This is the first article for a brand new Contributor to the New Image Of Charlotte Church Fans Beta Test Website: Elysium.
He has been following her Career moreorless since day one, and he provides an interesting insight into that Career and suggests that her New Image, may not actually be all that new at all...
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In November of 1998, a 12-year-old soprano by the name of Charlotte Church released an album by the name of Voice of an Angel to considerable media attention. Interestingly, controversy has followed her to one extent or another ever since. As a matter of fact, I believe that a great deal of her appeal and general popularity has been a result of the controversy. Charlotte sang mostly hymns and light classical work on that CD, and the original controversy stemmed from the fact that her public presence was already quite different from the "Angelic" material she recorded. She was obviously much more "pop" directed in her personality, and willing to be imaged and marketed - and this, more than the actual quality of her work caused a tremendous amount of criticism among those people who actually follow classical music.
The Beginning - Charlotte on "Richard and Judy" - age 10
Voice was an immediate and major "cult" hit - selling 600,000 copies in the UK in a little over a month (in fact - she has yet to attain the same level of success with any later effort) and as of writing, about 3 million copies in the United States since it's release. It remains a steady and consistent seller in the US, as it has attained those sales levels despite never breaking the top 25 on the Billboard pop chart.
The basic reason she was able to accomplish this only had an indirect relationship to her music itself. Her arrival on US shores was accompanied by her wildly popular PBS special, which not only featured some outstanding vocal renderings, but also displayed some rather detailed behind the scenes footage, providing us with a glimpse into the personality behind that voice. In America at least, it was Charlotte's image - just as much as her voice that was behind that popularity. Charlotte at age 12, was a marginally better singer than Becky Taylor at the same age - what happened to them after that point therefore is almost exclusively a tribute to the personality which Charlotte had - which provided strong support for an image and therefore marketing potential which Becky simply did not have.
It didn't take long for some controversy to ensue. One of the tracks buried within all of the hymns on Voice was In Trutina - a song about a young woman right on the cusp of succumbing to carnality. I think this was placed on the CD for the express purpose of raising eyebrows, but unfortunately went right over the heads of the masses of people who bought the CD. There were a couple of critical reviews at the time which did notice however - one reviewer noted that the inclusion of that song was very odd for someone marketed on the basis of childlike purity.
I think that this reviewer was close to seeing the truth but didn't go quite far enough. The song was there as an intentional counterpoint to the hymns - in effect to call that purity into question. Unfortunately, it really didn't get the attention it deserved, despite that fact that Charlotte tried to call attention to the song in a number of interviews. Sony used the song in the crossover segment on the video to the behind the scenes material, which I also found of note. However, they also "cleaned up" the lyrics a bit in the translation, which they included - thus further confusing the issue.
It was mildly amusing at the time. A lot of people in Britain and America were lauding the emergence of a "pure" and "chaste" young singer on the pop scene. At the same time Charlotte was giving interviews saying "I want to get an apartment when I am 18, and live like they do on Friends"...
Charlotte during marketing of Voice of an Angel
On her second album, Charlotte tried to do something similar, but more obvious.... she learned the song "Tell Me What Love Is" - this time with the controversial lyrics sung in English. Interestingly, from a purely objective viewpoint, by the time Charlotte was 13 years old, she had already recorded two songs, which dealt with sex, and sexuality in a much more earthy and direct fashion than anything Britney Spears has yet recorded. While even now, Britney relies on innuendo and suggestive dance to communicate her message, Charlotte by age 13 had already sung in effect about being horny, not once, but twice.
If any artist of the type has ever sung material like that at that age, I am unaware of it.
A few more people noticed the second time around - but I still suspect that the impact was not as great as she hoped. Still - the contrast between the image of Charlotte, and the actual persona she presented, with an interesting personality for someone of any age, was, and remains a great part of her success.
