SOUTH DUBLIN SOUL

She's not yet 20, but Laura Izibor's rich voice has already carried her from Rathfarnham to a major deal with Jive, home of Justin and Britney. She tells Jim Carroll about the journey so far

LAURA IZIBOR knows the drill when it comes to live shows. She knows what it takes to have that crowd eating out of her hand. She'll despatch a one-liner, lob a smart remark beyond the footlights or deliver a self-deprecating comment about her lack of a band. Most of all, though, Laura Izibor will just open her gob and let that rich, powerful soulful voice do the work. That'll keep them hushed. It never fails.

Tonight, Izibor starts with a snatch of Ray Charles, but it's her own tunes and performance which are the real showstoppers. The songs are so action-packed with soul power that it's hard to believe Izibor has yet to see her 20th birthday, such is the confidence and sass on display. Make no mistake, there's a veteran up there on that stage.

Like all the best stories, it was never supposed to be this way. "I wanted to be a basketball player," Izibor says. "I was on the school team, I had been voted most valuable player two years in a row, and I'd been asked to play for Dublin." But a hip injury sidelined her for six months and put paid to dreams of becoming south Dublin's Kobe Bryant.

By then, though, the schoolgirl had found her voice. A shy kid, Izibor was forced into singing by her drama teacher in Rathfarnham's Sancta Maria College. "She was making everyone in the class stand up and sing. I didn't want to do it, but I had to. I remember my teacher saying afterwards that there was definitely something going on there."

Izibor herself realised the same thing and was encouraged to go further. She got her hands on an "old, battered, broken out-of-tune piano" and began to teach herself. "I had my own technique. It was more rhythmic than the classical stuff you'd be taught."

Laura began to write songs, too - "awful, terrible 'I love you' stuff". By the time she was 15, she was writing tunes that she was happy for others to hear. She sent off a bunch to the 2FM Song Contest and took the top prize. "That was a huge shock, but it meant my confidence as a songwriter just shot up. The songs just came coming after that."

The recording equipment she won came in handy as Izibor sorted out her ideas. "I'd write the track, record it with my beats and then send it to various producers to see if they'd work with me. It was good because I'd be sending them my drumbeats and my strings and my vision for the track and seeing what they made of it."

But what people were really interested in was the voice and the girl behind that belter. "A few labels heard the first demos and came back and said they wanted to hear just the voice. I did 12 a capella tracks on one demo, and that was the demo which got everyone interested."

It seemed at times that every record label in the business wanted a slice of the 16-year-old Dubliner. She remembers doing 30 showcases in 10 days in Los Angles and New York. She'd sing one day in a studio and the next day in someone's office. "I was in bits - I wasn't taking care of my voice back then." She never said no, just smiled and did another song whenever someone asked.

"I enjoyed it, but it was really hard and kind of surreal," she says now about the experience. "I knew I wanted to sing and I wanted to play, but I think I was a little lost in the whole process. It was fairly intense for two years after winning the song contest, and it took a while for me to get my drive back about the whole thing. I'm a really grounded person, but that whole experience really took it out of me."

When the dust settled, there was only one suitor she was prepared to go with. Jive may be best known for Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears, but Izibor liked the cut of their jib.

"Other labels we were talking to had soulful singer-songwriters, but there's no one else on Jive like me and I think that's a good thing. They're one of the most successful labels around at the moment and they have a dedication to their acts which I like."

Izibor had been writing songs for years so she naturally assumed that she had her debut album sussed, but this wasn't so. "The tracks I came in with at first were really old-school, almost like Norah Jones or Marlena Shaw. They weren't hits and they weren't commercial." It was time to make some decisions. "It was only then that I began to realise what I wanted to do. I knew I didn't want to sit behind my piano for an entire show. I realised I wanted to appeal to people my own age and my writing changed."

She tried her hand at penning sassy r'n'b with producers Cool and Dre in Miami, but that was a non-starter. But she struck gold with Noize Trip, a young crew in Philadelphia who are shepherded by Black Eyed Pea Will.I.Am. "I really clicked with them. We got the sound right, old-school but really smart and contemporary."

After two years in the works and countless producers, Izibor's debut album is almost done. "There are about six songs that have that old-school but contemporary vibe at the same time. There are three or four which are really upbeat and youthful, and there are a few which are mellow, classic soul."

The album will be released later this year and Izibor is happy with what she's done. "It took me two years to work it all out and find the right producers and write the right songs. It's taken me until now to know what I want to be."

What she wants to be is not a million miles away from what the girl who began to sing back in a classroom in Rathfarnham wanted. "I just want to be seen as the act I am. I don't want there to be any misconceptions about what I do. I just want to be known for the songs I sing and the shows I perform and get to record albums that I'm happy with. That will do for me."

Hear sample tracks by Laura Izibor at www.myspace.com/lauraizibor