Kylie Minogue
Kylie Ann Minogue AO OBE (/mɪˈnoʊɡ/; born 28 May 1968) is an Australian singer, songwriter and actress. Minogue is the highest-selling female recording artist from Australia, having sold over 80 million records worldwide.[2] She has been recognised for reinventing herself in music as well as fashion, and is referred to by the European press as the "Princess of Pop" and a style icon. Her accolades include two Grammy Awards, four Brit Awards and eighteen ARIA Music Awards. Time named her one of the most influential people in the world.
For other uses, see Kylie Minogue (disambiguation).
Kylie Minogue
Born and raised in Melbourne, Minogue first achieved recognition starring as Charlene Robinson in the Australian soap opera Neighbours (1986–1988). She began her music career in the late 1980s, releasing four bubblegum and dance-pop-influenced studio albums under PWL. By the early 1990s, Minogue had amassed several top ten singles in Australia and the UK, including "The Loco-Motion", "I Should Be So Lucky", "Especially for You", "Hand on Your Heart" and "Better the Devil You Know". Taking more creative control over her music, she signed with Deconstruction Records in 1993 and released the albums Kylie Minogue (1994) and Impossible Princess (1997).
By joining Parlophone in 1999, Minogue returned to mainstream dance-oriented music with Light Years (2000), including the number-one hits "Spinning Around" and "On a Night Like This". The follow-up, Fever (2001), was an international breakthrough for Minogue, becoming her best-selling album to date. Its lead single, "Can't Get You Out of My Head" became one of the most successful singles of the 2000s, selling over five million units. Follow up singles, "In Your Eyes" and "Love at First Sight" became hits as well. She continued reinventing her image and experimenting with a range of genres on her subsequent albums, which spawned successful singles such as "Slow", "I Believe in You", "2 Hearts" and "All the Lovers". In 2017, she partnered with BMG Rights Management, with "Dancing" (2018) as their first release. In the following years, Minogue became the only female artist to have a number-one album and a top ten single, from the 1980s to the 2020s in the UK charts, with Disco (2020) and "Padam Padam" (2023) respectively.
In film, Minogue made her debut in The Delinquents (1989), and appeared in Street Fighter (1994), Moulin Rouge! (2001), Holy Motors (2012) and San Andreas (2015). In reality television, she appeared as a judge on The Voice UK and The Voice Australia both in 2014. Her other ventures include product endorsements, books, perfumes, charitable work and a wine brand. Minogue's achievements include being an ARIA Hall of Fame inductee, Officer of the Order of Australia (AO), Officer of the Order of the British Empire, Chevalier (knight) of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and an honorary Doctor of Health Science (D.H.Sc.).
Life and career
1968–1986: Early life and career beginnings
Kylie Ann Minogue was born at Bethlehem Hospital[3][4] in Caulfield South, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, on 28 May 1968,[5] to car company accountant Ronald Charles Minogue and his wife Carol Ann (née Jones), a former ballet dancer.[6][7] Her mother moved to Australia from Wales in 1958 as part of an assisted migration scheme on the ship Fairsea. Also aboard were the Gibb family of later Bee Gees fame.[8][9] Minogue is of English and Welsh descent (though her surname is of Irish origin)[10] and was named after the Nyungar word for "boomerang".[11] She is the eldest of three children: her brother, Brendan Minogue, is a news cameraman in Australia, and her sister, Dannii Minogue, is an actress, singer and television host.[12] The family frequently moved around various suburbs in Melbourne to sustain their living expenses, which Minogue found unsettling as a child. She would often stay at home reading, sewing, and learning to play violin and piano.[13] When they moved to Surrey Hills, Victoria, she went on to Camberwell High School.[14] During her schooling years, she found it difficult to make friends.[15] She got her HSC with subjects including Arts and Graphics and English.[16] Minogue described herself as being of "average intelligence" and "quite modest" during her high school years.[16] Growing up, she and her sister Dannii took singing and dancing lessons.[13]
A 10-year-old Minogue accompanied Dannii to a hearing arranged by the sisters' aunt, Suzette, and, while producers found Dannii too young, Australian television producer Alan Hardy gave Minogue a minor role in soap opera The Sullivans (1979).[12][13] She also appeared in another small role in soap opera Skyways (1980).[13] In 1985, she was cast in one of the lead roles in the television series The Henderson Kids.[17] Minogue took time off school to film The Henderson Kids and while Carol was not impressed, Minogue felt she needed the independence to make it into the entertainment industry.[18] During filming, co-star Nadine Garner labelled Minogue "fragile" after producers yelled at her for forgetting her lines; she would often cry on set.[18] Minogue was dropped from the second season of the show after Hardy felt the need for her character to be "written off".[19] In retrospect, Hardy stated removing her from the show "turned out to be the best thing for her".[20] Interested in following a career in music, Minogue made a demo tape for the producers of weekly music program Young Talent Time, which featured Dannii as a regular performer.[21] Minogue gave her first television singing performance on the show in 1985 but was not invited to join the cast.
