Kimberly Wyatt may have left the Pussycat Dolls behind her, but the 28-year old performer is about to embark on a new journey with her latest venture, Her Majesty & The Wolves.
Wyatt, who has previously worked with UK rapper, Aggro Santos, has teamed up with former Jupiter Rising member, Spencer Nezey, and MTV UK caught up with the duo to find out all about the project…
For those who aren’t familiar with Her Majesty & The Wolves, what can you tell us about the project?
Kimberly: Her Majesty & The Wolves is just a very exciting adventure for Spencer and I. I left the Dolls and was just searching for my next musical project and I met Spencer who’s an absolutely genius for everything that he’s brought to the plate of Her Majesty & The Wolves. It’s become a very conceptual album filled with incredible music with many different flavours and feelings and we’re just excited to be here and to be promoting our first single Stars In Your Eyes. We are excited for the adventure to begin.
How did the name Her Majesty & The Wolves come about?
Spencer: The name came from a concept that we knew we wanted to do something really cool and something big, kinda how Wu Tang Clan did something but not Wu Tang Clan, that sort of concept, like the Gorillaz. I came up with Her Majesty and I was playing around with this stuff and I have another friend who is really creative and we were hiking in Los Angeles and he kept saying we should do this thing with The Wolves. We kept going back and forth with it. Towards the end I was like, it makes sense as we wanted something cool and edgy but something soft at the same time. I told Kim and thought it would be a good idea.
You are best known for being in the Pussycat Dolls, how does the music you are making now compare to your previous material?
K: It’s hard to compare our music to the Dolls because it’s like apples and oranges really. I think that the flavours that we pull from are much different from the Dolls. We send our respects and love to the pop world and we have our songs like Stars In Your Eyes, but we are playing with others sounds aswell like dustep kind of flavours and Deadmau5, Calvin Harris type sounds. We are pulling from both worlds to hopefully creating something new and fresh.
Are you hoping to take your fans from PCD on this journey with you aswell?
K: I certainly hope to take my fans with me, you cant really do music without the fans, everyone’s gotta love it. I understand that some of the PCD fans aren’t going to love Her Majesty & The Wolves, what we are doing and our music but I hope to reach out to people that are going to jump on board and be interested.
How are you finding being in a duo compared to a group? What's it like working together?
S: I think we use this word all the time but it's organic, it’s natural and easy when you’re working with someone who is a professional and a cool person. Life is not too hard as far as this collaboration has gone so far.
K: I think we are just constantly bringing out the best in each other and I have the most trusted partner I could ever have, who brings a lot to the table, and I hope to bring a lot to the table too. Together we are just hoping to take over.
Seeing as you were in a girlband before, do you miss the girls and are you still in touch?
K: I love the girls, I do miss them. I see them every now and again we are all kind of finding ourselves within our own individual ambitions and I’m always very supportive and they are supportive of me. I brought Ashley, who was in the group with me, we were friends even before the Dolls and she came on board and did some choreography for Stars In Your Eyes and was in the video with me. I’m looking for ways to collaborate and stay in touch because I love performing with them and if it makes sense, we will definitely continue to work together.
The single is more of a dance track, do you think it is an accurate representation of what we can expect from your album?
K: I think it’s an introduction to our album, Stars In Your Eyes, it’s kind of just that beginning flavour of what to expect with everything else on the album, each song has a different feeling and message, the sounds are incredible, like playing with the dubstep sounds, which I am so excited about. I think that there’s a lot of new stuff.
S: There is a lot of good music. It’s all dance music but Stars In Your Eyes is kind of an introduction and at least opens the gates for people, to open their ears to something different, and not what you are used to. It will grow on you, it’s good stuff.
Your mentioned already that you like Calvin Harris and we read that you are inspired by Florence and the Machine, Empire of the Sun and Ladyhawke, will this be represented on your future LP?
K: I think that there is a lot of inspiration from all of those people, both of our interests are quite similar.
S: There is a combination of electronic music, like programme music and there is a good partnership with all the musicians that came in. We have like live strings, guitar players, keyboard players and everything. We still recorded the album traditionally but programmed new stuff as well, so it was cool.
Are there surprises on the album or any collaborations you can tell us about?
S: Well the producers are some of the people that did our remixes, those are cool collaborations like Sidney Samson did a remix of Stars In Your Eyes, Rocksonics did a remix of Glaciers and there is some other stuff floating around. Not so much as a traditional collaboration, but I like what they did with out music.
The video for the track reminded us of something from Tron Legacy, did you have much input? What was the concept behind it?
K: We definitely didn’t go into making Stars In Your Eyes thinking that we were going to make a Tron video, that just kind of happened. We met this guy, Justin Harder, who directed the video, and he is just so creative and he has a team that does aftereffects and we shot everything with a green-screen. We put a lot of trust into Justin with and what he could do with the computer and his software. Once we saw the outcome, I think we really served our purpose in creating a new world, kind of a new experience, like an introduction of what we always want to create, like a world for people to get lost in. I guess it is Tron like, but that wasn’t done intentionally.
Kimberly, after coming from such a successful girlband, do you feel pressure for Her Majesty & The Wolves to be as/more successful than PCD?
K: I don’t think I feel pressure directly because of that, I feel pressure because I’m an artist and I want to do my absolute best. You only feel as much pressure as what you put on yourself and I want to continue to grow and get better. I have visions in my head and I want to make them happen so it’s more pressure to live up to the visions I see in my head really.
Finally, what’s next for Her Majesty & The Wolves?
S: We are doing Kim’s show (Got To Dance) in February and we have got some shows coming up around that time, then hopefully touring in March for a while and coming back here (to the UK) for a while.
K: As long as the fans love it and we get a lot of support, we have huge and big hopes for Her Majesty & The Wolves. We want to create huge shows with lots of production and lights and really just create experiences. We want to create musical experiences that people can come and get lost in and that’s what we are really focused on and allowing it to happen organically.
Keep it MTV.co.uk for more from our Her Majesty & The Wolves interview, where Kimberly tells us what she really thinks of Nicole Scherzinger!
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By Joanne Dorken
