How Katy Perry’s ‘I Kissed A Girl’ Launched A Superstar And Sparked A Controversy

Before coating the world with candy for Teenage Dream and championing "purposeful pop" for Witness, Katy Perry dubbed herself One of the Boys for the opening of her several eras. That was 2008, and she stood out from fellow pop newcomers like Lady Gaga and Taylor Swift with pure spunk: She was a 23-year-old Californian dressed like a pin-up girl, puckered up with cherry chapstick, and acting so brave, drink in hand.


On the back of her debut single, "I Kissed a Girl," Perry became a pop princess, nevertheless her rise to superstardom wasn't without controversy. A decade right following the song's debut, its complex legacy is still being debated nevertheless, love it or hate it, it was the indisputable launchpad for one of the 21st century's biggest-selling artists.


"The song was a bonafide hit, it was a game-changing sound for a pop artist, and yes it broke Katy Perry,” mentioned Chris Anokute, a former A&R executive at Capitol Records who worked with Perry on her first two albums. “And from that point on, it was just a fucking train that you couldn't stop.”


KATHERYN HUDSON GETS HER SHOT


Before "I Kissed a Girl," Perry had weathered a series of stalled attempts at stardom. At 16, the doe-eyed girl then referred to as Katheryn Hudson — the middle child of two Pentecostal pastors — released a Christian record that reportedly sold just 200 copies. Per year later, she trekked 100 miles from Santa Barbara to L.A., Where the rock scene beckoned. She was signed and dropped from two major labels that unsuccessfully attempted to mold her into the next Avril Lavigne, plus it was around that time that Perry is widely quoted — in her 2012 concert film, Part of Me, as an example — as saying, "I don't hope to be the next anybody. I just aspire to be the opening Katy."


Finally, in 2007, she scored a deal with Capitol Records. Anokute recalls meeting Perry as a cartoonish, confident character who was equal parts Betty Boop and Cali party girl.


"This was a girl who'd been via ringer — who was signed and dropped, had probably done 300 writing sessions," Anokute mentioned. "So as soon as we met Katy, she was like, 'I'm here! I'm Katy fucking Perry, I'm a fucking star!' She was so confident."


Right after signing to Capitol, Perry released the EP Ur So Gay. It wasn't an enormous commercial success, although it did attract one of Perry's biggest idols, Madonna, who called the title track one of her preference songs in a radio interview. With that co-sign in her corner, Perry got to work on her debut album, One of the Boys. She already had a number of tracks written, like eventual single "Waking Up in Vegas," however it was a series of studio sessions with Max Martin and Dr. Luke that would birth her first two hits.


BATTLE OF THE BANGERS


With each other with Martin and Luke, Perry crafted the throbbing, bi-curious "I Kissed a Girl" and the droll dis track "Hot N Cold" in quick succession. Both were stone-cold hits, and the only question was: Which could be her first single?


"The truth is, most of them of the agency didn't think 'I Kissed a Girl' would work. There was a lot of insecurity about it," Anokute mentioned. "They thought it was controversial and would do not get played in The holy scriptures Belt. At the time, [Kelly Clarkson's] 'Since U Been Gone' was one of the primary records in the world, and 'Hot N Cold' had a similar tempo."


What "Hot N Cold" did not have, though, was shock factor.


"'I Kissed a Girl' mentioned something that made people stop," Anokute mentioned. "The simplicity of that driving beat, and that 'I kissed a girl and I fancied it'... That one line, either you're in or you're out. I'm not saying things would've been different if we went with 'Hot N Cold' first, although Katy became a breakthrough artist because 'I Kissed a Girl' was her first single."


To get each person else on board, the promotions team at Capitol began hyping the record for radio influencers like Prosperous Davis, the program director at Nashville's Top 40 station, The River.


"I remember thinking, 'Man, this seems like a smash,'" Davis mentioned to MTV News. "It's got tempo, a good beat, a good hook. Definitely, at that time, it was provocative lyrically."


The River was the opening radio station in the U.S. To play "I Kissed a Girl," and the single lived on the airwaves for months subsequently. Anokute recalled, "Seven weeks from launching the record, it went to No. 1 at Top 40 radio. A star was born."


THE ONE-HIT WONDER CURSE


With "I Kissed a Girl," Perry became the summer's biggest breakout star. She capitalized on the popularity by joining Vans Warped Tour, where her pink guitars, flowery parasols, and polka-dotted rompers made her the atypical girl out alongside punk acts like Paramore and All Time Low.


"Signing up for Warped Tour, and not having ever done a tour before… I mean, she would play for anyone who'd listen," the singer’s close friend Markus Molinari told MTV News. "It was a different city daily, and there was no cash. It wasn't glamorous. She would do her own makeup on the bus and would attempt to create her shows interesting, like, 'Should I use this prop, should I come up wearing this?' She understood that she had to create herself memorable to keep the momentum going."