The "angelic" image was right from the beginning, such a powerful one, that she was taking steps to soften it right from the start. Her success in this regard, until very recently was actually indifferent. She has been plagued by the expectations of that image to this day - and I suspect that her first manager bore the brunt of her anger and frustration over being stuck with it. Having such a powerful personality to begin with is a mixed blessing - because it means that people will form a very powerful first impression, which they are reluctant to change. This meant, that sooner or later, she would have to take risks - such as what we are seeing now.
If there is one specific period of time which one can point to in which Charlotte began to speed up the change in her image - and to actually take risks which might offend her fan base in an attempt to reach a more stable audience, it was her appearance on the American show, "Politically Incorrect" in October 2000 - followed a few months thereafter by the announcement that Irving Azoff was her new manager. It is notable that Mr. Azoff is also the manger of Christina Aguilera.
One of the first things of note, which changed, was from that point forward, pictures of Charlotte began to be made public - some of them rather early pictures - which would never have seen the light of day, were Shalit still her manager. Very shortly thereafter, Charlotte also began to give interviews which were very different from the ones she did before.
Charlotte posing outside Hollywood Bowl -age 13.
To my knowledge, this picture didn't appear for almost two years after it was taken.
This picture of Charlotte at age 13 didn't see the light of day until last fall
Charlotte in Atlanta - September 2000. Already "sexy but sweet"
Of particular note was the interview she gave in "Heat" magazine in March of 2001 - where she jokingly called her virginity into question - and also said that the fact that Price William was going to be at her Hyde Park appearance with Pavarotti was the "only reason I agreed to do the goddamn concert"
Not that long afterwards came another, even "edgier" interview, this time in the Sunday Times, which actually got Charlotte into trouble that I don't think she expected - she made an unfortunate comment about the American reaction to 911 which was taken badly in America. However, it also included this quote - which was probably supposed to be the "impact" quote from the interview had things gone according to plan.
"I have a real thirst for knowledge." she says. "When I do finally find a partner, I want someone who changes my world view. I'm not going to find anybody like that at this age, so you just look to have fun"
Not only is this not exactly "angelic" but given that it is a 15-year-old looking to "have fun" it is downright controversial. Unfortunately, the flap over the other parts of the interview was so great that Charlotte had to distance herself from the entire thing. I still view it as a declaration of intent in terms of where she intended to take that image.
I think it is very important to note that she was trying to get her image to this point over a year ago now - and in fact, given the picture spread accompanying Enchantment it seems reasonable to suspect that this was the original marketing plan for that album - the projection of a very "sexy" 15-year-old with a public image much more progressive than anything Britney had done on her debut album or the accompanying marketing.
Even though the cover pics of both Enchantment and Prelude are pretty tame in a sense, they both also imply nudity.
Pictures surrounding the marketing of Enchantment
The forest scene pictures included in the marketing of Enchantment are another matter entirely - because they specifically and obviously depict her as a "nymphet" - a 15-year-old presented as a legitimate sexual object - and I am a bit surprised that more eyebrows weren't raised by this
I am going to limit commentary on what we are currently seeing in the British media to this- Charlotte is obviously taking some of the things which are really happening to her, and presenting them to the British tabloids in the full knowledge that they will be subject to embellishment there. When they get out of hand, she can always give a statement having the effect of adjusting them...her image will remain progressive and sexy, and will rapidly become more so as she changes her music to an audience more willing to accept that.
Charlotte does the "Rear of the Year" - note that except for the Obviously controversial nature of the award itself, the picture really Isn't all that different from what came a few months before.
In the meantime, however, she is marketing Prelude - which much still sell primarily to her original fan base and will shortly embark on a major tour of America where she will be singing Christmas related material. I would expect her image to remain roughly where it is for the next month or so. This is pretty "sexy" in its own right - note that she did not go directly into the specifics of her relationship with Steven Johnson on Parkinson. This left a number of questions unanswered.... will he appear somewhere in America with her? Time will tell...
In the meantime, her public profile in Britain is higher now than it has ever been - just in time for Prelude to be released. I think it will sell better there than any album she has done since Voice - and that would be a pretty impressive achievement for a Greatest Hits compilation if it happens.
