I wanted to be that quirky girl who wrote funny songs that still had something to say,” Katy Perry said, reminiscing about her life before becoming one of the most recognizable women in the world. The California dreamer did it, safe to say.
The famous internet chick Katy Perry was born Katheryn Hudson in Santa Barbara, California. She spent her early years being raised by exceptionally religious – not to mention strict parents, who instilled a love for music within their child when she sang as a small girl in the church choir. But as the girl whose mum and dad couldn’t let her watch MTV growing up, she sure knows how to write a stick-in-the-head-chorus pop song.
Career
The brunette singer broke through to the big time back in May 2008 with her raunchy anthem I Kissed A Girl, and a trashy, fun girly image that the world of pop had been missing for years. But the song barely saw the light of day. “[My record company] said, ‘We don’t consider it a single; we don’t want it on the album. And I was like, ‘You guys are idiots, ‘ Katy Perry has previously said. I go out and always try to make a lasting impression and I work my ass off. You can burn bright and then just disappear again – “My dad quotes as saying, ‘You can’t be a flash in the pan’.
And thanks to the shrewd singer’s persistence, that song became a worldwide smash: It was the technique she had used to get herself signed in the first place. She didn’t really achieve big success until she was 23.”
I had a powerful vision, and I think some record companies didn’t necessarily like that, but I waited for the right one and took my chances. I was one of the fortunate ones because it can go both ways.” Katy Perry had actually released an album before, a self-titled gospel rock record that bombed.
Afterward she altered her surname to Perry – she thought Katy Hudson sounded too similar to the actress Kate Hudson – and made a career-defining move to the bright lights of Los Angeles. It was more of the same with her major-label debut album One Of The Boys – what Perry described as her “baby” – and singles Hot n Cold and Waking Up In Vegas stormed the charts.
Katy Perry toured non-stop to promote the album, and finally dropped its follow-up, Teenage Dream, in 2010. The kooky star, as always, infused her personality all over the CD. The cover art was a photo of her lying nude on a cotton-candy cloud; even the disc itself smelled like cotton candy.
Lead single California Gurls – featuring West Coast rap titan Snoop Dogg – was another summer anthem, while she subsequently released singles Teenage Dream and Firework. But Katy had experienced quite a bit of real life by the time of her second album’s release, and it showed in her sound. “My new songs are a bit more mature,” she shared. I can manage boys now. I don’t even fuck with boys no more; I fuck with men.”
Although it was initially met with mixed reviews, Teenage Dream has since received widespread acclaim from music critics and is primarily held as a defining pop record; it also had that status in the 2010s decade, “Pop perfection” retrospectively to be exact.
Shortly after the global success of Teenage Dream, Katy Perry started working on Prism, which was meant to be darker than its predecessor after her marriage ended. The album was a mix of anthems, including “Roar” and “Unconditionally,” as well as more jaded songs like “Dark Horse.” It was a global success, just like Teenage Dream.
Katy’s fifth album, Witness, proved to be a controversial release as in her latest era she decided to go for “purposeful pop”. The pop star abandoned her high-fly name to become what she called her “authentic self,” which means Katheryn Hudson. She cut off her long, dark hair in favor of a linky punky look and came clean with her natural blonde locks.
Three years later, Witness was followed up with Katy’s release of Smile.
You could argue that the album is even more commercially undercooked, despite having a self-help/empowerment narrative. More recently, Katy Perry has also played the Coronation Concert of Charles III last May at Windsor Castle, and played a concert residency at Resorts World Las Vegas.
Personal life
And not just any old men. She had become engaged to British bad boy comic Russell Brand. “I did a cameo with him when he was doing Get Him to the Greek,” she has said. My first scene was to kiss him. And on the way down the stairs after that scene, I was hopping like a bunny. And I jump around like a rabbit when I’m happy – it makes me quite childish.”
The sexy moment was eventually edited out of the filmBut in September 2009, their on-screen romance spilled over into reality, after the duo reunited at the MTV Video Music Awards. Notoriously promiscuous – plus a former heroin addict and alcoholic – Russell made no secret around the fact that he had fallen for Katy Perry.
And Katy Perry did not win anything and she is staying at the same hotel as me, so she’s going to need a shoulder to cry on. So in a sense I’m the real winner tonight,” he joked to the audience. They quietly began dating and got engaged after just four months together when Russell arranged a lavish, romantic proposal while the pair were in India over the New Year.
Two days before the bride’s 26th birthday, they were married with a sumptuous ceremony featuring elephants, camels and horses at the Aman-e-Khas resort just outside of Ranthambhore tiger sanctuary in India, on Oct. 23, 2010. “A Christian minister and close friend of the Hudson Family performed the private ceremony.
The marriage was relatively brief. Never mind that while Katy Perry was at her popstar prime, Russell always claimed he had the maturity to settle down and start a family. This appeared to boil over infamously when Brand texted her minutes before she was set to go on stage for a date in her tour, asking for a divorce. The marriage ended in 2012, and shortly afterward she dated John Mayer.
Katy Perry is now loved-up with actor Orlando Bloom, whom she began dating in 2016 and got engaged to in 2019 before giving birth to a daughter called Daisy Dove Bloom.
