London girl

>> U.K. singer Adele satiates the tabloids,
but keeps the paparazzi at bay

HURL POWER: Adele

by LORRAINE CARPENTER

“OH, GOD! Where did you read that?”

Adele is raising her voice about a story that she herself spilled online, one the British tabloids picked up and ran with, probably because it’s the worst behaviour they’ve caught her at yet.

“I was the number one Spice Girls fan when I was young,” she says, “and when I went to see the reunion tour in December, I got so emotional that I just started drinking loads till I was numb. On the way back, we were nearly at my house—where I live is one of the roughest places in London—and I threw open the door of my friend’s car, this beautiful Mercedes, and just puked everywhere. It was disgusting.”

When she’s not spewing the chunks of nostalgic delirium, 19-year-old singer-songwriter Adele Laurie Blue Adkins emits a soulful sound, one that has helped her single “Chasing Pavements” and album, 19, shoot up the British charts. Her merger of retro elegance and modern, eclectic aesthetics (her influences include Etta James, Lauryn Hill and the Cure) has drawn comparisons to Amy Winehouse—Adele even attended the same public performing arts school Winehouse had graduated from, where the girls would sing her early hits at the canteen. But Ms. Adkins is unlikely to provide the press with the level of debauchery they may expect, as she’s drug-free and lives with her mom. Adele recently moved away from home, only to return a month later, after the paparazzi learned her address.

“Now, if they know where I am, if I’m at a TV studio or a gig, they’ll be there,” she explains, “but they’ve stopped chasing me around just shopping for bread and stuff like that. It’s good.”

Even better is the Brit Award she received last month, before her album was even released, the Brits’ first ever Critics’ Choice prize. She’s also been endorsed by Kanye West, and by American gossip boy Perez Hilton, who recently accompanied Adele and a few friends to a London club on a visit to the U.K.

“We went dancing, it was nice,” she reports, “but I don’t dance. Perez went dancing.”

At Cabaret on Tuesday,
March 25, 8 p.m., $12