Charlotte today...
Is Charlotte’s "New Image" Really New?
It never rains here at the New Image Of Charlotte Church Fans' Beta Test Website - it pours!!!
Hot on the heels of an article by our first New Contributor - "Elysium", we add another New Contributor to the frey - "Pulvifex", who has put fingers to keyboard, and wrote a similar piece...
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It is my contention that the new image that Charlotte Church has been developing over the past two to three years is not really new, but rather is just the real Charlotte emerging from behind the manufactured image created for the 11 year old singing sensation by Sony and her management team to promote her fantastic voice. There is ample evidence available in several places to support this. One has only to look at the pictures of Charlotte and her family at home before she became so successful to see that the Church family were members of the middle class living in a modest home in a residential area in Cardiff. Both of her parents worked and she was attending a local Catholic school.
It is quite evident that when Charlotte was signed by Sony that the company needed to come up with a gimmick to distinguish her from all the other young singers. Her voice was truly amazing and her sweet fresh look made the coining of the phrase "Voice of an Angel" a natural happening. However, it does not require much effort at all to determine that the angelic image is nothing more than a façade covering a healthy, normal teen age girl with all the likes and dislikes of teens all over the world. When you add to this that she is Welsh, a Celtic people like the Scots and Irish, you can easily see that life with Charl will not always be peaches and cream. Several times in interviews and in her book, Voice of an Angel, Charlotte states that she and her mother are both stubborn individuals who like to get their own way. You can also see this clearly in the video "The Making of Voice of an Angel" where Charlotte has a temper tantrum when her mother takes a stuffed bear out of her backpack. In fact she asks the cameraperson to stop taping because she is having a tantrum.
Charlotte often remarked as she
grew older that she was tired of the "angel" image and wanted to distance
herself from it. She has accomplished this in several ways ending with choosing
an "unacceptable" boyfriend, spending nights at his home in a "rough" section
of Cardiff, being photographed smoking in public, 
and
the persistent rumors that she has asked a relative to look for an apartment
or house where she and Steven can live together. She has also chosen to make
public some of the disagreements with her parents over her lifestyle and choice
of friends.
There is indeed some basis for believing that Charl was trying to break away from the angel image from the first album. Both Sony and Charl have said that she has a voice in selecting material to be included in her albums. One only needs to take a close look at the songs on her debut album "Voice of an Angel" to see that some of the secular songs talk of love in all its natures from the almost courtly "My Lagan Love" to the definitely physical "In Trutina" (see a translation here) which was taken from a collection of Medieval Latin drinking songs, The Carmina Burana set to modern music by Carl Orff.
In the second album, entitled simply "Charlotte Church", only three of seventeen songs are religious down from eight of seventeen on "Voice of an Angel". This time nine of the remaining fourteen songs have some aspect of love as a theme even though they remain classical in nature, and if you add in the Brazilian bonus track the total is ten of fifteen.
"Charlotte Church – Dream a Dream" cannot be completely ignored even though it is a Christmas collection. The photos used in the CD insert show a more open acknowledgement of Charlotte’s emerging sexiness which to this point had only been hinted at by the barefoot pictures used in the first two collections.
By "Enchantment" religious songs have been almost totally abandoned and classical selections are reduced to only two. Every track on the CD has a love theme of some sort. The photos used for the CD case and insert, which were taken when Charlotte was fifteen, could easily be mistaken for those of an eighteen to twenty year old.
The "Rear of the Year" award that Charlotte accepted in May of this year adds further proof if any is needed that she is determined to completely distance herself from the angel image that Sony’s PR Department concocted for her when she was an eleven year old newcomer and let her true self emerge a smart, vibrant, sexual young woman of the 21st Century.
To sum up: CHARLOTTE CHURCH IS A MAJOR BABE!
If you have any questions,
queries, or feedback generally,
they can be directed to: Elysium20@aol.com
for the first article or Pulvifex@yahoo.com
for the second article, and of course don't forget
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