KEY POINTS:
Brooke Fraser just swore. I know, I can't believe my ears either. She said, "shit", to highlight her disbelief at something she had unwittingly done.
But why should we be surprised that Fraser cusses? Yes, she sings about her choice to abstain from sex before marriage on her
latest album, Albertine; she's a World Vision poster girl; has strong Christian ideals; she admits she's only recently started to feel comfortable performing on stage; and she's a lovely person.
Yet you get the feeling she isn't as goodie-goodie as she seems and there's a staunch and fiery passion that burns within this 23-year-old New Zealand singer-songwriter.
For example, she's open about her disdain for parts of the Christian music industry and says, "My issue there is the merchandising of the gospel and people making money off the name of Jesus."
However, recently (and this is where she swears), she's been thinking that with Albertine, which is named after a Rwandan orphan she met during a visit to Africa in 2005, she could be cashing-in also.
"It's funny, and ironic that with Albertine, perhaps I've done that too. And I'm like, 'shit'. But it definitely wasn't intentional. Albertine is a real person and it's not like this is a concept or a character I made up, like Ziggy Stardust or something," she smiles.
Rest assured, a good amount of her hard-earned cash goes towards her four World Vision-sponsored children. And so far Fraser's earnings have been pretty good.
Her national tour, which starts tomorrow in Dunedin, is sold out and includes two capacity Auckland shows at the Bruce Mason Centre on April 21 and 22.
Today TimeOut picks her up from Auckland Airport, where she'd just arrived from her base in Sydney, and whisks her away for a spot of fishing. As you do.
Arriving at the boatsheds in Hobson Bay, Fraser lugs her suitcase out of the boot and takes just 15 minutes to get ready for the photo shoot. She reappears not much different, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, with the addition of scarf and wide brimmed hat. When you're a looker like Brooke Fraser, who needs much make-up?
She doesn't catch anything, but it's a tranquil setting for our chat. Instead of talking up her new album she reflects on the success of it - there's been no sophomore slump following the success of her debut, What To Do With Daylight, which sold 115,000 copies after it was released in 2003 when she was 19.
She's relieved Albertine got a good reception by debuting at number one in December, remaining in the top 10 ever since, and at last count it has sold more than 53,000 copies.
"I like this one more," she says. "It feels more like me. And as much as I appreciate it I have to be careful about how I talk about the first album because it meant something to people, and that's what I hoped for it, but [Albertine] is more reflective and indicative of what I've been thinking about over the last couple of years and what's been important to me."
The experience of going to Africa changed her and even made her question whether music was her best path in life.
"When I was in Rwanda I thought, 'Would my life be better used leaving the music thing and coming here and working in an orphanage or getting a degree in development and working here?' But I got the answer, just from me getting my guitar out and singing to the small kids on the side of the street and seeing the gift that it gave them."
There are obvious religious overtones on the album too, like the prophet-of-doom reference in Hosea's Wife and delicate last track, Hymn, but you never get the feeling she's preaching at you. How does she walk that fine line between being a storyteller and a preacher?
"I really don't know. You may look at the lyrics to one of the songs and analyse the stanzas and be able to pick out things, and identify little pieces of scripture thrown in, but it's not me sitting down and cleverly coming up with these things."
Fraser belongs to Hillsong Church, a large Pentecostal church in Sydney, where she has been living since 2004.
Typically, on Wednesday night she has her Worship and Creative Arts meeting, where they study a psalm from the Bible and rehearse it. Then on weekends, if she's not away on tour, she often leads youth services on Friday and Saturday nights.
"It's funny. To me, I live in two parallel worlds, because people in New Zealand would have no idea that that is my life over there and I've spoken at church conferences in the US and South Africa and they only know me as being part of Hillsong."
Her church family is important and she gets teary when talking about her life in Sydney. "I love it there. I don't want to move. I will if I have to," she says quietly.
Is there a chance you'll have to?
"I don't know. I don't want to talk about it," she says.
She collects her thoughts and moves on quickly saying that Australia is the best place for her to be career-wise even though there are plans to take on America and other territories in the future.
"Sometimes you think you'd just like to be normal. But it's a sacrifice you make to do what you feel you're called to do. Even coming in the airport today I got stopped by this customs lady who told me about how she listened to the album on the drive to and from work. And letters that you get from people who decided not to commit suicide because of one of the songs. That stuff's cool. But it would be very selfish of me to sit back and live a comfortable life and it's not all fun and games, and it's a lot of sacrifice, and I'm away from the people I love most of the time, but it's worth it."
Albertine is the sound of a musician who's tougher and more spirited as a songwriter than three years ago. "Back then I was 19 and working with all these professionals and I felt like I would've been bratty to speak up. I did stand firm on a few things and there were times when I did compromise, which in hindsight I kind of wish I'd stuck to my guns. I was just beginning to find out what my thing was and the first album was a reflection of that," she laughs.
"But someone told me years and years ago that the mark of a sound song was a song that you could strip back to just one instrument - a guitar or a piano - and it will hold its own. I think there are a couple of sound songs on the first album that have endured like that and I still love playing, like Better and Arithmetic.
"Musically though [Albertine] is a lot closer to what I want and the music I hear in my head because with the first album I didn't have the vocabulary to express these ideas."
Working with producer Marshall Altman in Los Angeles had a lot to do with this new-found certainty. However, Fraser also credits the Church, where she writes worship and congregational songs, with helping her develop her craft.
"Writing for the Church [I] have to write songs that are completely true to what I am but also universal enough for people to sing and take on as their own in their worship to God.
"It's funny, because worship songs are simple, but I enjoy the challenge of writing songs and having to take complex thoughts, or facets of God, and translate them in a simple way. It's almost like trying to teach through a conversation you're having with God."
And that's the gospel according to Brooke Fraser.
Lowdown
Who: Brooke Fraser, songbird
Where & when: Bruce Mason Centre, Auckland, April 21 and 22 (sold out)
Albums: What To Do With Daylight (2003); Albertine (2006)
