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Who's That Girl? Soul Rebel Q&A with Barbados Newest Star SHONTELLE
Posted on October 13, 2008 2:36 PM
Barbados is on the fast track to becoming the latest hot spot for R&B talent. Of course everybody knows good girl gone bad, Rihanna, but now SRC/Universal has emerged with a brand new Bajan star, Shontelle -- who is an accomplished songwriter in addition to being a singer. With her new album Shontelligence dropping November 18th, Soul Rebel chopped it up with the island beauty about her first single "T-Shirt," her road to success, and the obvious comparisons to you-know-who.
Soul Rebel: Congrats on the success of your single Shontelle!
Shontelle: "T-shirt" is doing really really well. I'm so happy about that.
SR: Was that your first video?
S: I have shot other videos but this is my first Shontelle video.
SR: That's got to be really exciting. I know you're also a songwriter did you write "T-Shirt"?
S: I didn't, "T-Shirt" was written by Andrew Frampton and produced by Wayne Wilkins, he's the guy that did "Bleeding Love" for Leona Lewis. I recorded that out in LA also.
Shontelle "T-Shirt"
SR: How'd you come up with the title?
S: It was really funny, one day we were hanging out in the studio and we got bored so the guys were like let's play a word game with your name Shontelle and they said Shonteleport and Shontelevator and one of them said 'Wow this is some real Shontelligence', and I was like 'Heyyyy that's an album name.' Even though it came out of a game of funning we thought it was fitting because of the whole theme of my album. I guess Shontelligence represents me because not only am I literally a college student, close to graduating, I was studying philosophy and law before I came to the US. Could it be more fitting than that really?
SR: What made you decide, forget about being a lawyer I'm going to be a singer?
S: It was so hard for me to make that decision but how it happened was - I'm from Barbados so coming up on the island no one really sees music or entertainment as a real career. My parents were [the] old-fashioned, go to school and become a doctor or lawyer [type], but I always always wanted to do music. I would wake up in the morning and the first thing I'd think of was that. When it was time for me to go to school, to have a plan b, the reason I chose law was that I figured if I did entertainment law I'd still get to be part of the industry. I never thought this was going to come true but this was the most random, weirdest thing then.
SR: Sounds like a good story.
S: I was literally doing music behind my parents back at home. They weren't too keen on it because they know me and my personality is that if I am passionate about something I don't really care what anyone thinks so they were worried I'd forget about school and I didn't want them to get worried. I had a lot of friends who were producers and songwriters and I would hang out with them at the studio. I met this lady Sonia Mullins at home, she manages other artists in Barbados and she said if you really want to do this I can guide you. So she took me under her wing and introduced me to some people. I ended up meeting this guy who was like I have this artist Alison Hinds and she's looking for material for her new album and I ended up writing this song "Roll" which she performed and it did really well, in the whole West Indian community cuz Alison Hinds is like, they call her the "Queen of Soca."
Alison Hinds "Roll it Gal"
SR: So that's what put you on, how'd you end up signing as an artist yourself?
S:I came to New York to audition for American Musical and Dramatic Academy and I didn't tell my parents the details about that. Here I am in NY trying to get a scholarship to art school. The day before I was going back to Barbados I got this random phone call like 'Hello this is Evan Rogers, I'm the guy who found Rihanna, I'm one of her producers.' So of course I'm going nuts but trying to act all calm on the phone, so he asked if I wrote Roll and said "I'm interested in working with the writer, they said it was you." When he found out I was in New York, he was like "You need to get to the studio immediately!" I was at my cousin's apartment in Tribeca and I got the first train to Bronzeville and met with SRP, they signed me to their production company put together a demo and we went shopping at all the labels and ended up signing with SRC/Universal Motown. This was '06 and I signed with Steve Rifkind in '07.
SR: So you came home from the trip you told your parents how much did they freak out?
S: Yeah I was like Mom, I have something to tell you. She was like 'Oh boy you went up there doing music stuff.' And I was like 'Yeah, and it's worse, people want to sign me to their label.' But my family started to open up to me doing music by then after I wrote the song "Roll" because it was so successful in the whole soca scene. So they could see at least if I was going to do it I was probably going to do well. Of course now things are better.
