‘I don’t want to be in the celebrity bubble’

Carrie Underwood says it’s important to step away from the limelight.

NASHVILLE:

Singer Carrie Underwood says she’s glad she took some time off from country music following her marriage to hockey star Mike Fisher in 2010.

After storming the country music scene since her 2005 “American Idol” win, her almost two-year break from recording and touring helped her find “real things to sing about,” and write what she calls her fun, rocking new single “Good Girl”. “I feel like so many people get stuck. They write, they get songs together, they make an album and they go on tour. Then they do it all over again. I just wanted to change things up. I can’t have stuff to write about if I don’t have a life,” states Underwood.

The singer says taking that time off allowed her to remember what it’s like to be normal. “So much happens when you’re just in your celebrity bubble, and I don’t want to be in that bubble. It’s fun sometimes, but for your heart and for you as a person, you need to step away and be real so you’ll have real things to write about and real things to sing about,” she says.

Underwood, 29, will be performing the single — the first from her upcoming album Blown Away — at the Academy of Country Music Awards. She also is nominated for best female vocalist and best vocal event for her duet “Remind Me” with Brad Paisley.

“I’m excited to be singing ‘Good Girl,’” she says. “We’re planning some really fun tricks for the performance.”

“Good Girl’s” edgy music video sees Underwood showing off her rock chick side in a departure from the pop country that marked earlier hits like “Jesus, Take the Wheel” and “Cowboy Casanova”. She explains it’s not a change of direction but an indication of the variety that will mark “Blown Away” — her follow-up to 2009’s “Play On”. “Good Girl” was the last song that Underwood co-wrote for the album. 

Published in The Express Tribune, April 1^st, 2012.