NF: Yeah, unfortunately. Nothing serious, just silly little girl scraps. We were mostly all talk: "Yeah, I heard you said something bad about me -- you're dead, man!" And nothing happens and you end up getting suspended before you can even do anything. "Nelly Furtado, please come to the principal's office." I was kind of a nerd at the same time. I played in the school band, but I managed to somehow be cool at the same time -- it kept me balanced.
PB: Did you feel sheltered where you grew up?
NF: Victoria's a small city, which is great when you're a kid, but then you become a teenager and you get bored and it reminds you of those suburban movies where the kids are hanging out at McDonald's getting free refills and bumming cigarettes off people. But great things came out of that, too. You'd be hanging at the mall with the hip-hop kids and they'd be freestyling or doing graffiti -- it's actually great creatively.
PB: Have you been getting a lot of comparisons to Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera?
NF: Yeah, but it's kinda funny. This serious news anchorwoman was doing an interview with me, and she was like, "So what separates you from Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and 'N Sync?" And I was like, "Um, no choreography onstage. Have you heard my album or seen my show? Because it's so different." The only thing similar is that you look at my album cover and I look very young -- like 18. So I'm not blaming people for making those comparisons, and I'm fine with it.
I guess people in this industry these days are kinda jaded, and whenever they see a new artist like me they think, She's pretty, she's young -- the CD cover looks like Christina Aguilera so she must sound like that. Or they think I'm just a product of the label. I don't mind that because then they hear the record or they go to the show and they're usually blown away. I'm actually hoping I get compared to them because then we can trick the little kiddies into buying my CD.
PB: Regardless of what critics think, we really like the album cover art.
