Taking control

By Boon Chan
The Straits Times
Publication Date: 18-06-2007
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BECAUSE I LOVE IT: Amerie Rogers focuses on being normal to survive in the music world. If her mother had had her way, Amerie Rogers might not be singing today.
The half-African American, half-Korean singer says playfully that "all Korean parents" want their children to grow up to be lawyers, doctors or professors.
"But my sister's a lawyer, so we have a lawyer now," she says. "I might be a professor later, maybe in my 70s or something."
The 27-year-old, who goes by just Amerie professionally, is probably best known for her massive hit, 1 Thing. The song defined the summer of 2005 and made it to the runner-up spot in influential music website Pitchfork's top 50 singles list that year.
She also won the Aretha Franklin Entertainer of the Year Award at the Lady of Soul Awards that year.
Last year, she garnered two Grammy award nominations and was named one of People Magazine's 100 Most Beautiful Of The Year.
The dusky beauty's third album, Because I Love It, is a welcome return to the music scene.
Although she went into the music business despite her mother's initial reservations, the two are actually very close.
Speaking to Life! from her home in Los Angeles, she says: "Everyone knows that I talk about my Mum all the time. The older I get, the more like my Mum I'm getting. Everything is 'My Mum says...''
So what does her mother say about her new album?
"She really loves it. She loves the variety of the elements incorporated into it. She has an opinion for everything, and she's really, really honest with me."
Part of her mother's reservations about the music business came from the perception that it was all about sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll.
But the level-headed singer seems to be handling it well, though.
She says: "I just stay me. One thing I try to focus on is to stay normal, which isn't really hard because my friends are normal and my family's normal.
"If you want it to be a whirlwind and kind of dangerous, you can make it that. But if you want it to be calm, it can be that, too."
Keeping things normal means that she will not talk about what is happening in the romance department.
When you ask if there is someone special, she replies in a cheeky singsong voice: "I'm not saying."
Instead, she says that when she was really young, she used to draw paper dolls and make clothes for them - and there was this boy paper doll that she developed a little crush on.
She laughs at the memory and adds that she did not know any guys then. Things are probably quite different for the sultry singer now.
She might sing "take control of me" on her new album's first single, Take Control, but there is no question that Amerie calls the shots in her life.

1 Thing - Amerie
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One thing - Amerie, remix
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I really like the song she did with Se7en. Take Control

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I just can't help myself. Risk it all with me.