Maintaining that momentum wasn’t just about record sales; it was key for proving that Perry had staying power. "I Kissed a Girl" was a divisive record (more on that later), and a couple of critics wrote the song off as "gimmicky" and dubbed her a "one-hit wonder."


once I saw comments like that, I wanted to fire back and be like, 'You have no idea how hard she’s worked!'" Molinari mentioned. Nevertheless I contained back because she contained back. She just worked. We were like, 'Just wait.'"


FILMING IN THE PORN CASTLE


With the single dominating the radio, it was time to shoot a video that would play up Perry's girl-kissing fantasy. That proved to be easier mentioned than done for director Kinga Burza, who faced a tight financial range and time constraints. With only a couple days to find a location, the crew settled on The Hollywood Castle, a mansion with a "weird, medieval vibe," Burza told MTV News. She remembers rooms decked out in red velvet, dark wood paneling, mirrored ceilings, and, uh, "unexplained stains." She mentioned, "I think some porn had been shot there."


Miraculously, the video was shot in one day: a tight turnaround made possible by a couple key factors. For one, Perry "nailed each take," according to her director. And for another, the singer recruited her own companions, including a pre-fame Kesha, as her corset-wearing co-stars, giving the set a "nice family member vibe," according to Burza.


To Burza's credit, the video was sexy without being sleazy: a line the director was adamant about toeing cautiously. She wanted to capture the burlesque fantasy through a "voyeuristic lens," hinting at "something sexy yet forbidden." "Hinting" was the key word, meaning she and Perry agreed that, yes, an on-screen kiss for a song about kissing women could be also obvious."


The video premiered on Perry's Myspace on May 16, 2008, and afterward topped the TRL countdown and earned five VMA nominations. However while the playful video was racking up views, the song itself was at the center of a much more serious conversation.


KATY UNDER FIRE


The reaction to "I Kissed a Girl" was "polarizing," Anokute mentioned. "It was like, 'Is she promoting homosexuality?' Honestly, we must've come a long way in the past 10 years, as the song is cheeky and cute."


Some in the gay community disagreed, claiming that lyrics like, "It’s not what good females do / Not how they should behave" were demeaning. The debate was only intensified by the fact that Perry's previous single, "Ur So Gay," was a rant aimed at a metrosexual ex starting lyric: "I hope you hang yourself with your H&M scarf").


At the time, MSNBC’s Tony Sclafani wrote, "It's cool to create fun of gay people again. … The folks in 'Medialand' instructed us as much by relentlessly cheerleading two gay-unfriendly songs by newcomer Katy Perry." Elsewhere, a critic for Feministing.Com wrote, "Perry's lyrics mirror the trivialization of queer female sexuality and the cultural norms which state that female sexuality exists for the pleasure of men."


Though the single was dominating the charts — topping the Hot 100 for seven weeks straight — it was alienating certain parts of the nation. Davis mentioned, "I remember getting complaint calls any time we began playing it. You should remember, it was 2008, and people just didn't talk about it; definitely not like today. Some people were just not prepared to hear that."


At the same time, Perry was being targeted by ultra-conservative groups. Molinari recalls seeing her face emblazoned on billboards that read "Katy Perry is going to hell," and hearing her song being analyzed on Fox News. Although, he defends the song as being "at the forefront of a movement of LGBTQ normalization."


"I think it's funny as soon as folks are like, 'She’s using the gay community.' She's just saying her experience, and I think sharing it normalized it," Molinari mentioned, adding, "I'm a gay man, and being gay then was fairly new to me. I didn't visualize a lot of acceptance in music and entertainment. I think for the youth, it seemed like, 'Finally, someone mentioned it! I can experiment and it's fine.' People related to it."


THE DIFFERENCE A DECADE MAKES


Even right now, Perry has a complex relationship with "I Kissed a Girl." Several months back, she admitted "a couple of stereotypes" in the song, telling Glamour that if it were released today, lose "probably make an edit on it." She attributed the song's alleged queerbaiting to being written throughout a much less progressive time, and she has a point — problematic language aside, "I Kissed a Girl" did blaze a trail for queer inclusion in pop music. In recent memory, Demi Lovato winked at bisexuality in "Cool for the Summer," Halsey duetted with Lauren Jauregui on the romantic "Strangers," and Hayley Kiyoko shared her lesbian experiences on songs like "Curious."


Last year, while accepting the National Equality Award at the Human Rights Campaign Gala, Perry addressed the long-ago controversy, saying, "I’m just a singer-songwriter. I speak my truths, and I paint my fantasies into these little bite-size pop songs. For instance, I kissed a girl and I fancied it. Truth be told, I did more than that. ... Honestly, I haven’t gotten all of it right, yet in 2008, once that song came out, I knew I had began a conversation that a lot of the world seemed curious enough to sing along to."


Not only that, nevertheless it launched the Katy Perry we know today: a bona fide pop titan, thanks to a string of subsequent No. 1 hits, like "Teenage Dream," "Firework," "Roar." And it also all began because she kissed a girl and she admired it.