lisa scott lee

Lisa Scott-Lee has just grown up. The only former member of Steps to sign solo, she inked the deal with Mercury Records just as the corks were popping on the champagne for her birthday last year. The date was November 5th. It's significant. Because now the fireworks can really begin with the release of her debut mirrorball filter-disco shelter-belter “Lately”.The Aussie birds should be quaking in their kitten heels. “Lately” has the stamina to stand proud in the middle of the dancefloor next to Stardust and Supermen Lovers while retaining the flirtatious pop class of Missy Minogue. "I've always been a closet raver at heart," confesses Lisa, "so it was natural for me to do something uplifting with the dance sound I love." She intends to go round every club in the country with her refreshingly untamed new direction. And when Britain has danced its socks off she'll go to the dancefloor Mecca itself: "Get me to Ibiza!"Lisa didn't rest on her laurels when Steps broke up. Such is the diminutive pop goddess's hand's-on, independent woman approach to her own career that she sat down and scribbled the barnstorming anthems ("and one killer ballad") that will make up her debut album, due later this year.Inspired by the messages of love and support she'd received from countless fans through the website that she'd kept afloat, she approached Mercury with no management and just a head full of ideas and a pair of hips itching to swivel once more. All the creative decisions have been hers. The songs are hers. The look is hers. It's sexy, chic, a little bit knowing and a whole lot of fun. "I wanted to do something feelgood," she says, demurely "but I wanted it to feel good for me, too. I'd always been writing but this was the first time I could write for one person and that person is myself. I'm not ashamed of anything I've done in the past, but I think it's time to look at the here and now."And what a here and now it is. She's having the time of her life. The all-pouting, showing out and sexy new Lisa is ready to swing back from the chart-busting five piece of her former life straight into a new, mature limelight specifically shaped as her own. Of her hot new look she will only say: "I think it’s time for British butt, there’s a gap in the market and I want to fill it."“Lately” is a little breath of early summer, arriving just when we need it. It's for cool days tripping on your strappy sandals down the high street, for flipping the roof back on the jeep and singing along and, most importantly, for some serious moves at the club of your choice. So tip off the strobe lights and alert the smoke machine: Lisa Scott-Lee is here to party like it's 1999.