Nikki Webster is now 17, but is she acting her age? Craig Mathieson reports.
In an empty auditorium at the Yarraville Club, Nikki Webster is singing to her past. Standing on stage, running through Somewhere Over the Rainbow as part of her pre-show soundcheck, the 17-year-old pop star is clad in black: leather jacket, jeans and boots.
A few metres to her right, on a large video screen, is an image of herself as a 13-year-old, all perfect teeth and an explosion of pink. She’s older now but her image is still the sweetly precocious girl thrust into the public eye at the opening ceremony of the 2000 Sydney Olympics.
It’s the last day of the Victorian leg of Webster’s latest national tour, which has taken in locations from Ballarat to Ferntree Gully. She hits the road during school holidays; shows are at either 11am or 2pm – sometimes both – and feature Webster singing, in a strong voice for her size, over a recorded backing track while four dancers run through choreographed routines behind her.
It’s a sturdy business framework. Nikki Webster is already a brand name. She’s released three albums, appeared in musicals and now has a signature clothing range. A new line, designed by Webster, appears every two months, in competition with the range by America’s titans of tween, 18-year-old twins Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen.
The tween market is girls aged eight to 12 and it’s expanding rapidly as they flex their nascent consumer power and parents happily acquiesce. Tween is the gateway to teen, a steeping stone between Hi-5 and Justin Timberlake. It’s G-rated pop and angst-free celebrities. It’s goofy shows on the Nickelodeon channel and adventure-filled movies where a first kiss and a moped ride with a sweet boy are the plot’s pay-off. The Olsen Twins, Hillary Duff and Amanda Bynes are the American figureheads. Webster is the Australian pretender seeking parity.
But while her American contemporaries are trying to age their following, ushering them into adolescence, Webster appears to be operating in reverse. At 17, she’s reading Tim Winton’s Cloudstreet as part of year 12 English and will soon be old enough to drink, drive and vote, but she’s actively targeting a younger audience. Her new album, Let’s Dance, which features six new tracks and six standards, is recorded in a somewhat anodyne manner and regresses from the pop beat of 2001’s Follow Your Heart and 2002’s Bliss. It’s lighter, if that’s possible.
“I have younger supporters who are between three and six, up to teenagers and then parents and grandparents,” notes Webster. “It’s not a niche market, it’s quite broad.”
Her market laps her up, and spends up. At the Yarraville show, mum Elsa Gorman, of Hoppers Crossing, forks out about $100 on tickets and merchandise for her three young daughters. “My girls have got bags and purses and CDs. They’re moving towards the clothing line as well,” she says. Most in the crowd of 200 are under 10 but they’re well-versed in Webster’s product range and even have ideas on how it should develop. “More clothes and shoes,” suggests nine-year-old Bianca Rook from Newport, clutching her mother’s hand.
For many of Webster’s fans, this is the first time they’ve been to a concert. They sit cross-legged on the floor at the foot of the stage, while their various guardians congregate further back on rows of seating, taking advantage of the free tea and coffee before they’re dragged to the merchandise desk for further purchases. Stacked with T-shirts, Let’s Dance, posters and faux Access All Areas passes, it’s staffed by Webster’s older brother, Scott, and her mother, Tina, a bustling, attentive presence who also serves as her daughter’s costume mistress during the show and generally keeps a watchful eye on proceedings.
The show is loud, bright and without spontaneity. One father manages to work his way through several chapters of Michael Moore’s Stupid White Men while it unfolds. The kids yell and clap when they sense they should, standing up to learn various dances when told to. The children watch Webster and the parents watch their children. There are 12 songs, six costume changes (“Velcro, that’s the key,” says Tina) and it’s permeated with an innocent excitement. It’s a coaching clinic for the Celebrity Age.
Afterwards, her cheeks still flushed, Webster emerges and sits down at the merchandising desk, where she signs everything presented to her, poses for photos and never, ever lets her smile slip. She’s indomitable. At larger gigs, Webster signs for hours on end.
So why is she still singing for 10-year-olds?
“I love it. It’s great fun. There are all these people working with me and we’re a great team,” she enthuses, after the room finally clears.
“The shows are generally sold out and the audiences are full on. It’s a really interactive show and a really positive one.”
Does Nikki Webster ponder the future? How does she think she will change as she ages even more? “When you look at people like Britney (Spears), she was a young star and she’s grown up and made that change.
“A lot of people say she’s gone too far, but I don’t think I’ll be like that. Not now. I’m happy where I am now and I’m comfortable with myself and with my body. It’s also different for me because I do look young, so I suppose I’ll wait a few more years before I make that big jump.
“Obviously there’ll be subtle changes along the way because my body is changing, but the big changes are yet to come.”
She listens to Christina Aguilera, Usher and Outkast and talks about her career with a tactician’s eye. She’s ambitious (“You have to be, otherwise you just won’t get anywhere,” she says without pause) and determined to build her following. When she finishes high school at the end of this year she won’t be thinking about university.
Doesn’t she want to schedule a rebellious teenage phase? “I’m not the rebellious type. If I locked myself in my room instead of going on stage I’d just be wondering if people were screaming my name. I’m doing what I like to do and to me that’s normal. It’s a dream come true. It’s my life. And my job.”
Webster is tiny for her age – she admits she could still pass for 13 if she wanted – and with her shiny ringlets and petite features, she looks like a perfectly groomed lure for her demographic. But she’s quick to gently refute any suggestion that she’s manufactured for mass consumption. She stays on message during our interview in a manner that would do a government minister proud, and says she sees the good in nearly everything and measures her achievement through the feedback of her fans.
“It’s quite amazing. I’m really happy where I am.”
She says she is not scripted or controlled.
“I’ve never had media training and I never wanted to do that. I never wanted to be scripted, although a lot of people do write about me being scripted and being propped up and told what to say. I just talk freely.
“Everything I’ve done to date and everything I’ll do in my life is what I’ve chosen to do. Nothing has been dictated to me. I love talking, I’m a chatterbox.
“If it’s not something I believe in and not something I want to do, I won’t do it.”
Source: The Age
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