"The Sport I can't Live Without"

Loaded Groove Pet
August 2001

Spiller sextress Sophie Ellis-Bextor on public nudity, selling heroin and gurning

Words: Scott Manson
Photos: John Stoddart
Article printed August 2001 issue of 'Loaded' magazine

"I made $16.5 million dollars on a cocaine deal this morning," grins Sophie Ellis-Bextor, explaining that she bought a kilo of coke for $15,000 and then moved it across town to sell it for $29,000. On the face of it, this seems like a refreshingly honest statement from a dance music star. In a scene where 'keeping it real' is key, most clubbing celebs still shy away from discussing drugs, let alone telling journalists about their serving-up skills.
"Yes, I'm a dealer," she admits. It's worth pointing out though, before loaded's lawyers get a call, that she's strictly a virtual criminal, playing a fiendishly addictive game called Dope Wars on her Palm Pilot every day. "You start off selling grams and then you work your way up to running the supply for a whole city. It can be a bit embarrassing though, I was on the tube the other day, checking my progress, and shouted, 'Damn, I should have bought the heroin!' The other passengers did not look impressed."
She throws her head back and barks out the filthiest laugh imaginable. Slim, posh, heart-breakingly cute and only 22, Sophie Ellis-Bextor may look like an untouchable ice queen of pop but in truth she's a mischievous pussycat.
Just witness last year's tabloid-orchestrated catfight between her and Posh Spice as 'Groovejet' and 'Out Of Your Mind' battled it out for Number One. As a desperate Mrs Beckham got increasingly catty, Sophie kept smiling, and sales for the Ibiza anthem kept climbing, eventually reaching 202,000 - putting her and Italian DJ partner Spiller 20,000 sales ahead of Beckham's garage-lite effort. 'Groovejet' was the fastest-selling single of the year, not bad for a girl whose previous taste of fame was fronting an under-achieving indie band called theaudience.
"I never liked being labelled 'indie', though. It's a grubby scene and I'm into glamour, not gloom. My music has become more happy and pure since I discovered dance."
Then again, it seems being a newly-hatched dance celebrity isn't always so glamorous.
"I was doing a PA at a grim club up north and the hydraulic stage broke down so I had this panicked bouncer pushing my bum while I pulled myself up on stage."
Nice. What about club punters, are they more glamorous than indie kids?
"Hmm, well they gurn more. I can't look at the gurners while I'm on stage, they look really ugly and it makes me feel sick. Still, it's better than them shouting 'get your tits out' I suppose."
Gurning drug-dustbins aside, Sophie's fans seem a pretty normal bunch. No letters written in menstrual blood? No requests for toenail clippings?
"I'm still waiting for some mad fanmail. Something with unusual descriptive passages would be great [Sophie gives another big dirty laugh]. God, that's really left me open to all sorts now."
To be fair, 'unusual' is a theme that's been running through Sophie's life. Her mum, Janet Ellis, was a Blue Peter presenter and that, plus her wide and exotically geometric face ("I did look a bit funny when I was at school") brough her in for a bit of playground stick.
"I didn't have a boyfriend till I was 16," she admits. "It took a while for my features to, er, settle. I'd go to parties and watch girls being chatted up by blokes I fancies while I sat there and seethed."
Her teenage angst was redirected from boys to music and she started writing songs. Really, really bad songs.
"They were nasty, angsty, hormonal things - like Placebo B-sides. Listen to this: 'The kamikaze part of me is dying to be with you.' Isn't that the worst line from a song you've ever heard? I thought it was really deep at the time."
Tschh, call that bad? She's clearly never heard Snap's 'Rhythm Is A Dancer' ('I'm as serious as cancer when I say rhythm is a dancer') or anything by Atomic Kitten.
Things improved though and, by the age of 17, she was fronting theaudience. Although they didn't exactly set the charts alight (number 25 was their highest placing), Sophie's aloof stage presence had many music critics dribbling over their dictaphones: "Liquid Vivien Leigh poured into a Helena Bonham Carter mould," was on of the more memorable descriptions.
Predictably, given her take-no-shit nature, Sophie ended up in an acrimonious wrangle with her record company.
"I felt quite suffocated. They were trying to turn me into this Sharleen Spiteri [from Texas] figure, like an edgy look with a safe, family-friendly sound and I resented it."
