Kylie Minogue

Melbourne, and indeed the whole of Australia, loves pop princess Kylie Minogue so much we don’t bother with her surname. She’s Kylie. Petite, pretty, and prodigiously talented, Kylie OBE has been a creative icon of pop music for decades, selling more than 70 million records worldwide. Not too shabby for a lass from suburban Melbourne who began her career as tom-boyish mechanic Charlene in the long-running TV soap, Neighbours.

Signed to Mushroom Records in 1987, her debut album was released the following year and began a journey through dance, disco, pop and performance that took her to huge audiences around the world. Along the way, Kylie—always aware of the glitz and glitter of pop—transformed her persona from ‘the girl next door’ to a much more grown up image; in 2002 she ranked highly in a VH1 list of the 100 Sexiest Artists. Such fame is, of course, a double-edged sword. It builds recognition but may distract from the music. But as someone whose career has often been compared to that of Madonna, Kylie is well aware of the interaction between image and content. One of her fans, singer Rufus Wainwright, once described her as ‘the anti-Madonna’; Age journalist Larissa Dubecki called Kylie  the ‘Mother of Reinvention’.

Whatever you call Ms Minogue, one thing is certain. Her bright, energetic pop has brought a lot of people a great deal of joy.