Leighton Meester is abandoning her dance-princess roots for country music. The track for her forthcoming flick “Country Strong” has hit the Internet, and it showcases Meester’s vocal abilities.

The track, “Words I Couldn’t Say,” is a breakup ballad that could easily appear on a Taylor Swift album. It’s Meester’s only song on the film’s soundtrack. On it she laments losing a love after not being able to express her feelings for that person. “What do I do now that you’re gone? No backup plan/ No second chance/ No one else to blame,” she sings on the chorus. “All I can hear in the silence that remains/ Are the words I couldn’t say.”

Meester previously released several singles, one with Cobra Starship (“Good Girls Go Bad”) and two songs of her own, the Robin Thicke duet “Somebody to Love” and the club-ready “Your Love Is a Drug.” But it seems that Meester is abandoning that vibe for her still-in-the-works solo album.

“I took this trip to L.A. and I’ve been working with a band called Check in the Dark, and I’ve just been writing for the last six months, like a totally different sound,” she told MTV News at the Hollywood Awards Gala. “I’ve also been really inspired by ‘Country Strong,’ the movie we’re celebrating. I’ve just been having fun and writing from my heart, so hopefully I’ll be able to let some people hear it soon.”

While it might be a while before fans hear her new music, the “Gossip Girl” star gave more indication of what’s to come by revealing her key influences. “You know, I guess I could just tell you what my influences are. I love Neil Young and Joni Mitchell, that style of music, and as far as songwriting I think that’s where my heart is,” she said. “So that’s sort of the strength of the music.”

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TV Appearances: 2010: October 25 – MTV News

The full version of Cobra Starship (Featuring Leighton Meester) music video Good Girls Go Bad has finally been released. You can watch it below. We will have screencaps up soon.

Last night, Cobra Starship invaded the screening room at the Tribeca Grand hotel for the video premiere of “Good Girls Go Bad,” their new single that features Gossip Girl star Leighton Meester.I spoke to the actress (and two-time NYLON cover girl!) for about sixty seconds before she was whisked away by photographers. And here’s what we said:

You have a great look in the Good Girls Go Bad video. Did you pick your own clothes? “I did! I loved the clothes in that video… I wore a beautiful Bally dress, and I ended up keeping a few pieces from set – I kept this great dress from Kim Ovitz with a belted waist that I love. She makes amazing stuff. And do you know my friends were in the video?”

No way. “There’s a lyric in the song about five best friends, so it was me and Vicky [Cobra Starship’s keytarist], plus three of my girlfriends. They all got styled for the shoot, too… hey, you look really familiar… I met you at a Longchamp party…”

Like two years ago. “I have a really good memory. You’re a writer and you told me I had to meet Olivia Palermo, because you thought she was the real life Blair Waldorf.”

And now she’s on The City! “I haven’t seen that show, but I did ask Cecily [von Ziegesar, the Gossip Girl author] if Blair was based on Olivia, and she said she wrote the books way before Olivia was in New York City, and she basically made Blair up. But people do say I look like Olivia Palermo. And also, that I look like Minka Kelly from Friday Night Lights.”

Oh, that show is amazing. “It’s an incredible TV show, isn’t it? And I just did a movie with Minka, that’s a little bit like Fatal Attraction. It’s called The Roommate… I guess you could say I play her stalker, so it was odd also looking like her. But I was blonde in the movie, so it wasn’t so obvious.”

Back to your shoes; I’m obsessed with them. “I bought them at Barneys, they’re Roger Vivier.”

They’re so classic, but also very sparkly. “Exactly!”

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MTV went behind the scenes of the music video for Cobra Starship’s song Good Girls Go Bad with Leighton. Watch the video below. And don’t forget you can now buy the song on Itunes as of today!

