Nelly Furtado Recalls Being Heavily Airbrushed in Early Photoshoots, Talks Start of Her Career

Nelly Furtado opened up about having photos of herself heavily edited at the start of her career.

The 45-year-old hitmaker found breakout success in 2000 with singles like “I’m Like a Bird” taking flight.

In a new interview, she looked back on that time in her life, revealing some of the things that she faced.

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Nelly told People that she faced “a lot of airbrushing” in that era.

“I have olive skin, and they’d kind of lighten my skin a lot in photos,” she recalled, “and kind of take my hips down all the time — they would always cut off in editorials.”

She continued, acknowledging that she called it out at the time in a song called “Powerless.”

“By my second album, I guess I was kind of angry about it,” Nelly said.

Nelly said that she still felt “lucky and blessed” to have a strong team by her side at the time. She also was willing to go after what she wanted.

“I was pretty feisty, so I really knew what I wanted,” she told the outlet. “For instance, let’s say a photo shoot or something, I’d always bring my own little carry-on with my own little raver pants and tank tops and glitter, just in case I didn’t like what the stylist brought to the shoot, just to make sure I was comfortable, and just blazing my own trail I guess, in my own way. You have to, I think. You have to kind of have that sense of self. I think it’s important, to navigate the industry. You have to kind of listen to the tiny voice inside. That’s really important.”

If you missed it, Nelly recently made a comeback with a long-awaited new album!