SR: The album was slated to come out last year was that tough getting pushed back? S: Any artist will tell you it's like being on an emotional rollercoaster because one day you think you got it and another day not quite. It can go from very excited to where are we going? What are we doing? My project was challenging because I'm trying to be a mainstream artist but I'm not from the mainstream culture. Everyone was optimistic that we could do it because they already had success with Rihanna, but it was like how can we do this again with out them saying this is the same thing. Another girl from Barbados? That was the biggest challenge we had but we definitely worked things out.
J-Status ft. Rihanna & Shontelle "Roll"
SR: As far as the album goes, how is it balanced between island and pop/R&B music?
S: It is more or less a pop/R&B album but I told them I have to stay true to my roots, I'm an island girl, a Bajan girl, but Steve [Rifkind] was very adamant about that. His biggest artist is probably Akon right now and Akon is similar to me in that he's from Senegal, a totally unrelated world, but making music here but you can here the sound of where he's from in his music and Steve wanted to make sure we had that. There are songs on my album that definitely have that. We worked with west Indian producers so you are going to hear elements of reggae and even soca and calypso elements. It's a versatile and dynamic project.
SR: Did you have a chance to write?
S:I had a lot of creative input on this album they really let me do my thing so for the majority of the album I wrote or co-wrote 8 out of 11 songs. The three I didn't write were "T-Shirt," "Battle Cry," which will be on the democratic compilation, music they made for the elections, it was also produced by Wayne Wilkins and it's lined up to be the second single. The third song was "Superwoman," which was written by Amanda Ghost, she also wrote "You're beautiful" for James Blunt and "Beautiful Liar" with Shakira and Beyonce and that was produced by Stargate. I sometimes have to pinch myself, this is so unreal to me that I get to work with these producers that I look up to. Even since I've come to New York, I've had opportunity to do songwriting with Tricky and The-Dream, it's just been so unreal to me.
SR: You and Rihanna were in Cadets together right?
S: She went to one of the top high schools and so did I, our schools are affiliated and there is a program called Cadets which is like ROTC. There's drilling and all that stuff and that is how I knew Rihanna. The funny thing is I always knew there was something special about her, she just looks different than every one else. She was this little sandy haired, green eyed, tall girl. She always stood out, even just from how she looked and I always thought she was going to grow up to be a model, I didn't even know she was s singer. When she broke out I was like Oh my gosh that is Robin Fenty, what is she doing being a big star.
SR: She doesn't write and you do, I would think you guys would come up with something good working together.
S: Just before she went on the "Glow In the Dark Tour" she called me and we were trying so hard to get together and get our schedules to work but between the two schedules it was just so crazy and never happened. The same thing happened with Akon.
SR: Do you think you are ready for what you're getting yourself into with the tabloids and the Rihanna comparisons?
S: I'm literally affiliated with Rihanna because we are from the same place and we have the same management and same production companies, we're on two different labels but even they are affiliated Def Jam and Universal so I get to see what happens with her life and it's very intimidating but I'm so much of a go getter and an overachiever, I know this is what I want to do I just have to be prepared for what comes with the territory.
SR: What was your favorite song on the album?
S: "T-Shirt" was definitely one of my favorites, but some of my others are "Battle Cry" and "Cold Cold Summer" that is a ballad, it's really really nice and another one of my favorites is "Superwoman."
SR: Outside of music, what else have you been up to?
S: A few more things this experience has opened up for me, is in NY we just had Fashion Week and I actually got to do the show for Elle and Tide and Stuff 360, the Caravan show and I got to open the show with T-Shirt and model for Rock the Vote and also for Michael Antonio and I went to the Baby Phat show and Russell Simmons. I had a busy fashion week and that was pretty cool. I got to live out my secret fantasy of being a supermodel.
Shontelligence lands in stores November 18th on SRC/Universal.
3 Comments
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Can't wait for "Shontelligence" to drop!! Her album art is amazing!
Her album cover is really beautiful...looking forward to the album!
Shontelle looks so pretty on the album cover....I'm looking forward to the album! I wonder if it have reggae beats as well!?