Natalie Jane Imbruglia () (born February 4, 1975) is an Australian singer-songwriter, model and actress.
In the early 1990s, Imbruglia was known to audiences as Beth Brennan in the popular Australian soap
Neighbours (also responsible for launching pop singers Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan). Two years after leaving the program, she launched a highly successful singing career with the international hit, "Torn". The subsequent debut album
Left of the Middle (1998) sold 6 million copies worldwide. While following releases,
White Lilies Island (2001) and
Counting Down the Days (2005), have been unable to match the commercial success of her debut, the latter became her first UK #1, and all are critically acclaimed. To date she has sold more than 10 million albums worldwide.
On New Years Eve 2002/2003, Imbruglia and her boyfriend of three and a half years, Silverchair frontman Daniel Johns, were married in a beach ceremony in Australia. She currently lives with Johns in Windsor, Berkshire, UK, on an island called "White Lillies" that she later named her second album from, and Newcastle, Australia.
Early life
Born as second of the four daughters to an Italian (Sicilian) (Messinese) father and an Australian mother, Imbruglia grew up on the Central Coast, north of Sydney. Imbruglia studied ballet, tap, and highland dancing as a child, hoping to make a career out of it. She also sang in shopping malls and in school performances. At 14 her dance instructor encouraged her to sing with an all girl group but once at the audition, the managers saw that the strikingly pretty youngster with a beautiful voice could make it on her own. They wanted to sign her as a solo act but she refused. "They were like 'we're going to make you a star...' Even at that age you couldn't talk to me like that. I was like 'see you later..'"
Later, she started auditioning for Australian TV commercials and appeared in spots for Coke and the popular Australian snack Twisties. By age 16, she left high school to start a career in acting. She soon obtained the chance to play a regular role on the Australian soap opera,
Neighbours at the age of 16 1/2.
Neighbours has also launched the careers of many other successful Australian female artists such as Kylie Minogue, Holly Valance, Delta Goodrem and Natalie Bassingthwaighte. However, by the end of her second year, she left the show to move to London, immersing herself in the city's club scene.
There she was refused a work permit (on the grounds that too many
Neighbours stars were trying to find work in the UK) and within a year or so of partying became bankrupt. This forced her to go back to her passion of singing, something which she had been putting off because she thought everyone would laugh at her because she'd been on
Neighbours. Her effort paid off and she was signed to BMG Publishing. She came up with a demo of the song "Torn" which greatly impressed RCA Records and got her a record contract.
Music
Natalie Imbruglia is one of the most successful Australian-born female singers. She has received one MTV Awards for Best New Artist in 1998, and 3 constitutive nominations of Grammy Awards in 1999. She has sold over 9 million albums worldwide.
She was ranked #11 on Rock on the Net's list of single artists of the year in 1998, and #76 in 2001.
Torn
Her first internationally released single, "Torn" (1997), was a cover of an Ednaswap song. Instantly the single became one of the biggest hits of the 90s, reaching number-two in the UK Singles Chart and number-one on airplay around the world and was number-one on the Billboard chart for 14 weeks. The single went on to sell over a million copies in the United Kingdom alone.
It was also released as a radio single in the US, but not in buyable CD-format. The single quickly hit #1 on the Billboard's Hot 100 Airplay chart, where it stayed for 14 weeks. At the time singles not released commercially were unable to chart to the overall Hot 100 chart (combined sales and airplay) so "Torn" made no appearance on it for a while. By the time the policy was changed in late 1998 to allow airplay-only songs, "Torn" was already heading down the charts, so its peak on the Hot 100 only ended up being at #42. The single also topped the Top 40 Mainstream/CHR Pop and Adult Top 40 charts.
In October 1997, it broke the all time airplay record in the UK for being the most played (more than 2000 plays) for six consecutive weeks. It was, finally No. 1 for 14 weeks in the UK radio chart, a record that is being tied by only Simply Red's Fairground. It was No. 1 radio single in the USA from March to July 1998. It was knocked down to No. 2 by Alanis Morissette's "Uninvited".
Rick Dees, in his Top 40 Chart show also declared Torn as the 'number one radio single of 1990s' in their 2000 Millennium Countdown show, broadcasted from KIIS-FM on News Years Eve.