She was cast in the soap opera Neighbours in 1986,[14] as Charlene Mitchell, a schoolgirl turned garage mechanic. The show achieved popularity in the UK, and a story arc that created a romance between her character and the character played by Jason Donovan culminated in a wedding episode in 1987 that attracted an audience of 20 million viewers.[22][23] She became the first person to win four Logie Awards in one year and was the youngest recipient of the "Gold Logie Award for Most Popular Personality on Australian Television", with the result determined by public vote.[24]
Artistry
Minogue explained she first became interested in pop music during her adolescence: "I first got into pop music in 1981, I'd say. It was all about Prince, Adam + the Ants, that whole New Romantic period. Prior to that, it was the Jackson 5, Donna Summer, and my dad's records – the Stones and Beatles."[147] She would also listen to the records of Olivia Newton-John and ABBA.[13][63] She said she "wanted to be" Newton-John while growing up.[63] Her producer, Pete Waterman, recalled Minogue during the early years of her music career with the observation: "She was setting her sights on becoming the new Prince or Madonna... What I found amazing was that she was outselling Madonna four to one, but still wanted to be her."[14] Minogue came to prominence in the music scene as a bubblegum pop singer and was deemed a "product of the Stock Aitken Waterman Hit Factory".[38][63] Australian musician Nick Cave, who worked with her, was a major influence on her artistic development.[291] She told The Guardian: "He's definitely infiltrated my life in beautiful and profound ways."[292] Throughout her career, her work was also influenced by Jamaican singer Grace Jones,[293] British singer-songwriter-producer Cathy Dennis, British record producer D Mob,[292] British band Scritti Politti,[147] Icelandic singer-songwriter Björk, British rapper Tricky, Irish rock band U2 and Japanese pop band Pizzicato Five.[87]
Minogue has been known for her soft soprano vocal range.[294][295] Tim Sendra of AllMusic reviewed her album Aphrodite and said Minogue's "slightly nasal, girl next door vocals serve her needs perfectly."[296] According to Fiona MacDonald from Madison magazine, Minogue "has never shied away from making some brave but questionable artistic decisions".[297] In musical terms, Minogue has worked with many genres in pop and dance music. However, her signature music has been contemporary disco music.[60] Her first studio albums with Stock, Aitken, and Waterman present a more bubblegum pop influence, with many critics comparing her to American singer-songwriter Madonna. Chris True from AllMusic, reviewed her debut album, Kylie and found her music "standard late-'80s Stock-Aitken-Waterman bubblegum", however he stated she presented the most personality of any 1980s recording artist.[38] He said of her third album Rhythm of Love, from the early 1990s, "the songwriting is stronger, the production dynamic, and Kylie seems more confident vocally."[298] At the time of her third studio album, "she began to trade in her cutesy, bubblegum pop image for a more mature one, and in turn, a more sexual one." Chris True stated during her relationship with Australian singer-actor Michael Hutchence, "her shedding of the near-virginal façade that dominated her first two albums, began to have an effect, not only on how the press and her fans treated her, but in the evolution of her music."[299]
Her self-titled fifth studio album, primarily a dance-pop album integrating elements of R&B and adult contemporary music saw a shift in her music. Chris True of AllMusic stated the album is a "remarkable change from Minogue's previous teen pop material" and the "start of a second phase" in her music career.[300] From her work on her sixth studio album, Impossible Princess, her songwriting and musical content began to change. She was constantly writing down words, exploring the form and meaning of sentences.[301] She had written lyrics before, but called them "safe, just neatly rhymed words and that's that".[302] Sal Cinquemani from Slant Magazine said the album bears a resemblance to Madonna's Ray of Light (1998). He said she took inspiration from "both the Britpop and electronica movements of the mid-'90s", saying "Impossible Princess is the work of an artist willing to take risks".[88]
Her seventh studio album, Light Years is a disco-influenced dance-pop record, with AllMusic's Chris True calling it "arguably one of the best disco records since the '70s".[100] True stated her eighth studio album, Fever, "combines the disco-diva comeback of Light Years with simple dance rhythms".[303] Her ninth studio album, Body Language, was quite different from her musical experiments in the past as it was a "successful" attempt at broadening her sound with electro and hip-hop for instance.[299] Incorporating styles of dance music with funk, disco and R&B,[304] the album was listed on Q's "Best Albums of 2003".[305]
Critics said Minogue's tenth studio album X did not feature enough "consistency" and Chris True called the tracks "cold, calculated dance-pop numbers."[168] Tim Sendra of AllMusic said her eleventh album, Aphrodite, "rarely strays past sweet love songs or happy dance anthems" and "the main sound is the kind of glittery disco pop that really is her strong suit." Sendra found Aphrodite "One of her best, in fact."[296] Kiss Me Once, her twelfth studio album has been described by critics as her return to contemporary pop music.[306][307]
Her fourteenth studio album, Golden was heavily influenced by country music, although maintaining her dance-pop sensibilities.[308] Sal Cinquemani from Slant Magazine wrote "Golden further bolsters Minogue's reputation for taking risks—and artfully sets the stage for her inevitable disco comeback."[309] For her fifteenth studio album, Disco, she began
to audio engineer her own music due to the restrictions surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic.[310]
