Nelly Furtado strips off for emotional announcement

The noughties pop star had “super personal” news to share today, in a musical career that’s had its fair share of ups and downs.

Noughties pop star Nelly Furtado has shared some emotional news with fans, announcing the upcoming release of her first studio album in more than seven years.

And judging by her new single Corazón, released today, it’ll be a return to the dance floor sounds of her biggest album, 2006’s Loose.

Furtado, 45, has released six albums, beginning with 2000s Whoa, Nelly! Her career had its ups and downs, and by the time she released her most recent album, 2017’s The Ride, she was on an independent label and failed to chart in most major markets.

Seven years on, her seventh album – aptly titled 7 – will be released on September 20.

Its cover shows Furtado topless, shot in black and white, with a giant, glittery ‘7’ emblazoned on her back.

Nelly Furtado's 7 album cover.

In a statement posted on Instagram today, Furtado revealed that in making the new album she “made 400-500 pieces of music in 4 years”.

“My ADHD doesn’t always allow for me to organise creations in a methodical way so it’s hard to explain how we have chosen 14 songs that magically rose to the top of the heap. Phew – they come together just by nature of being in the same collection, 7, kind of like random seashells that may be similar but not at all alike.”

Furtado explained that she was excited to be properly returning after so long away from the music industry:

“This is going to sound strange and stupid but this isn’t a job for me. It’s super personal. Music is my whole language and life and love and blessing, so sometimes it’s hard for me to wrap that up in a bow.

I badly need music every single day. I badly need songs to listen to every single day. My brain doesn’t even work without music,” she wrote.

Nelly circa 2024: Ready to release her first album in years. Picture: Getty

In 2006, as album Loose topped the charts worldwide.

She said that, in making the album, she “experienced it all and cried the tears and made the friendships and felt the joy and fear and pain and I learned a lot and that’s all that matters.”

Fans got a first taste of the album back in May when Furtado dropped the dance track Love Bites, a collaboration with fellow pop star Tove Lo and DJ SG Lewis.

Furtado made her first tentative steps back into the spotlight last year after taking several years away from the public eye. Posting a glam new magazine shoot in May 2023, she confessed it had been her “first photoshoot in six years.”

Furtado burst onto the scene in 2000 with her global hit I’m Like A Bird – but her true commercial peak came two albums later, with 2006’s Loose. Home to smash hits like Maneater, Promiscuous and Say It Right, the album sold more than 10 million copies worldwide.

But her follow-up albums failed to capture the public’s attention: Where Loose hit the top of the US charts, 2012’s The Spirit Indestructible charted at 79 and sold just 3% of its predecessor’s opening week sales. Her last album, 2017’s independently released The Ride, fared even worse.

Furtado has opened up in the past about why her career went south after Loose, which cemented her as one of the biggest pop stars in the world throughout 2006 and 2007.

“I had a nervous breakdown on stage. I was on the Loose tour and my daughter was with me — I was being a mum and a singer on the road. I was exhausted,” she later revealed to the Mail on Sunday.

“I took a break from music and went home. And I realised that being at home and having the whole family experience was what I was seeking.”

Furtado’s debut album will turn 25 next year.

“Fame took me by surprise,” she admitted.

“It was too much too soon. After two years of intense touring and partying I’d spend hours alone in my LA home, just staring at the floor. I felt like a fraud, believing that people liked me for my image and not my music.”

From there, Furtado took five years out from the music business, parting ways with her record company and making frequent visits to Kenya as part of her work with non-profit organisation Free The Children.

“I took some time to pursue some personal passions. I did everything from pottery classes to sewing classes. I took a playwriting class at the University of Toronto to pursue a few ideas I had. It was a time of self-development,” she told Billboard in 2017.

Originally published as Nelly Furtado strips off for emotional announcement