Marina rocks (From Bromsgrove Advertiser)

Marina rocks

7:00am Saturday 6th February 2010

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Marina And The Diamonds, aka 24-year-old Marina Diamandis, is one of this year's most hotly tipped artists. Before things get too busy for her - her new single Hollywood is out on February 1, her UK tour starts on February 14 and debut album The Family Jewels is released on February 22 - she talks about her music and what it feels like to be on everyone's Ones To Watch lists.

By Andy Welch.

Ever get the feeling certain people are just meant to be famous?

Marina And The Diamonds could well fall into that bracket.

While the name suggests a band, it is in fact just one person, 24-year-old Marina Diamandis - and that's where the star quality begins.

With a surname that means 'diamonds' in Greek, Marina was bound to have at least a casual interest in showbusiness.

"I've knew from when I was nine I was going to do this. I knew," she begins, without a hint of irony or pretentiousness.

Marina was born to a Greek dad and Welsh mum in Brynmawr in South Wales, a tiny town about 10 miles from Abergavenny and not much further from the English border.

"I moved about a lot when I was young," she adds, "I moved to Greece when I was young, then back to Wales, then back to Greece for two years when I was 16. Then I moved back to London."

Back in England, Marina attended four universities in as many years before finally deciding on trying to realise her dream of becoming a singer.

As star stories go, so far, so good - an exotic, almost nomadic childhood and, as demonstrated by dropping out of four unis, a clear desire not to conform.

This is where Marina's story becomes a little scrambled, and depending on whose account of her story you read, she was cast in the West End production of The Lion King, spent lots of time auditioning for musicals and nearly joined a girl band.

Thankfully Marina is on hand to straighten a few untruths out before they become accepted facts.

"I was in The Lion King?" she queries. "That's total rubbish!" she shrieks, clearly loving the idea of having been in The Lion King. "I've got a bit of a scrambled story, I know, but that's just not true.

"I did audition for it, but I was so crap I never would have got in. It's basically a ballet for starters, and I'm not trained like that. I wanted to be a performer, so I just thought I was doing the old-school way of 'making it' where you go to loads of auditions that are advertised in The Stage, just as the Spice Girls did," she says.

Actually, the sort of opportunity afforded Scary, Baby, Sporty, Ginger and Posh rarely comes along these days in a world of televised talent shows and internet sensations.

That said, there was one advert in the aforementioned theatrical bible Marina responded to, from Virgin records who were trying to put together a boy band.

"I dressed up as a boy and went along to the record label," says Marina, laughing. "They wouldn't let me in, funnily enough, but I did leave a letter and a photograph saying I was amazing and was going to take over the world."

Amazingly, a label executive contacted Marina soon after and asked her in for an audition, but she was so nervous when it came down to it she could barely sing.

"I just felt sick," she says.

Such naked ambition informs much of Marina's debut, The Family Jewels, which is released on February 22. Take Oh No! for example, with its opening lines of "Don't do love, don't do friends, I'm only after success. Don't need a relationship, I'll never loosen my grip."

On first listen it'd be easy to assume it was Marina mocking her peers for their ambitious, ruthless nature, but in actual fact, it's much closer to home than that.

"That's definitely a part of me, but I hate that part, it's not healthy," she admits. "I think every song on the album is part fantasy and part truth. I didn't want people thinking I don't know who I want to be, and that song expresses that," she adds. "It's just about fear of feeling that you're not going to achieve the things you want, and that you'll do anything to get there, no matter what.

"I'm very aware of that side of personality, but realising it's there is a good thing. Getting it out there in a song is me dealing with it and now I've done this, the feeling is gone. I'm already on my next album."

For all the inevitable comparisons critics will make between Marina and the similarly named Florence And The Machine and the original British female maverick Kate Bush, Marina's latest album The Family Jewels doesn't particularly sound like either.

"I think if I sound like anyone it'd be Enya," says Marina with a wry grin. "I didn't listen to any music until I was 19 really, but my mum has always loved Enya. My dad is just into classical Greek music and scary choral church singing. That was my foundation. I feel like a blank slate. I don't really know anything about books, or politics, or music or movies. I don't know where this music has come from.

"All I know is I want to be a pop artist, I want as many people to hear my music as possible, but I don't want to create something that's already been done before.

"My goal has always been to be experimental."

Marina And The Diamonds - Extra time :: According to Marina's MySpace page, the 'Diamonds' in her name refer to her fans. "I'm Marina, you're the diamonds," she says.

:: She recently came second on the BBC's influential Sound Of 2010 poll, which tips the coming year's music stars. Other acts mentioned include Delphic, The Drums and Hurts.

:: Ellie Goulding came top of the poll, but Marina doesn't feel too aggrieved - the pair are good friends. "I can't think of a better person to be beaten by," she says.

:: Marina cites PJ Harvey as her biggest influence. "I have massive respect for her, such an amazing artist who never cared about being mainstream, or succeeding on a level of money and fame. That's the way to be with art."

:: Don't expect any raunchy videos from Marina. "The whole stripper/raunchy culture too... It's swamped our culture for the past five years, clothing, music, whatever. I think a lot of women took hold of it because they think it puts them in a powerful position, or that it's empowering. It isn't. It's just another way of dealing with a seedy part of our culture."

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