Shakira performs at the AMAs on Sunday
Photo: ABC

In a little black mirrored dress and big hair, Shakira stomped the yard to her newest single, "Give It Up to Me," at the American Music Awards on Sunday (November 22) in Los Angeles. The dancers, who flanked her onstage and took over the aisles of the auditorium, got their step-dance on as Shakira sang the sexy, electronic track.

The performance perhaps didn't get quite as strange as the song's music video, but it did have occasional nods to the clip for "Give It Up to Me," mostly the references to her transition into the Hindu god Shiva.

Shakira didn't rest on her hot-girl laurels either. She got into the action, shaking her hips — which, in her knee-high boots, is much more of a feat than one might imagine. Be forewarned: Only real pop stars can dance in skintight dresses and heels and not break a sweat. Shakira is one of those people.

Shakira was one of early performers of the night, following Janet Jackson and Daughtry. But the Colombian songstress' sassy dance number definitely set the tone for a girl-power kind of night, which will also include ladies like Rihanna. She also managed to prove a song can be completely unconventional and still be a club-banger that will get the crowd on its feet.

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Conventional wisdom states that you shouldn't review a record after it's already been in stores for more than a month (overseas, anyway), but when the record in question has been described as "endearingly bonkers" and "fantastically strange" and leads with an Italian-disco-indebted first single that features the word "lycanthropy," well, sometimes you have to ignore conventional wisdom and just go for it.

So, yes, this is my take on Shakira's She Wolf (which hits stores here in the U.S. next week with a surplus of bonus tracks), a slinky, sexy, spirited pop/disco bonbon that's all hips and lips and handclaps, with the occasional cowbell or clarinet (or mouth trumpet/ electro urchin/ Matt Damon shout-out) sprinkled in for good measure. It's every bit as good as the reviews advertised, and roughly 50 percent more batsh-- crazy than I ever could have imagined.

So, yes, this is a great pop record, certainly one of the year's finest (right up there with Lily Allen's It's Not Me, It's You and Kelly Clarkson's All I Ever Wanted), and, yes, hearing Shakira bleat lines like "I gotta say, California is a place that I respect" or "I hope the French fleas eat you both alive" is endlessly entertaining. But what I really enjoyed most about She Wolf is that, for all the ephemera buzzing in/on/around it, it's really a pretty straightforward, oddly personal record — a fascinating, funky, fun one at that.

Because, at its core, She Wolf is simply Shakira's attempt at making an electro-pop record. And the songs presented here are her versions of dance music: mutated, genre- (and era-) hopping, poly-national tunes, written by a Colombian pop star who's fluent in English, Portuguese and Italian, tinkered with by a globe-spanning squad of producers (the Neptunes, Timbaland, Wyclef, John Hill, Amanda Ghost, etc.). It's music that couldn't have existed in any other era — a very 21st-century, global thing — made by a woman whose career wouldn't have been possible at any other time in history.

Which is how we end up with songs like "She Wolf" — the batty first single that slinks along on an Italo-disco line (it was written by Hill and Sam Endicott from the Bravery) and features Shakira howling at the moon (and comparing herself to a coffee machine) — and "Long Time," which is buoyed by a Roma-esque clarinet breakdown. It certainly explains songs like "Good Stuff," electronic genie music that transforms into "La Isla Bonita" in the chorus, or the excellent "Men in This Town," a tune that starts in California but finishes up as a disco tune on Jupiter (it's also where Shakira openly pines for Matt Damon, for the record).

So, basically, it's not a stretch to call She Wolf Shakira's most personal album. This is dance music, as she hears it in her head, with no filters added. And that goes doubly for the lyrics, which are riddled with guilt ("Did It Again") and spite (the biting "Mon Amour," which closes with her singing/speaking, "Passengers with destination to hell, we are ready to board now") and — most of all — lust ("Long Time," "Why Wait," "Spy"). These are imperfect emotions, and she's unashamed to be feeling them. In fact, this is probably her confessional.

