“It’s really wild,” says Kylie Minogue. She is in New York, promoting her new album, Tension II, and even she can’t quite wrap her head around the glittering latest chapter of her career. “I’m meeting up with a makeup artist later who I haven’t seen in a couple years, and it’s like…Where do I even start?”
Of course, Minogue has long been a pop princess beloved the world over—going back at least to the early 2000s, when we couldn’t get “Can’t Get You Out of My Head” out of our heads. The Australian native has had her ups and downs—or, as she prefers to call them, “peaks and platforms”—but last year, Minogue hit a Mount Everest-sized peak with the global success of “Padam Padam,” an earworm-y sensation that earned her the inaugural Grammy for best pop dance recording earlier this year.
Now, as she prepares to mount her biggest tour in a decade, Minogue has released her seventeenth studio album, Tension II. Considered a stylistic sequel to Tension, the 2023 record that gave the world “Padam Padam,” it’s a pulsating love letter to the undeniable power of dance music. Along with a bevy of inspired collaborations (including with vocal powerhouse Sia and celebrated producer The Blessed Madonna), Tension II also features distilled club bangers like lead single “Lights Camera Action” and the aptly-named “Dance to the Music.”
“It’s crazy and exciting, and I’m so conscious this is a good time for me,” Minogue muses. Here, she tells Vogue all about it.
Vogue: If life were all gravy and hot fudge, the normal reaction would be to get a little numb to it. How are you grappling with this latest moment in your career?
Kylie Minogue: You can never make a song with one note. Of course, sometimes things don’t go quite the way you want, with the frustration and everything that goes with it. I don’t know if you’ve heard me say this, but I feel like my success right now is not just my success. For fans who have been with me the whole time—the OGs—it feels like a celebration. There’s now a whole new generation who decided to plug in. And more broadly speaking [this shows] that anything is possible. I really hope that someone seeing this current phase of mine, even if they’re not in music at all, would think, I bet no one saw this happening in her life. And that can relate to anyone’s life.
Tension II marks the first time you’ve put out a sequel album. What connects it to Tension?
Well, that wasn’t the intention. I wish we had this great idea when we were making Tension: Hey, we have enough, let’s save it for Tension II. But it’s a fairly ordinary story. With so many albums, you do a repackaging and there’s two or three more songs. So we started to head down that road—but because of the success with “Padam Padam,” more and more songs are being sent to me than perhaps the year before. I wouldn’t have been the name outside writers thought of [then] when it came to the right person for a song. I was also in the studio with great writers. But long story short, I’m a pen-and-paper girl, and I kept writing lists of all of the songs we were working on. [Eventually] I remember calling my A&R in Australia and saying, “This is starting to feel like another body of work.” I never thought of doing a part two of any album before, but what we were working on definitely wasn’t the next album. The next album will be the next thing. But I feel like we’ve gone from 16:9 ratio to Panavision; it’s broadened the world of Tension. And now, with a new tour, there’s definitely still a lot of excitement for this current era.
When I listen to a song like “Dance to the Music,” which I absolutely love—
It’s a funny one, isn’t it? It’s like, Doo-doo-doo, I’m not tryin’ to be anything, I’m just here being a pop song.
Those kinds of songs are my favorites. From the outside it can seem like pop songs are very simple to put together, but I know you would agree that they’re anything but. Did I catch a Donna Summer reference in that song? Was she an influence of yours growing up?
Yeah. My influences were Prince, ABBA, Olivia Newton John in Grease, and some Australian bands you probably wouldn’t know, so whatever I heard on the radio when I was about 10. But with Donna Summer, I listened to her album Bad Girls a lot when I was around that age. When I watched the documentary on her, Love to Love You, Donna Summer, I thought, Wow, I wish I knew all of this, because I was just a fan and never really did a deep dive into her life. It was amazing to learn of her journey and also how insanely smokin’ hot she was. I realized she affected me a lot beyond what I even thought. I mean, those performances and her looks? She was sensual and would draw people in when she’d sing “Love to Love You Baby.” I was almost clutching my pearls watching it now. She was provocative, but she was also self-contained.
Wasn’t she actually bashful in the studio?
As I can be. I can come off as a total prude, but the flipside of me can be anything but. I just delighted in this discovery of her life, so in “Dance to the Music” I do sing, “Just like Summer said...”
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You and her have so much overlap, including having diehard gay fanbases. Was there one moment when you realized you’d started developing this fervent gay following?
There’s definitely a moment I remember in around 1989 or 1990. In Sydney, the most famous gay bar at the time was called the Albury on Oxford Street. I was visiting Sydney and someone said, “There’s a Kylie show at the Albury.” I was like, “What?” I didn’t get to go, but I heard there were drag queens dressed as different versions of me from different video looks. One was even modeled after a Coca Cola commercial I did. That was the moment I was like, Wow! That’s amazing.
