« Suddenly Elvis appeared in the spotlight and he was magical. He was greeted by a chorus of wild roars like I had never heard before. (…) It was the most exhilarating experience of my life because for the first time, I knew that I wanted to go on stage, and be in the spotlight one day too “. It is with these words that Cher recounts in the first pages of her autobiography her first musical shock, which changed the course of her destiny. The first part of the memoirs of the legendary American artist is full of personal anecdotes which, behind their piquant humor, outline a whole section of the history of music. However, the 78-year-old icon had all the trouble in the world to find the inspiration to write it! “ I often thought it would be cool, but it was a lot harder than I expected. Because I was very late and I made three versions. Editors kept telling me, “We’re going to miss the deadline.” My friend Julia wrote and my sister helped us, sometimes we would go 11 hours straight without eating or drinking. I wanted to write stories and that takes time. Giving information is useless, it’s on Wikipedia » smiles the diva in a recent interview given to Parisian.
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“I am lucky to have a good memory”
What made this long and tedious work easier? “ I am lucky to have a good memory. I’m dyslexic, I can’t just have faults (laughs) » quips the iconic singer of the hit “I Got Your Babe” with Sonny, which launched her career in 1960. With more than 100 million albums sold, six decades of reinvention and even the Oscar for best actress on her fireplace, Cher is one of the few great pop culture figures still alive to tell her story. Was compiling these memories therapeutic for her? “ I don’t think so. It’s true that my childhood seems chaotic but, for me, living through it was normal. My father had left before I was born, we had no money, but I was surrounded by four wonderful women, including my mother. We often got angry but we loved each other. She had a much harder life than mine » she analyzes with hindsight.
“There was criticism but I held on”
Surprisingly, Cher scored the biggest hit of her career in 1998 when she was 52 years old. In a music industry where mature women are often relegated to the background, her achievement is historic. Especially since “Believe” is one of the first songs to have democratized autotune, a software modulating one’s voice to give it a robotic effect which has since become commonplace, particularly in rap. The creation of this anthem will undoubtedly be on the program for the second part of this autography, since the first volume ended in 1980. However, Cher reveals the behind the scenes for the French daily. “ The recording was a real chaos! The chorus was great but the verse was not good. And I couldn’t improve it. I ended up arguing with my producer, who was my boyfriend, and I went back to the castle where we lived in England » relates the interpreter of “If I Could Turn Back Time”, then in a relationship with Mark Taylor. If the atmosphere was electric, the producer was able to find the perfect idea to ease tensions and solve their problem: “ He called me back and said he found a solution using a tone-modulating machine. I thought I would hate it but I listened and we high fived. We had never heard this sound ».
The tandem thus gave birth to what immediately turned into a global success. Ranked number one in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and also in France, “Believe” will allow Cher to become the oldest female artist to reach first place in the American charts – a record since broken by Brenda Lee with “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree”. However, the reception given to “Believe” was as eventful as its conception! “ There was criticism but I held on. It’s harder to become again than to become. Because people want you to always conform to the image they have of you » underlines the superstar, who says he found a lot of comfort in his transition to cinema. See you in a few months to discover the second part of this story!