Imbruglia made a surprise appearance alongside David Armand midway through a performance of his supposed 'interpretative dance' routine to her hit song Torn at Amnesty International's The Secret Policeman's Ball
Left of the Middle
Her debut album
Left of the Middle followed soon after. The second single released in the UK, after "Torn" was "Big Mistake." The song debuted at number-two. "Wishing I Was There" followed and it was less successful than her first two singles, reaching number 19. However, "Wishing I Was There" was a smash hit on the UK radio, peaked at No. 2 in summer 1998, and was a summer smash hit in the USA radio, peaked at No. 14 on the Top 40 Show. The final single from
Left of the Middle was "Smoke", and the reception was much more divided compared to the other singles. It was a hit in the UK and made the top 5, while in Australia it just missed the top 40. Eventually, the album became a million-seller after charting well in many countries and entering the Top 10 in the US and UK. In 1999, she recorded a cover of the song Never Tear Us Apart by INXS with Tom Jones which appeared on his album
Reload.
Left of the Middle was certified platinum by RIAA within 4 weeks of release (3rd April 1998) and was certified 2X platinum in November 1998.
White Lilies Island
Imbruglia?s next album,
White Lilies Island, arrived in 2001. Named after an island where her home is situated, the writing process took almost three years to complete. The album's first single, "That Day," was very different stylistically from her previous singles, and it did not reach the UK Top 10. The song did not do well in her home country either. In the US, "Wrong Impression" was released as the first single and it enjoyed small success, charting in the Hot 100 Singles chart and the Adult Contemporary chart. The track was also released in the UK as a second single, and it did slightly better than
That Day. "Beauty On The Fire", the final single, experienced minimal success and barely entered charts worldwide. In Australia it did not even make the top 50. "
Beauty On The Fire", however, was one of the more critically-acclaimed tracks from
White Lilies Island and is considered by fans to be her most underrated single. The album still managed to sell over a million copies but failed to repeat the widespread success of
Left of the Middle. She got married in 2003 to her long-time boyfriend, Daniel Johns, the frontman of Silverchair. Despite its relative lack of commercial success, White Lilies Island is Imbruglia's most critically acclaimed album to date and she co-wrote all of its 12 songs.
Counting Down the Days
Imbruglia's third album was ready in November 2003. Imbruglia's record label refused to release it due to it being too rock and not radio-friendly. She was later given songs to record with Scandinavian pop producers, which she refused to do. Imbruglia and her record label parted ways at the beginning of 2004. Four months later she signed with a new label Brightside Recordings, which was formed by a former Innocent Records boss Hugh Goldsmith.
Imbruglia started working on an album again. In April 2005, Imbruglia released her third studio album
Counting Down the Days in the UK with "Shiver" as its first single. "Shiver" was a huge success, and it became her longest running single in the UK since "Torn." It topped UK airplay charts for several weeks, reaching eighth place in the UK charts. It also became the most played song of 2005. The song?s acclaim and reception paid off and
Counting Down The Days became her first album to reach the top spot on the album charts.
It was decided that 'Sanctuary' would be second single from the album. The promo singles were sent to radio stations. The decision was later changed to the title track "Counting Down the Days", with radio stations being asked to play the album version, because the radio mix was not finished. The single was released on July 25th but it did not have as much success in the singles chart as "Shiver." Though it managed to reignite interest in its parent album, and also received a lot of airplay in the UK. Due to the single, the album managed to re-enter the top 40 in the official UK charts.
Imbruglia had a choice to either release 'Perfectly' as her third single, or use the GBP200,000 funding from BMG to do a tour. She decided to do a small European tour (as she had not done a proper tour since Left of the Middle in late October and November to promote the album. Though the album never entered UK Top 40 again, she proved once again that she had maintained a dedicated fan base; several concerts, especially those in London sold out.
The album is the 100th best-selling album in 2005, selling some 200,000 copies in the UK alone.
Glorious: The Singles 1997-2007
Imbruglia started working on her 4th album in late 2005. In mid 2007 the plans changed and Natalie's record company decided to release the single collection instead. The compilation is a celebration of Imbruglia's 10 years in the music industry.
On June 23rd it was announced that Natalie would release a singles collection titled
Glorious: The Singles 1997-2007 on September 10th. Natalie initially did not want to release the collection, opting for her fourth studio album instead, but was apparently made to compromise with record producers by adding a few new tracks. The release featured five new tracks including: "Glorious", and "Be With You", former of which was released on 27th August 2007. A bonus DVD is included.
[ Natalie Imbruglia MySpace page Retrieved on June 22, 2007]
Proposed 4th album and last with RCA/ BMG
Natalie's 4th studio album will be released after her filming for Wolverine finished in June 2008.
