Life”, and recommends how she’d like listeners to experience it. “People should listen to my new album, take a minute and a glass of wine, and, like, take the album in because it’s like a ride,” she says.
“The musicianship is saying, whether it’s the orchestra, or the brass section, I think it’s because I made a record how I liked receiving records as a kid. I literally remember getting Boys II Men ‘II’ album. Mo-Town Philly. I did not leave my room, my mom probably thought that there was something wrong with me. Same thing with Alanis Morissette, ‘Jagged Little Pill’. I would just live with my headphones on me and just really take in each song and go on the ride. I have listened to my album from start to finish, I don’t even know how many times. When ‘Love So Soft’ came on the radio, I listened to it like 100 more times. Cause I was like, ‘OK, I’ma pretend’ — I do this with my husband in the car — ‘pretend we’ve never heard this song.’ We’re like, ‘Oh, it’s a new Kelly Clarkson record.’ Hahaha cause I’m a dork. But I really do get excited about this music and people hearing it, just I’m so proud of it.”