Of course, that's all nerdy music-journo crap. The real power of She Wolf lies in its ability to pack dance floors. Of the 10 songs on the record — the U.S. version comes with six additional tracks, three of which are reworked versions of songs already on the album, two of which are live tracks and one of which features Lil Wayne — only one ("Gypsy") isn't an immediate, rousing hip-shaker, which makes it one of the most party-ready, blissed-out listens of the year.

This is impressive, undeniable stuff: deeply personal pop for everyone. There's a she-wolf (or, perhaps a wolf-man) inside us all, and this is the soundtrack to his/her Saturday night. Or, as Shakira puts it: "Awoooooooooo!"

Totally.

Questions? Concerns? Hit me up at BTTS@MTVStaff.com.

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Shakira in "Give It Up To Me"
Photo: Sony

The hips don't lie! Shakira's gone "Single Ladies" in her brand-new "Give It Up to Me" video (from her recent She Wolf LP), which finds everyone's favorite practitioner of midsection manipulation showing more than a few Beyoncéisms.

While the video doesn't mimic Beyoncés work, the influence is evident: From the dangly earrings and high-cut leotard to an aerodynamic 'do (which has since been replaced by a mane of dreadlocks) and a spate of dance moves that would make even the stoutest of chiropractors cringe, "Give It Up To Me" takes those elements, throws them into a blender, spins them around the globe and sees them brought home by Lil Wayne.

In fact, "Give It Up to Me" manages to carve out its own little niche, thanks mainly to Shakira's seemingly boundless spirit (which is a nice way of saying "she's a little crazy.") While not as nutty as her "She Wolf" video, "Give It Up to Me" is far from straightforward, either. There's the fact that she opens the video dressed like Jennifer Lopez from her days as a Fly Girl ... the inexplicable hieroglyphics on her left arm ... the part where she and her backup dancers turn into human caterpillars ... the part where she transforms into a super-shiny Shiva floating above Manhattan.

So yeah, it's pretty out there! And it shows Shakira and Beyoncé to be kindred spirits: both mine similar territories, both tend to skew delightfully odd, both shake their lower extremities at dangerous velocities (the video for their duet, "Beautiful Liar," is enough to give you whiplash). And they're both great, too, the kind of pop acts we don't see often enough these days

"Give It Up" — like much of Shakira's She Wolf album — is her take on straightforward club pop, with a straightforward video to match ... but, given that Shakira's involved, it's anything but straightforward, which, of course, means I love it. Shakira really is a true original — as she says, the hips don't lie.

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Shakira
Photo: MTV News

Shakira wasn't afraid to get a little wacky when it came to the lyrics on She Wolf. But the international songstress admits that kookier lyrics are sometimes born out of necessity in order to make the song work.

For instance, on the track "Long Time," when she sings, "I'm so happy I should get sued," she insists that the lyric made sense because of the song's rhyming scheme. "Maybe it rhymed," she told MTV News. "It's hard to explain your own lyrics, you know."

On "Mon Amour," she vows, "Hope the French fleas eat you both alive," but said there's no harm meant in the song. "I was just fantasizing about fleas in France eating them both alive," she simply stated.

"This album has been written from a very feminine perspective. I think maybe because I feel more like a woman today ... I guess this album contains a lot of the emotions that a woman experiments when you're in love or out of love — jealousy, fantasies, daydreams," she continued. "I even spoke a little about friends of mine — girlfriends of mine — that I see struggling with their own romantic lives ... how hard it is for girls to find the right guy."

The song that covers this topic best is "Men in This Town." In it, Shakira sings about looking all over and still not finding the right guy. However, don't mistake the Matt Damon name-check as a jab.

"I know Matt Damon," she said about the lyric, "Matt Damon's not meant for me." "I know him and his wife. It's all good. This is a song and Damon really rhymed with the other word. Matt Damon is actually a terrific dude — I'm saying it in a good way. What I'm actually saying is there aren't many great guys out there and Matt Damon is one of them. I love Matt Damon. He's so great. He's a good sport too."

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Shakira
Photo: MTV News

Shakira's latest singles, "She Wolf" and "Give It Up," are just a taste of the new direction the singer is taking in her November 23 release, She Wolf. Though she's never been a conventional pop star, to say the least, the Colombian songstress says that this album is pushing the boundaries, with the help of producers like the Neptunes and Wyclef Jean.

