As the very first winner of the AMERICAN IDOL television show competition, Kelly Clarkson was inevitably pegged as little more than a manufactured pop commodity. The surprisingly versatile singer managed to survive against expectations, however, and …

In the late 1990s, Madonna had long since become a mature artist, turning her back on the carefree dance-pop of her early days ("Like A Virgin," "Holiday," etc.). Teenage singer Britney Spears picked up on this specific Madonna era, albeit with a mor…

Ashlee Simpson, younger sister of singer Jessica Simpson, is one of the most fascinating pop-culture phenomena of the early 2000s. Following a stint on the squeaky-clean television drama "7th Heaven," the prefabricated sensation's singing career was …

Hilary Duff, along with her one-time rival Lindsay Lohan, is a product of the Disney idol machine and the star of the long-running LIZZIE MCGUIRE television series. Duff's image has gone from squeaky-clean teenybopper to slightly vampy teenybopper si…

As the lead singer of California neo-ska pop-punks No Doubt, Gwen Stefani gained notoriety for her spunky, riot grrrl-lite approach to fronting a rock band. On her 2004 solo debut, LOVE. ANGEL. MUSIC. BABY., Stefani pulled a musical about-face and fu…

b. 2 July 1983, Flagstaff, Arizona, USA. This US singer-songwriter was raised in Sedona, a small town in Arizona. After receiving a guitar for her fourteenth birthday, Branch began writing her own songs and playing live gigs around her home-town. Bef…

In 2002 one of the biggest stories in the music business was the ascendance of 17-year old Canadian singer Avril LaVigne. In an era dominated by pre-fabricated teen-pop, Avril was seen as a teen star with an edge. Instead of carefully crafted, studio…

Of all the teen queens of the early 2000s, Lindsay Lohan seems to be both the most troubled (drug rumors, family strife, and the like) and the most likely to succeed, as her film and recording careers have slowly moved beyond bubblegum boundaries. Wh…

A soulful and poppy sensation from the U.K., Natasha Bedingfield outdid her older brother Daniel's pop success when her debut album went triple platinum in her homeland, and her single "These Words" became a huge charter in the U.S. Born into a music…

Britney Spears proved that the same goldmine that Madonna and Cyndi Lauper mined in the 1980s was again ripe for the picking, and she was immediately followed up the charts by another female teenybop sensation, Christina Aguilera. Closely aligned wit…

Videos and albums are not always the preferred formats for gaining success as a recording artist--it was an appearance in the hit Will Smith movie MEN IN BLACK that gave Destiny's Child a major boost to their recording career. From there, the all-fem…

The Los Angeles-based hip-hop group Black Eyed Peas has made a name for itself by taking an eclectic and organic approach to rap, R&B, and funk. Led by vocalist/multi-instrumentalist Will.I.Am., the band also includes two other MCs, Apl.de.Ap. and Ta…

b. Amanda Leigh Moore, 10 April 1984, Nashua, New Hampshire, but raised in Orlando, Florida, USA. One of the big success stories of the US pop charts in 1999, Mandy Moore rose to prominence after touring dates with *NSYNC and the Backstreet Boys. Her…

With her multi-octave voice and more than 80 million records sold worldwide, it's no surprise that pop diva Mariah Carey is viewed as the successor to Whitney Houston. She emerged as the premier R&B/pop songstress of the 1990s, and by the end of the …

Most teen pop singers are actual teenagers who ostensibly try to shed their bubblegum image and shoot for credibility once they get older Vitamin C is a strange exception The onetime Colleen Fitzpatrick was lead singer of the punk-pop band Eves Plum …

Dallas-born Jessica Simpson started out as a heavily gospel-influenced teenage singer of contemporary Christian music, but before long her sheer starpower dictated a crossover to the secular world. In the late 1990s, Simpson became an enormously succ…

Out of the backwaters of Oklahoma rose the power-pop clatter of the All-American Rejects, whose 2002 self-titled debut album, released on the indie Doghouse Records, yielded a huge fan base and the attention of several major labels. In a field crowde…

b. 16 August 1980, Mitford, Pennsylvania, USA. Carlton was brought up in a musical family, with her pianist mother instilling in her daughter a love of classical music. Vanessa began playing piano at an early age, and was soon highly proficient, comp…

Pop singer and actor Jesse McCartney was a child performer dynamo singing on Broadway and landing an acting gig on All My Children before even joining his first boy band a feat that came at the age of 12 Teen poppers Dream Street scored a platinum al…

A popular Hollywood burlesque act, the Pussycat Dolls emerged as mainstream fixtures when they became an outlet for big-name celebrities looking to embrace their inner sex kittens. As a musical act, the Dolls scored huge hits with a familiar albeit …