They probably weren't too chuffed when you turned down a support slot with Robbie Williams either? Apparently Robbie was so insulted when he heard you'd call him a Butlin's Redcoat performer he said that if he ever met you he'd make sure you left the room weeping...
With a shrug, she insists he's still an overhyped cabaret act: "He's not a credible performer, so we refused to do the tour. Simple as that."
Admirable sentiments indeed, but this uncompromising stance, coupled with disappointing record sales saw the band dropped, and Sophie was stuck in the creative wilderness marked 'Almost Was', in the country of 'Could've Been'.
Strapped for cash, she took a "totally demoralising" decision and joined a model agency, turning up for casting calls at magazines where she's previously been tipped as 'one-to-watch' musically.
"That was the most depressing part, being in a magazine office showing them my portfolio and having journalists wander past saying, "Aren't you Sophie from theaudience?"
So, we have to ask, will we be seeing any embarrassing Geri Halliwell-style glamour shots appearing? Any I-was-young-and-needed-the-money 'artistic' photography sessions you want to get off your chest?
"Well, no. Er, not really. But after the second month of modelling I did start to loosen up a bit on the stuff I'd do. There's on shoot - God I hope it doesn't come out - where all I'm dressed in is sequins. They're sort of Blu-tacked to the bits that need hiding, if you see what I mean."
That said, exposed flesh is something she wholeheartedly approves of and if there was one law she'd like to change it's the one which forbids public nudity. Were Ms Bextor in charge, the whole of Britain would be spiller-ing out (sorry) wherever and whenever we want to.
"The problem with naturists, though, is that it's always the wrong people campaigning for them," she muses. "Old, wobbly people are not going to convinve anyone that there's something to be said for going naked in public.
"I do enjoy strolling around at home naked. It's a bit silly though, 'cos if I'm standing in the window of my flat with nothing on I assume that if I can't see anyone looking at me then they can't seem me either. I hope my neighbours don't read this."
You've just moved into a posh new flat in London's Swiss Cottage. How about speaking to Hello! magazine and doing one of those cheesy 'at home' features in the buff? You relaxing on a sofa with a carefully positioned cushion perhaps?
"Ha! No, I don't think so. OK! actually have asked me to do a shoot but I just wouldn't. 'Love me, love my sitting room' just isn't me, no matter how much money they'd offer!"
It's unlikely that financial pressures are going to dog her in the near future. A new deal signed with Polydor as a solo artist will see her brand of quirky electro-pop hitting Britain's collective consciousness big-style in the coming months. There's an album in the offing, with first single 'Take Me Home' due out this month, co-written and produced by Damien LeGassick, one of the studio wizards behind Madonna's 'Music'. While less obviously 'dance' than Groovejet, its summery synthy sound, plus some house remixes, will ensure it ends up at the front of many a DJ's Ibiza record box. The rest of the album is similarly strong, moving from bouncy pop ('Murder On The Dancefloor') to chilled soundscapes like 'Move This Mountain', written by Blur bassist Alex James. There are currently 19 tracks jockeying for position on this album, and Sopie is clear about what kick-started this second burn of white-hot creativity.
"If it wasn't for Spiller and discovering dance music I would never have made this album. My sound has modernised, I'm much more in tune with the groove and the whole European electro style. It's a cleaner sound, a glamorous sound."
Glamorous but unconventional, sexy and a bit weird-looking, this double-barrelled dance hero is, without a shadow of a doubt, one of the most unusual pop stars likely to be tickling the top of the charts this summer. With this in mind, is there anything slightly weird you can do with your body, like those kids at school who could do that gross folded-back eyelid trick?
"I can tie a knot in a cherry stalk with my tongue," she says. "And I can do this..."
Without prompting, she opens her mouth and folds her tongue into a weird cloverleaf shape which, truth to tell, is also vaguely erotic.
"Apparently, there's only about one in 250,000 people who can do it."
That many? We'd put Sophie Ellis-Bextor down as one in a million...

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