"[Pharrell] was very open," Shakira told MTV News. "He's a very smart guy. He gets me. He understands what I'm about, what I stand for musically and artistically. He knows that I like to combine influences from different worlds and make them coexist under the same roof."

The new album is her most electronic so far, and it draws influence from a variety of different locations, including Colombia, India, the Middle East and Jamaica. She hopes that it keeps that fusion element she likes so much.

"I like to experiment and see how all these things can survive within a pop record, and working with Pharrell is a great experience," she said. "He's very fast, and I'm kind of slow, take my time. But working with him was great. I really learned a lot. ... As well with Wyclef Jean. He's a great friend and a great artist. He's pure and real; he's a real musician."

And her collaboration with Wyclef isn't just "Hips Don't Lie" 2.0. Instead, the pair tried on a few new hats for the track "Spy," a super dark, ultra-sexy retro disco track. "We hung out in Bahamas, which is where I live. After a few days searching, looking for different inspirational sources, we got to 'Spy,' which is a different direction for both of us," she said. "But we instantly recognized the value of the song. It's definitely different. It's sexy in its own way."

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Photo: Akshay Bhansali/ MTV News

Shakira is about to release her latest English-language effort, the sexy, quirky She Wolf, on November 23. The first single, the title track, caught fans' attention with coos and howls about a woman finding and acting on her animal instincts.

Shakira realized that putting out the unique tune was a bit of a risk, but one she knew she had to take. "I had to do it. It was an impulse and I usually like to listen to my instincts," She explained to MTV News. "So 'She Wolf' was a surprise."

The song wasn't even planned, really — it just came about after a lousy day in the studio. "I was in the studio working on another track. I was in a terrible mood one day and we started working on this idea of a track that we had," she said, explaining that "She Wolf" soon arrived. "I knew it was a little bit risqué, but I was howling and we had the song."

Having the song come to her in such a "visceral way" meant that she couldn't just discard it. "I didn't take that for granted. I think every woman has a she wolf inside. I think every person in the world has an instinctive and primal aspect," she said. "We belong to the animal kingdom, don't we? The reality there is this irrational part within that always exists and can drive us to places."

So what takes Shakira to that animal place? "Music, wine — red wine. It does make me sleepy at first and then I'm like, 'Whoa. I'm good.' By the second glass, I'm drunk."

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Green Day's Billie Joe Armstrong and Mike Dirnt
Photo: Bryan Bedder/ Getty Images

The 37th annual American Music Awards have lined up a few more acts to take the stage at the show on November 22. Green Day, Shakira, and Mary J. Blige have joined the performers list, which includes Rihanna, Jay-Z and Adam Lambert, to name a few, for the awards show that will air live on ABC.

"We're very excited about having Green Day, Rihanna, Shakira, Mary J. Blige and Keith Urban all performing on one stage," AMAs producer Larry Klein said in a statement. "Each year, we try to have a variety of artists and sounds, and I think these performers really showcase the depth of what this show brings to its fans."

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The night's other big performers include Lady Gaga, Eminem, Keith Urban, Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson, Daughtry, Jennifer Lopez, Alicia Keys and the Black Eyed Peas.

The awards show will feature an array of nominees determined by data from Nielsen SoundScan radio and retail figures, with Taylor Swift in the lead with six nominations, followed by Eminem and the late Michael Jackson at five apiece. Though Jackson had not released new material for nearly a decade at the time of his passing, his nominations are based on the strong sales of his catalog albums following his death.

Swift's nominations include Artist of the Year, Favorite Country Album (for Fearless), Favorite Female Pop or Rock Artist and Favorite Female Country Artist. MJ was also recognized in the Pop or Rock Artist of the Year category, Favorite Soul/R&B Male Artist and Favorite Soul/R&B Album (for Number Ones). Em's nominations include Artist of the Year; Favorite Male Pop or Rock Artist; Favorite Male Rap/Hip-Hop Artist and Favorite Rap/Hip-Hop Album (for Relapse).

Other multiple-category nominees include Lady Gaga, T.I., Kings of Leon, Beyoncé and the Peas, who all have three. For the third year, winners will be determined by online voting.

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