Kylie Minogue has had the knack for making bops since the ‘80s — and she has no plans to stop now. In fact, she’s upped the ante with new music and a new Las Vegas residency.
In an exclusive interview, the “Can’t Get You Out of My Head” singer, 55, talked to Us Weekly about what she’s learned about herself since releasing her self-titled album in 1988. “I immediately go really deep: I know I have a strong constitution and a strong will. I feel like I’m a quiet achiever, I don’t make a lot of noise about stuff. A lot of it is internalized, and that hasn’t really changed,” Minogue shares. “I’ve learned that this is my path.”
In the last three decades, the Grammy winner became the highest-selling Australian artist of all time, earned a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records and headlined at Glastonbury. But the proudest moments of her career involve “getting past every person that tried to write me off,” she tells Us. “I am sitting here in a good position — but I know the cost.”
“I’m proud that I’ve found a way to navigate that,” she continues. “Just feeling the fear and doing it anyway and [keeping] that search alive to do better, be better, connect with people and understand myself more.”
Kylie Minogue Edward Cooke
Most importantly, Minogue is proud of the way she handled critics of the genre of music she’s dominated. “Traditionally, there’s been people at certain moments in time that really want to not give that much credit to pop music,” she explains. “I’ll fight them, I’ll take them on because it is involved and just to be an artist of any sort … there’s different layers to it.”
In September, Minogue released her 16th studio album, Tension, which is “a very authentic representation of me right now,” the Neighbours alum tells Us. “Authentic to me is being in that electropop lane with a couple things that are out of my comfort zone.”
“Overall, it’s got a very liberated feel,” she says. “There’s a lot of freedom on it.”
The Melbourne Native is excited to perform new music — including her latest singles, “Hold On To Know”, “Tension” and “Padam Padam” — at her residency, which kicks off Nov. 3 at Voltaire at the Venetian Resort Las Vegas. “It’s [at] a custom-built club called Voltaire,” she tells Us. “It caps at a thousand [people], so it’s super intimate, [and] a cross between a 1930s club and Studio 54.”
Though Minogue admits the show she’s putting on isn’t the one she initially envisioned for Sin City — “I’ve done tours where it’s just massive … this is a different angle” — she’s excited to adapt to a more cozy feel: “It’s more akin to what Frank Sinatra or Elvis would’ve done before Vegas got bigger, which I think is fantastic.”
“We’re going to make one hell of a racket and go high octane,” she adds. “Turn it up to 11, basically.”
Tickets for Minogue’s residency are on sale now
