R&BShe has sold 23m records, toured with Britney Spears, and been for dinner at the White House – so why isn’t she a household name? The Atlantan singer-songwriter reveals why she’s not as big as Rihanna – yet
One of the best lyrics of 2015 landed this week on Jackie (BMF), the opening track of Ciara’s sixth album, Jackie. “Man, I just delivered a 9lb 10oz baby,” the R&B star sings. “I’m a bad motherfucker.” Ciara repeats it at lunch in a Beverly Hills hotel, only mouthing the M word. “I love that line,” she beams. Another favourite lyric of hers is on the single I Bet. This time, she spells out the offending word. “Is that your girl over there? The one with the silicone A-S-S, and the Brazilian hair?” She laughs at her own brazenness. You can say the words “motherfucker” and “ass”, I tell her. “I don’t curse when I talk. Unless I’m mad. Then I say Scheiße in German, so nobody knows what I mean.”
Ciara is superbly well-mannered. “How are you? I’m amazing!” she says to the waitress. Would she like regular or wholewheat crust for her pizza? “Regular, please. And some of your incredible fries. Thank you.” She minds her Ps and Qs for a full hour, even without the presence of her growing son, Future Jr. “He’s huge,” she confirms. She’s raising her baby alone after splitting from his father, the rapper Future, having lived their relationship in public, shared most intimately on her 2013 single Body Party. She’s not worried about Jr eventually hearing that racy track. “I’m a grown woman,” she says. “Momma can do grown-woman things!” When Ciara heard retorts that Future had been unfaithful to her with his ex-wife (presumably the one with the silicone A-S-S), she channelled the drama into Jackie, her most autobiographical record yet. On the eve of its release, however, her focus is on her other baby. “He took four steps today. 1-2-3-4. If I could, I’d be around him every second of the day, but baby’s gotta eat and baby ain’t cheap,” she howls. “Watch out. He’s gonna be all over this place in two seconds.”
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, there. Today, the 29-year-old is a singer-songwriter, dancer, actor, model and soon-to-be TV star. She has sold 23m records and toured the world with Jay Z and Britney Spears. A few nights before our interview, she was dining at the White House. “It was my first time with Mr Barack Obama and Mrs Obama. Sorry, I should say that correctly,” she finishes her mouthful. “Mr President and Mrs Obama. It was a dream. I remember everything: the conversations, the china, the orchestra of army veterans, even the photos on the wall … It was so inspiring how elegant, eloquent and regal Mr President and Mrs Obama are.”
Ciara was born in Austin, Texas, but was brought up as an army brat around the US, with a spell in Germany, before her family settled in Atlanta, Georgia, when she 14. She calls her dad “Superman”, marvelling over his army stories. “He told me about surviving in the jungle. A jaguar jumped out across him at night time,” she says. “Fascinating. You’re literally lunchmeat in two seconds.”
As soon as the family settled, she began performing. “I was 14 when I started. I never had vocal lessons, dance classes, or any of the things my peers had.” she says. “I learned everything along the way. I only performed five times before I was in the public eye.” On graduating from high school in 2003, she was signed by LA Reid to the LaFace label. Her debut album, Goodies, went straight in the Billboard chart at No 3, its title track staying at No 1 for seven weeks – the longest run by a female artist since 1977. She was hailed as “the First Lady of Crunk & B” as she rode the wave of southern hip-hop.
Despite her success – 2010’s Basic Instinct is the only one of her albums not to reach the US top five – she has never become a household name in the manner of Rihanna or Beyoncé. “You know what I think?” she asks, rhetorically. “Everything’s about timing. I’ve had records just as big as those artists, I’ve had No 1 songs around the world. My biggest competition is me.” That and her old label, perhaps. After Basic Instinct only reached No 44, she left LaFace/Jive, announcing on Facebook that they had not supported her enough. Her next album, Ciara, released on Epic, duly went to No 2. “There’s no doubt in my mind how high up this train can go,” she says calmly. “I faced those challenges. I don’t see myself beneath Beyoncé and Jay Z; I don’t see myself above them. I’m in my own world, hungry to grow.”
Ciara attributes any disconnect between herself and the music-buying public – the fact that she isn’t a household name – not to an inaccurate portrayal of her personality, but to her not making that personality plain enough. Hence her forthcoming appearance as a regular on NBC’s celebrity variety show I Can Do That. “Over the years, there was a perception I was trying to be too perfect.” She narrows her eyes. “I’m far from perfect.”
She’s also started to be more vocal online. On Twitter she has mentioned the rioting in Baltimore, and she doesn’t avoid the subject in person. “You have to fight for what you believe in, but you can’t tear the town down,” she says. “We, as people – not just African Americans – have to have integrity.” But she doesn’t think music needs to respond to events like these: its job, she says, is to provide escapism. “I talk about the three Ms: music, money and medicine. Music is the most powerful force on earth because it heals. Cancer patients want music: it cures their soul.”
But she also has the caginess of a seasoned R&B star, content to offer platitudes on plenty of subjects: Jay Z’s Tidal streaming service – “Hey, man, do your thing”; Miley Cyrus – “If Miley wanna twerk, twerk”; Bruce Jenner transitioning – “I take my hat off to being courageous.” She talks so often about “the next chapter of my journey” that it’s like spending an hour with a contestant on The Apprentice.
The latest chapter in that journey – Jackie – has unfolded like a soap opera, with the recording beginning in autumn of last year, just months after the birth of Future Jr, and her relationship with his father ending, restarting and ending again in the period between recording and release. Her son is hymned on the lullaby I Got You, in which she forgoes any hint of tongue in cheek to declare her maternal love. She sets aside her pizza to recite the lyrics: “‘I lay my life down for you, I’ll crawl over broken glass, I will stand in the flame. Take the bullet, take the blows, I would take all the pain’ … Wow. That is powerful,” she says. “I feel every word of what I’m saying. I have goosebumps. I would die for my son.”
“Mommyhood” has revived Ciara’s drive. She says she’s “super thrilled” about her impending first headline tour in six years, no nerves in sight. “I’m gonna keep it real here,” she belly-laughs. “I gained 60lbs [during pregnancy]. I ate everything. Quesadillas, Cheesecake Factory, strawberry lemonade. I tell every mom to take advantage of that; eat all the foods you want. Then, when it’s time to get to business,” she clicks her fingers, “snap in to it. I was like a zombie robot, then I got a new level of confidence. Five months and I was back swinging.”
She’s looking beyond the album-tour-album cycle now, though. “I don’t know if I’ll still be doing music 20 years from now. It’s the foundation of my business, but I want to be a successful entrepreneur. I know I’m gonna be it.” Then she delivers her killer blow. “I’m on videotape aged 17 at high school graduation saying: ‘I’m gonna have a No 1 song in the Billboard chart and sell 3m copies of my debut album.’ One year later I had a No 1 song in the Billboard chart for eight weeks” – well, seven – “and I sold 5m copies of my debut. Now I’m on this next chapter in my life and I can assure you: give me 10 years, it’s gonna be great. I believe it.”
Jackie is out now on RCA
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