This film image released by Paramount Pictures shows Katy Perry in a scene from her 3D film, "Katy Perry: Part of Me."
The so-called "god particle" has been discovered. Amelia Earhart's resting place in the South Pacific is about to be found out. These baffling mysteries are semi-solved to the point where we can now move on to the world's other great riddle: How did Katy Perry do it?
The pop princess's Part of Me (also the title of her new 3-D concert film, in theatres today) reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart this spring, giving her six chart-toppers in less than two years. The secret to Perry's success is that she's a product of a varied musical and marketing attack, involving chameleon-like pop sensibilities, a highly focused career drive, cartoon-y costumes and characters, community building, and yes, sex-selling savvy.
She kissed a girl and we liked it
Perry burst onto the pop-music radar in the spring of 2008 with the ear-snagging single I Kissed a Girl.
It's a thumping new-wavey number that transcended its catchy charisma with its girl-on-girl titillation. The video was audacious, naturally. And then we started to read up on this sexy upstart, and we find out she's got an equally titilating back story – a preacher's daughter who failed in her early attempt at Christian music. Spiritual songs like Oh Happy Day and His Eye Is on the Sparrow were quickly forgotten when Perry discovered her breasts spewed whipped cream. An audience lapped it up, and a career was born.
The art of the quick change
Perry is a real-life Barbie who changes costumes lickity-split, appearing on stage and in videos with ever-changing wigs and wacky attire. Unlike fellow tween-dream Justin Bieber (who, let's face it, is a fairly boring guy ), Perry, in fashion and personality, is a kaleidoscopic riot. Musically, she's married to nothing. Early in her relentless ascent, Perry was inspired by Alanis Morissette, who had transformed herself from kid-pop prodigy to angst-ridden singer-songwriter with help from producer Glen Ballard. Perry's own work with Ballard never was released. Undeterred, she then aligned herself with song-scientists like Desmond Child, Lukasz Gottwald and Max Martin. Ballard has said that Perry's emotional range and stylistic variety are "enormous," and that her music had great intelligence behind it. Yet California Gurls, the lead single from Perry's 2010 follow-up album Teenage Dreams, is silly and high-sheen. "But it's catchy as [bleep]," Perry told Rolling Stone, "and it's a great summertime song."
Who doesn't like cupcakes?
Perry's fans are a carefully cultivated lip-glossed throng. She's sexy to some of them, sweet to others and perhaps inspiring to all. It's possible the parents of her younger fans don't actually listen to Perry's go-all-the-way lyrics and sophomoric double entendres. She places cupcakes atop her boobs, and bizarrely encourages Katy-cats (or copy-Kats) to do the same. The pre-sexualization of a few of her more pint-sized followers on the red carpet of this year's Much Music Video Awards in Toronto was unsettling and inappropriate. But everyone wants to be like Perry, whose music is amped up, celebratory and uplifting – sometimes, as in the case of the sparky single Firework, all at once. There's dancey electro-rock and love songs too. As for live shows, Perry's 2011 tour grossed nearly $30-million (U.S.). The concerts are costume-crazed, high-energy extravaganzas. Unlike a drab presentation from someone such as Avril Lavigne, a Perry show is for all ages. Parents don't wait out in the car with a good book – they're in the building, getting a load of one of the world's most perfect pop fabrications.