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Selena Gomez talked candidly about her career in a new interview, sharing that she felt pressure to be sexual when she was creating her last album.
In an interview published this week in Allure, Selena, a former Disney star, said she was pushed beyond her comfort zone while working on her 2015 album ‘Revival’ and its video.
“I just did things that weren’t really me,” she said. “There was pressure to seem more adult on my album, ‘Revival.’ [I felt] the need to show skin ... I really don’t think I was [that] person.”
The album, released when Selena was 23, featured a topless image of the star on the cover.
In an interview with Ryan Seacrest ahead of the album’s release, Selena explained that although she appears nude in the cover photo, she’s actually wearing shorts.
“I have these high-waisted shorts that are cut off, and it kind of reminds me of a little Linda Ronstadt ’70s vibe,” she told Seacrest at the time. “I always used to get told I look like her and I started listening to her music because of that and I love ’70s.”
Gomez also told Seacrest the image was a “beautiful representation of where I am.”
In her interview with Allure, Gomez shared what it’s like to have her body under public scrutiny throughout her career. She’s been candid about her diagnosis of lupus, an autoimmune disease, high blood pressure and surgeries for a kidney transplant and complications. Her weight, especially, has always been under a microscope, she said.
“I was dealing with a lot of medical problems, so I fluctuated in weight a lot,” she told the publication. “It was just unfair for someone to handle.”