INTERVIEW
KYLIE ALWAYS & FOREVER
It’s been a wild year for pop icon Kylie Minogue – and she has no intention of slowing down, she tells Fiona McCarthy
Summer is approaching, so you can bet Kylie Minogue will be toasting not only its arrival, but the stellar 12 months she’s just had – with a glass of her own rosé. ‘It has been a trip,’ she beams. There was her sell-out residency at The Venetian’s new Voltaire club in Las Vegas. The viral sensation of Padam Padam and the Grammy win that followed (her first in 20 years). Her inclusion in Time magazine’s feted ‘100 most influential people of 2024’ list. Dua Lipa declared her ‘one of the greatest pop legends in the world’, presenting her with the Global Icon award at this year’s BRITs.
It takes Minogue, 56, a while to put her feelings about all the accolades and praise into words. ‘Of course, there have been waves of things happening for the first time throughout my career, but it feels like it is from a different “camera angle” now,’ she says. ‘On the one hand, it doesn’t change anything and, on the other, it changes a lot. It’s hard for me to unpack, let’s put it that way. But there has definitely been a part of me that has tried to relax into it and appreciate the recognition.’
She certainly didn’t see the sensation of Padam Padam coming. Fans of all ages and nationalities took to TikTok to recreate the dance moves from the song’s video; in February, it won the Grammy for Best Pop Dance Recording. Minogue loves that it has taken on a life of its own, becoming part of the cultural vernacular ‘as a noun, a verb, an adjective, even used as a greeting or farewell’, she says. ‘It’s so joyful. It feels like it’s not my song any more. When I’m singing along, it’s like it’s everyone’s.’
We catch up just before the Met Gala – where she wore a custom gown by Diesel’s creative director Glenn Martens and danced until dawn at the Loewe after-party with Jonathan Bailey and Andrew Scott – as her Vegas residency draws to a close. ‘It was a unique experience,’ she says. ‘Not so much adapting what I do as a performer, but adapting to how I felt about it. It was intense.’ The intimacy of a venue like Voltaire meant the crowd of 1,000 were incredibly close, confrontingly so at a mere arm’s length away. ‘It all added to the experience for the people in the room and the shows got wilder and wilder but, full disclosure, day one, I was thinking, oh my god, what have I done?’
The impact of Minogue’s 35-year-andcounting career in music cannot be overestimated: over 80 million records sold and five billion streams worldwide, she is the only female artist to score a number one album in five consecutive decades in the UK (her 16th album, Tension, flew straight to the top of the charts in September).
