Can Shakira C o n q u e r the World? Her album is late. Her shrink is on the phone. And her biological clock is ticking. But nothing will stop Shakira’s quest for global domination By Vanessa Grigoriadis u Photographs by Max Vadukul 44 • Rolling Stone, November 12, 2009 Rolling Stone, November 12, 2009 • 4 5 SHAKIRA ost of the time, when shakira is want to be free to do anything that I want recording music in Nassau near her home to do sonically. I think dance music today has a lot to offer in that sense.” Says Sam in the Bahamas, she wears her PJs all day Endicott, lead singer of the Bravery and and hardly ever puts on shoes. But today co-writer of “She Wolf,” “Shakira is open- minded. I love that she howls in ‘She Wolf.’ is supposed to be her last day of work on It’s so bizarre and cool.” She Wolf, the album she has been creat- In September, after the “She Wolf” sin- gle didn’t catch fire on U.S. radio – it rose ing for a year, so she’s decided to celebrate, to Number 11 but never broke the Top 10 dressing up in a silver necklace, a long black silk dress with spaghet- – it seems that Shakira and her label went Mti straps and club-kid platform shoes that lift her five-foot-two-inch into high gear to get a single that would. A day before the Video Music Awards, on frame up like stilts. “My boyfriend is six feet tall, and sometimes I September 12th, Amanda Ghost, the head feel like I’m his keychain, a small little thing,” she says, then sighs. “I of Epic and co-author of Shakira’s song “Gypsy” – a possible third single from the am so ready for this to be over!” she exclaims. “I just told my manag- album – says she got a call from Timba land er, ‘I’m ready for hair and makeup. Just take me out of here.’ ” u As to visit him at Trump Palace. He wanted her to hear “Give It Up to Me,” a track he Shakira makes her way into the studio, though, her mood begins to had in mind for Shakira, even though darken. When she can’t find the keys to her car in her Gucci hand- the She Wolf album was ready to Tiny Dancer ship. “I hate changing plans,” says bag, she searches for them with the intensity of someone who has Ghost, “but the music business is lost her passport before an internation- the house together, but men aren’t very done today,” she says. “It may not be the Shakira began the Wild West right now, so I’m al flight. Once she finds them, she climbs focused on the details. Now, I’m the wife, last day of the rec ord after all.” performing at age four, ripping up the rule book and start- into her pristine Mercedes SUV, turns up staying behind to put the flowers in the But the album is late – will she get some when she started ing again.” She played the song for Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon and vase.” Her process as a producer is to lis- grief from the label for missing her dead- belly-dancing. She’d put Shakira in the car on the way to the on shows for her zips down a twisting coastal road, mak- ten as much with her body as her ears. In line again? She cocks her head, consider- VMAs, and they made a decision to classmates in Colombia ing what seems to be a very illegal U-turn, fact, “Hips Don’t Lie,” her first collabora- ing the question. “You mean I might have (opposite). With Wyclef push the release of the album from at least by U.S. standards. On one side, the tion with Wyclef and the bestselling sin- to beg someone for extra time?” she says. Jean performing their October 12th to November 23rd. road is overhung with the dense foliage gle of her career, is a phrase she has used “Beg? Ah, no. No.” 2006 hit “Hips Don’t “We said, ‘Fuck it all,’ ” says Ghost. of mango trees, and on the other, there’s in the studio for a long time: “I would say, Lie.” The song is the The drama didn’t stop there. For a vast expanse of glittering Caribbean, ‘Hey, do you see my hips moving?’ ” she eedless to say, this bestselling of her career. “Give It Up,” Shakira filed her parts which she throws a longing look. “I haven’t says, laughing. “ ‘No? This is not working. was not the last night of “I focus 100 percent of remotely, writing the lyrics on a car been in the ocean for so long,” she whines. My hips don’t lie.’ ” Shakira’s record. She’s my physical energy on ride during her promotional tour There’s already a whirl of activity at the An assistant hands over a pot of cof- messed with She Wolf end- the music,” she says. in Germany and taking one of her studio, with Shakira’s exhausted manage- fee, and Shakira pours herself a cup. “I lessly, because she cares so days off in London to rec ord. At ment team punching away at their Black- stopped coffee for six months, because Nmuch about it succeeding. “I know that first, it looked like Timbaland would take Berries and engineers making changes in when I drink it, I get cravings,” she says. this is my moment in America,” says Sha- all the rap parts on the track, but then they the control room (“I have them create all of “But now I need to have it three times a kira, who is already a global superstar hired Flo Rida to cut them instead – and my ‘K’s and ‘R’s on the computer, because day.” She’s trying to watch her weight, even with 50 million records sold and earnings then, says Ghost, “Everyone’s breath was I cannot say them with my accent my- though she shouldn’t. She’s gorgeous, with of over $100 million – even if she isn’t taken away when Lil Wayne said he want- self,” she explains). Compass Point Studios an expressive, heart-shaped face, a thick quite in Beyoncé territory here. “This is ed to jump on the rec ord.” Even though was founded in the late 1970s by Island fringe of eyelashes and a supertoned body my chance to consolidate a career and my Lil Wayne and Shakira now share billing Rec ords’ Chris Blackwell: AC/DC record- without the plastic endowments up top dreams as an artist in the U.S., so that I on the song, they’ve met only once, brief- ings by ed three albums here, including Back in that usually complete the picture. “In Co- can continue making music for a long time K ly, when they landed at an airport in the toc Black, and the halls are lined with gold lombia, I’m the only woman who doesn’t and traveling the world.” This might sound s Bahamas at the same time. “This is the age records and portraits of Eighties artists have those,” she says. “Colombian sur- cold and calculated, but for Shakira, this Im modern approach to things, with so little chilling in the Caribbean, some in baby- geons are the best, along with Brazilians, is an emotional moment: After this tour, time and so much going on,” says Shakira, ane/Wire blue shorts and mirrored sunglasses. “I am in South America. It’s cheaper there, and she wants to start a family. “And that’s less K laughing prettily. “I guess I’ll see him when e Montparnasse, we shoot the video.” such a huge fan of Bob Marley, the Cure the doctors there make them pretty natu- an intellectual decision than a physical evin d K i and AC/DC, and when I heard about this ral, very good.” calling,” she says, a glimmer of excitement K “Women deal with Shakira is one of the best flirts in the ira; K legendary studio where all of them record- She steps into the control room. “Are you passing over her face. “My body feels like t by Ki world, and that laugh is part of it, a long L sha ed, I knew I had to be here,” says Shakira. ready?” she asks Gustavo Celis, a Grammy- it is asking to reproduce, to have a huge F stream of rapid-fire giggles that are so “This place is the main reason that I set- winning mix engineer, hoping to listen to belly and carry babies. And when the baby so many pressures: cute they could come from a baby unicorn. tled in the Bahamas.” his new mix of “Men in This Town,” a track comes, I don’t want to be in the middle of She has two faces: on one hand, just total- t: courtesyt: o As a musician, Shakira is a perfection- about desperate single women prowling 100,000 projects.” F ly adorable, as much of a coquette as her e L ist – “I’m an Aquarius, but I’ve turned into for decent guys at places like Los Angeles’ She Wolf is only Shakira’s third album in M belly-dancing would imply; on the other, ro aesthetics, being eadpieces, shirt and be F a Virgo over time,” she says. She wrote 60 Sky Bar.