Date: 1 January 1987
Originally published in: Télé Loisirs (France)
Written by: Marc Thirion
One could believe Kim Wilde sacrificed to fashions and supplanted by Madonna, Sandra, Samantha Fox and other new stars. Well no!
Thinner and more radiant than ever, Kim Wilde is back in the charts around the world with ‘You keep me hangin’ on ‘, a song of the Supremes brought up to date. This is her thirteenth single from her fifth album, ‘Another Step’.
‘Indeed, I really worked differently on this disc at the concept level, the realization and even the cover. I totally invested myself. I stopped for three years before making an album again, because I had lost all confidence in myself. Successful income freed me.’
Little Kim left the family home to settle in London, near Regent Park, and then went to record part of her album in Los Angeles. ‘It was a very good experience, but a month there was enough for me. If I had to leave London, it would rather be to go live in Paris! ‘
At her side: the Wilde tribe, a family of musicians, since her father is none other than Marty Wilde, a true British rock star of the Sixties.
‘My father did not push at first, but I spent my youth traveling the world with him. At nineteen, I had two passions: music and painting. It was necessary to choose. ‘
Ricki, her brother composer and producer, was training for the first time in the studio to record a demo of ‘Kids in America’. First contact, first hit: Kim was only twenty years old. Since then, the hits follow one another: ‘Cambodia’, ‘View from a bridge’, ‘Love blonde’. Kim even gets the trophy of the best female 1983 performer in England. In 1986 the work is done. With ‘Schoolgirl’, Kim decides to write almost all the texts of her album and starts playing keyboards for a title. With joy, she announces she is number one in the UK ‘Top 10’.
‘It’s the first time. I really feel like I’m starting my career all over.’
Thus, Kim strolls again his sulky pout and his Bardot smile of rock around the world. Is she in love?
‘No! When I’m in love, I feel like I’m wasting the energy I need in my job. (Laughs.) And I have not found the man of my life yet. ‘
This is a sentence that will no doubt please her millions of admirers.
‘We wanted to stick a picture of a ‘glamor girl ‘a little free. It’s not because I sang ‘Love blonde’ that I have to assimilate to the traditional sexy blonde.’
Without an established ‘look’, Kim dresses mostly in black to avoid a clash of colours. The secret of her shape? ‘I’m too lazy to do sports. I force myself a little for swimming. I do not diet, but I do not smoke and do not drink. ‘