This month, Imbruglia finished filming Australian feature movie Elise in Adelaide. The former Neighbours star seems to be switching her focus back to her acting, after her single, Glorious, failed to set the charts alight in either Britain or Australia this year.
[[1] Retrieved on December 24, 2007]
Other recordings
In 1999 Natalie released the single "Identify", considered by many fans to be among her best recordings despite its relative obscurity. Written by Billy Corgan of The Smashing Pumpkins fame, the dark, brooding song ? an artistic departure for Natalie ? appeared only on a CD single and on the soundtrack for the movie
Stigmata. Natalie also wrote a song with Nick Seymour and David Biegel in 1999 called "Troubled By The Way We Came Together" which was part of the soundtrack for the movie "Go".
Another Phil Thornalley collaboration written with Natalie in mind, entitled "I Quit" ended up being given to short lived UK girlband Hepburn, which went onto become their only UK Top 10 hit in 1999.
She also recorded the song "Cold Air"
[2] for the Mexican movie "Y tu mama tambien", which also appeared as a B-Side on Beauty on the Fire.
In 2004 she did the vocals for the theme song in the Winx Club movie, called 'all the magic'.
Film career
Johnny English
Imbruglia made her big screen debut as an actress in the 2003 British comedy,
Johnny English. Starring alongside Rowan Atkinson, she played a supporting role as Lorna Campbell. The movie also featured another musical talent, bond, in a cameo appearance. Internationally, the movie did well despite negative reviews from critics. It topped box offices in 22 countries and grossed around $150m.
Elise
Since 2004, Imbruglia has been preparing for the small, self-financed lead role of Elise Silverton in the Australian independent film
Elise. The film is based on Georgia Blain's novel
Closed for Winter.
Elise is directed by James Bogle. Filming commenced 1 October, 2007 in Adelaide, Australia. It is believed that the reason for "Glorious: The Singles" being released now is so that Natalie will have a chance to finish the filming of Elise.Filming has wrapped and is now in post-production, with a tentative release date of March 2008.
It is also believed that Natalie has auditioned for the new Wolverine movie.
TV
Neighbours
Imbruglia made her first regular TV appearance in popular Australian soap Neighbours at the age of 16 in 1991. She played the role of Beth Brennan on the show.
L'Oréal
Imbruglia became a worldwide spokesperson for L'Oréal after the release of
White Lilies Island. She was a model for many cosmetic products by L'Oréal, particularly mascaras and skincare products. She also appeared in several TV commercials for L'Oréal. In July 2007, her 5 year contract with L'Oréal expired and was not prolonged, because, in her words, she's "not worth it".
[Starpulse News Blog Natalie Imbruglia Dropped From L'Oreal]
Celebrity Deathmatch
Imbruglia was featured in the 6th episode of 2nd season of Celebrity Deathmatch, in which Mel Gibson and Paul Hogan fought. She was accidentally decapitated by a boomerang that Hogan threw at Gibson, which Gibson dodged.
Personal causes
- Imbruglia is an ambassador for Virgin Unite and supports campaigns to end poverty and to bring attention to the disease known as obstetric fistula.
- She appeared in a sketch at the Secret Policeman's Ball for Amnesty International on October 31, 2006.
- She has also spoken publicly of suffering from clinical depression to raise awareness about the disorder.
[ http://www.sane.org/Information/People/Natalie_Imbruglia.html Sane.org ]
Looks & Fashion
Imbruglia was named 6th most naturally beautiful woman of all time in 2004
[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3763887.stm], much to the frustration of husband Daniel Johns, who said she should have been number 1. Audrey Hepburn topped the poll in which only experts like fashion editors, model agents and make-up artists could vote. She was ranked 90th on
VH1 100 Sexiest Artists.
She has been seen
fashioning tattoos of Sanskrit/Hindi inscription "Shreya" on her neck, Chinese word for courage on her left foot and Sanskrit
Aum on her lower back.
Imbruglia stated that she has never had any plastic surgery but added "I wouldn't rule it out because I don't know how I'll feel in the future."
[[3] ContactMusic.com ]
Discography
- 1997: Left of the Middle
- 2001: White Lilies Island
- 2005: Counting Down the Days
- 2007: The Singles 1997-2007
Notes
External links
1975 birthsLiving peopleItalian AustraliansSicilian AustraliansAustralian vegetariansAustralian Roman CatholicsAustralian television actorsAustralian pop singersAustralian female singersAustralian singer-songwritersARIA Award winners
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