Leighton Meester has revealed further details about her forthcoming solo album.
The Gossip Girl actress plans to release the record in early 2011 and it has the working title of Love Is a Drug – after the recent single Your Love’s a Drug.

Revealing what fans may expect from her first CD, Leighton said: “Right now I’m just writing. I’m working on a lot of acoustic stuff, that’s where my heart is kind of going right now.”
24-year-old Meester, who just wrapped-up filming her new movie Monte Carlo with Katie Cassidy, Cory Monteith and Selena Gomez, added: “I’m just experimenting and having fun.

“I just did another feature on a song – She Said (by Stephen Jerzak), which is very much like a club song. It’s pretty hot, I like it!”
Source: OMGMusic

No Comments

Though primarily known as Blair Waldorf on the CW’s Gossip Girl, Meester is hoping to become recognized as a singer – having been a part of Cobra Starship’s hit song “Good Girls Go Bad.” And she already has one big musical mentor.

“Recently I’ve spent a lot of time with Cyndi Lauper, and she’s a legend,” says Meester. “She gave me the advice: Never sell your publishing, so I’ll take that.”

The thrill of the stage has Meester – who’s worked with Lil Wayne, Robin Thicke and Adam Lambert – hooked.

“I get more excited than nervous, and I feel like that’s the best kind of energy to have,” the TV actress, 23, told PEOPLE Saturday before a 15-minute gig at Venetian’s Tao Las Vegas. The performance, she says, is “cute, sexy … I’m just having the time of my life, and I hope it continues.” (See her video with Thicke here.)

Meester began her electro-pop set with the Cobra Starship song “Good Girls Go Bad,” then followed with “Somebody to Love,” “Playing Games” and “Your Love’s a Drug.”

After the performance, she headed to a sky box table in the moat overlooking the entire club, to celebrate her last night before heading back to the Gossip Girl set. Earlier in the evening, Meester, the band, dancers and crew dined at LAVO for an Italian feast.

And since performing live doesn’t frighten her, what does give Meester pause? Her brother’s driving.

“He’s 16, so I get worried,” she said.

(Source)

Thanks to Britt we have HQ scans from September’s issue of Harper’s Bazaar with Leighton on the cover.

[007] Harper’s Bazaar (September)

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!”

(Source)

Sorry this took so long to get up. Here’s the screencaps and clip from Leighton’s appearance on Ellen last month.

[185] Screencaps || [001] Clip

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]

Thanks to the girls over at Blair Waldorfs @ livejournal we have added some amazing scans of Leighton’s feature in the June issue of Cosmopolitan.

[05] Cosmopolitan June 2009