EW recently caught up with Gossip Girl star Leighton Meester in the recording studio, where she’s working on her still-unnamed debut album, due this fall (her first single is slated for July). The actress, who’s best known for her bitchy-one liners as Blair Waldorf, says the album will have an electro-pop sound, and she’s working with producers like Kenna (Lupe Fiasco, JoJo) and Polow da Don (The Pussycat Dolls, Fergie). “It’s very pop,” she says. “You can listen to it on the radio. You can listen to it in your car. You can dance to it.”

Meester offered us an exclusive listen to three of the album’s potential tracks. “Push and Pull” is an elegant anthem about making a relationship work; she says the song “takes my breath away.” On “Almost Perfect,” she takes a break from electro-pop for a stripped-down ballad lamenting a lover’s lies. The song ends with Meester bluntly spitting, “F— you.” “That was what we call an adlib,” she says. Then there’s the pulsing “Lights Out,” produced by J.R. Rotem (Britney Spears), which has her singing very un-CW things like, “Don’t turn the lights out/I bet you like to watch.” Meester plays coy when it comes to the subject matter. “Who knows what I’m talking about? Everything is kinda in metaphors.” Maybe, we ask, she simply wants someone to spoon with? “Or fork.” Even so, “there is somewhat of a sexual undertone to a lot of songs,” she says. “I’m a grown woman [laughs].”

The 23-year-old actress actually began recording her music without a major-label deal. Some of her early tracks, like a cover of “Bette Davis Eyes,” leaked onto the web, but Meester isn’t sure if they’ll make the album. “I’m still figuring it out,” she says. “I loved the song and I loved the feel of it. That’s what the feel of the rest of the album is gonna be.” One thing’s for certain: it will reveal some intimate details of Meester’s love life. “I’ve been through a lot as far as love,” she says. “When I’m singing a song, I picture somebody in particular. A lot of it is to a guy.” Which guy? Nice try: Meester won’t spill (the actress had reportedly been dating her GG co-star Sebastian Stan).

It turns out Meester has loved music from a very young age. “I remember I was in the grocery store with my mom when I was little and I heard ‘I Will Always Love You,’ ” she says. “I must have been 3 or 4, and I went, ‘Mom, that made my back tingle.’ She was like, “That’s what music is supposed to do.’ I loved it.”

Meester, who will also spend her summer hiatus shooting the Single White Female-esque thriller The Roommate, has been inspired by some musical giants. “I really love Madonna, Cyndi Lauper, and Debbie Harry,” says the actress. “Gwen Stefani and Fergie, too. They’re very strong women and have a completely unique sound.” Meester also says she’s been grooving to Ladyhawke and Australian band Empire of the Sun. “I was in Paris and I listened to [their single 'Walking on a Dream'] like 40 times a day. I love them.” Cobra Starship is another band that Meester enjoys, and she actually recorded a song, co-written by American Idol judge Kara DioGuardi, with the rockers (they’re also shooting a video together). One other person she really wants to work with? Her GG co-star Ed Westwick. “I would love that. I’ve thought about it a lot, so we’ll see. He’s very talented.”

[Source]

Leighton Meester is now throwing her incredibly stylish hat into the music ring.

The queen bee of Gossip Girl’s Upper East Side announced at New York’s Fashion Week that she will be recording and releasing an album, reports Access Hollywood. Meester has always enjoyed making music, but this time around, she wants the public to hear her work as well.

The budding fashionista told Access, “It’s so cool because it’s a completely different creative process,” than television. Meester enthused, “From beginning to end it’s yours and you make it… You can see the finished product.”

Perhaps her role as teen pop star Justine Chapman on Entourage inspired her to bust out her first album. Either way, you can be sure many a Blair-wannabe will pick up her album and blog their little hearts out about its merits – or lack thereof.

Meester will also be appearing alongside Gossip co-star Blake Lively on NBC’s 30 Rock, as well as reprising her role as Justine on Entourage this Sunday, Sept. 14 at 10 pm/ET on HBO. [Source]