Shakira Articles - Fade To Blonde

By Ed Morales of Urban Latino Magazine

A year or so ago, Gabriel García Márquez wrote about Shakira in his magazine, Cambio. "It's difficult to be Shakira in this day and age, not just because of her genius and judgement, but for the miracle of her maturity so inconceivable at her age. She has more prizes, trophies, and awards than many longtime veteran performer. You can see she is just how she wanted to be: intelligent, insecure, modest, desirous, evasive, intense," he explained.

Here she is today, all of those things, acting as if every moment of her life was a creative exercise, everything she said was broadcast live from some new planet she was visiting. There has always been something mystical about Shakira and her creativity. Sprawled across a couch in jeans and a white, ribbed tank top at the swanky Essex Hotel in New York City, Shakira was tired, but gracious. She had been out all night, shuttling between the numerous after-parties for the MTV Video Awards, where she presented alongside Busta Rhymes.

Towards the end of a long afternoon, I asked her about "Underneath Your Clothes," a song from her new album Laundry Service, where she sings, "There's the man I chose/ That's my territory/And all the things I deserve/ For being such a good girl honey."

"What do you mean, she was a good girl?" I asked, thinking the lyrics could be interpreted in a number of ways.

"It's like, how good was she, right?" she laughed, for a second completely amused by the reality of being "Shakira." The new kid on the block. The Lebanese Colombian girl-next-door who spent months learning English so she could conquer the American pop music world, only to be confronted in a hotel suite with a view of Central Park by a nosy reporter as she patiently pawed through her dyed-blond pseudo-dreadlocks.

"I feel I've been a good girl," she half-shouted, smiling, sitting up, rising to the occasion. "Underneath his clothes is everything I deserve for being a good girl. And the rest is for people to interpret. I don't want to explain each little word. I'm sure even [Soda Stereo frontman] Gustavo Cerati doesn't understand what he writes. Ask the painter Miró what he tried to express. It's impossible. I could explain it but I feel like I'm ruining the magic of it."

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