Lovely
Leona Lewis flew in to Toronto to do a round of promotions for her
Sony Music sophomore release
Echo, appearing on
MuchMusic's popular
MuchOnDemand program. The
X-Factor winner turned international superstar is best known for her worldwide number one hit
Bleeding Love, which made her the third British female artist only to ever top the
Billboard Hot 100 Chart. To date, Lewis has sold 6.5 million albums worldwide and in the UK,
Echo debuted at number one again last week selling 161,000 copies. This of course, is far off the mark set by her first album
Spirit which sold 375,000 there in its first week. The album however, has not fared as well in the U.S., debuting at number 13 with 68,000 copies sold.
Lewis fielded questions from VJ
Devon Soltendieck and confirmed that she is about to embark on her first world tour, although North American dates have yet to be announced. She is currently residing in London, although she did reside temporarily in Los Angeles last year while recording
Echo, as many of her producers were American-based. She did mention also that it was a great pleasure working with
Ryan Tedder and that she admired
Simon Cowell very much as she can count on him to "tell it as it is".
I did manage to get in close with her and she is quite gorgeous in-person; very soft-spoken. Luckily, I also got her to autograph my copy of
Spirit. To be honest, I have given
Echo a couple spins and not many of the tracks stuck with me as she opted for more of a rock direction on this album. I don't feel that this was as suited to her as the R&B-lite sound on
Spirit. The album takes few risks and borders perhaps on being a little too "mature" for an album by a 24 year-old pop artist. The essence of pop music is that it should always be fun/entertaining and I just never got this out of
Echo. I am however a huge fan of her track
Max Martin-produced
I Got You (featured on this blog previously) which hasn't been confirmed as a single yet. I would definitely be interested in seeing
Lewis on tour, so I'll be keeping a tab on further announcements to come.
For more pics I got from
Lewis' visit today, visit my
Facebook gallery
here.
album. As usual, her make-up is impeccable and she looks awesome. But perhaps, the message of the song is most important. If you're with someone and not in love with them, "you're not losing them by letting them know". Honest words to live by.
single will be released on February 16, 2010. Although already great, it would've given it that extra punch to have all the artists together at the end in a series of big repeated choruses, don't you think?