It took me a couple more years before I actually saw a drag show with versions of me. But [the fanbase] wasn’t something I actively pursued. I’m asked this all the time, so I don’t have a definitive answer, but what I started to realize more and more is that at my early shows, everyone was welcome. I started off with parents and young kids, and then grandparents would come and then more people were coming. It was around the early ’90s when I’d see three generations of a family, some muscle marys, some drag queens, and a bunch of blokes. I’d be a really broad demographic, so I’d like to think that my nature and my shows have just been inclusive. I’d add that when I was getting a lot of criticism and flack in Australia, it was the gay community who was really protective of me. With that extra level of love and devotion, if anyone does that for you, it’s reciprocated. I really have to kind of try to find the words, but it’s been very organic and powerful.
I have a vivid memory of being on Fire Island last summer…
Oh, you can remember it?
Well, this is what I do remember: “Padam” was so ubiquitous, it was being played at every house, every party, and I witnessed people replacing the word “Hello” with “Padam.” When you have a success like that, does it make releasing music afterwards easier—because more people are paying attention—or more difficult, because you need to follow that up?
Definitely both of those things. It’s easy because you have people s attention and ears and their enthusiasm. As it turned out with “Padam Padam,” it was really Gen Z who was activating so much of the organic social media promo around that. People were reminded that I’m still doing this, and some were saying, “That’s her, who my mom was listening to?” But it also took us a long time to release the second single because the “Padam” force was just too strong. It just kept going! We were really relieved and just so happy that choosing “Tension” as the second song felt like a proper follow-up. So it was all kind of perfect. Now that “Padam Padam” is done, you could look back and say, “Of course that made sense!” But you’ve got to go back to each layer. I mean, imagine “Padam” without the music video!?
There’s a big conversation about fame happening right now, with artists like Chappell Roan speaking out about boundaries and the pressures of celebrity. I’m thinking back to your debut album, which came out when you were barely 20; it became one of the biggest of the decade. How did you deal with fame at that time? Did you learn anything that you can pass on to artists who are experiencing what you experienced?
It can be complicated, for sure, but in many ways it was a different time. You didn’t have social media, so does that make it easier? Is it worse? Separate from having a critic talking about your album, when I felt like I was being treated not so well—when it comes to general kindness and respect—some of it was unpleasant, and I would feel quite helpless at the time. But thankfully I still had to go to work the next day, like when I was on [the Australian soap opera] Neighbours. I also had enough positive voices around and positive people, supporters and fans, which helped me not dwell on the difficult stuff too much. But this whole conversation wasn’t really talked about then, so the fact that it’s happening now is really important. I’m sure there are people who’d say, “Well, you got yourself into this and stepped into the world of fame.” But people in all professions have all got stresses and need to take care of themselves and their mental health. Being famous doesn’t exclude you from that at all.
You’ve been a part of so many people’s amazing nights out. What’s been one of your own most memorable nights out?.
In my entire life? My God. My clubbing period was like the early ’90s. I felt like that was the best era, but that was also my clubbing period. I’m sure if you went out during Studio 54 or the garage rave era, those will be yours. But I go back to London in 1991 and 1992. You had a lot of house music, of course no phones or cameras, and when you went out, you went out with all like-minded people. I’d wear my hot pants and ankle boots, a Dolce bustier on top, and just go for it at places like Subterania. I’d be at these clubs until, as Prince said, “closin’ time, ugly lights.” And then we’d go somewhere else after. I also remember going out in my John Galiano split skirt often. I wish I still had half of these clothes; they’re all gone. They’re gone!
But more recently, a memorable night was during the last Met Gala, at Loewe’s after-party, which was really fun. As I was heading there, I thought I’d stay for three minutes—just say hi and then turn around and leave. I think it was at about four when I left, when the place was clearing out. But I had amazing dance partners with Jonatahn Bailey, Andrew Scott, and a few others who were there.
You’re about to embark on your biggest tour in a decade, playing everywhere from the O2 Arena to Madison Square Garden. How are you feeling leading up to it?
It’s like the emoji with the swirly eyes. [Laughs.] But actually, when you ask me about that I kind of get a different inhalation, which I feel in my chest. It’s mostly excitement, with a few nerves. When I look at the dates, I’m thinking, This is going to be a lot of work… but I’m so excited. We’ve been working on the setlist and trying to lock down the show. We got a template of what works and it’s different from my past tours, where we take audiences to places like ancient Greece or outer space or something. This one will be more about delivering the music and feeling together in the room. That’ll be the magic…letting the music take you away. I was inspired by my time in Vegas, when I was trying to be present on stage and feeling super connected to the audience. It’s about making that energy swirl and just having an amazing night together. We’ll do Tension, the disco album, and then go back to the beginning with [an early song] like “The Loco-motion,” which everyone usually goes crazy for.
Bringing people together with that joy—I’m sure you realize that’s not something just anybody can do.
I’m not sure why I’ve been blessed to have this ability. I knew from when I started out and I had success that I’ve been able to connect with people, which I’m thankful for. I always [had] people telling me about the joy in my music over the years, but now I think I’m more aware of it. Aside from the bops and the bangers—“Padam, Padam” all day!—the songs that have a melancholic high are a strong element of my output. It’s about finding joy and hope wherever you might need it.
This conversation has been edited and condensed.