Kate Hudson knew – no matter what – she needed to get the music inside her out. She’s lived, dreamed, breathed songs; that dream was her first true love and destination. She explains, “I didn’t know if it was a crazy dream, but I realized if this was my heart, I needed to surrender to this deep desire. I couldn’t worry about what people thought, I could only do the right thing by the songs inside me…”
Turns out everyone from Howard Stern to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, CBS Sunday Morning and the people clamoring into the Bellwether for her first official show have agreed: Glorious actually is pretty glorious. With Rolling Stone proclaiming, “one of the year’s most pleasant musical surprises, a thoroughly grown-up and strikingly assured collection of guitar-heavy songs that land somewhere between Adele and Sheryl Crow, with Hudson’s big, slightly husky voice and deep rock & roll fandom always front and center,” SPIN went further, offering, “With Glorious, Hudson goes for a full role-reversal—one she has been preparing for in private for many years — and it looks great on her … In the dozen songs on Glorious, she is self-reflective, using her life and growth for source material. Bolstered by [Danny] Fujikawa, Johan Carlsson, and Linda Perry as producers and/or songwriters, Glorious is wholly Hudson’s vision. Her truth is what’s heard on the early singles ‘Talk About Love’ and ‘Live Forever,’ whose video is interspersed with delightful home movies of Hudson and her sons. Hudson’s is husky-voiced bar crooner and lullaby whispering mother all at once, while her sound is part rock chick, part down-home country, with a strong sense of melody rooted firmly in guitar riffs.”
Coming off a whirlwind, including PEOPLE’s May 17 cover, Hudson performs “Glorious” on “The Voice” finale tomorrow (May 21). To celebrate the journey of a lifetime and realizing what could’ve stayed an impossible dream, she’s thrilled to encourage the contestants as they embark on that final round.
“Everything the contestants are feeling, I understand,” says the woman hailed by REVOLVER, BILLBOARD and HITS. “It’s such a big thing to put your heart out there, knowing how much is on the line, the way people will judge you and doing it anyway! I can’t wait to experience this.”
With all vinyl copies of GLORIOUS already sold out, Hudson’s TalkShopLIVE – hosted on RollingStone.com’s platform – her independently recorded and realized project has struck a chord with pop, rock and adult alternative music lovers with a sound that is both familiar and fresh. Distributed by groundbreaking Virgin Records, home to shape shifters and groundbreakers including Lenny Kravitz, Florence + the Machine, Iggy Pop, Janet Jackson and the Rolling Stones, the songwriter, and singer, who’s spent a lifetime making this moment happen is wide open to what comes next.
On NPR’s “All Things Considered,” host Ari Shapiro offered, “This album, to me, is so consistent with that sort of completely unfettered vocal power, this rock empowerment … There are so many different forms of love, and I feel like different parts of the album touch on different versions of that.” VULTURE concurred, “As the lead single ‘Talk About Love’ teases, she sings a lot about it — but her writing transcends the simple themes of desire,” and VOGUE took it to the hoop, writing, “a blend of Americana, pop, disco, and vintage rock ’n’ roll — all held together by full-bodied, gravelly vocals sent straight from Laurel Canyon. Shimmery and bold, the 12 tracks range from triumphant ballads like ‘Not Easy to Know’ to self-assured bops like ‘Gonna Find Out’ and ‘Lying to Myself.’”
“I didn’t know what people would think, but I knew I couldn’t care,” Hudson explains. “You put it out there. You believe in your heart and your music. But I can say it’s amazing reading what some of these publications I grew up wrote! Just WOW.”
Credit: Guy Aroch
