Avril Ramona Lavigne (pronounced /ˈævrɨl ləˈviːn/; born 27 September 1984) is a
Canadian singer-songwriter, fashion designer, actress and philanthropist. She was born in Belleville, Ontario, but spent the majority of her youth in the small town, Napanee, Ontario. By the age of 15, she had appeared on stage with Shania Twain, and by 16, Lavigne had signed a recording contract with Arista, now RCA Records. Record executive Antonio "L.A." Reid offered her a two-album deal worth more than $2 million. When she was 17 years old, Lavigne broke onto the music scene with her debut album, Let Go, released in 2002.
Let Go made Lavigne the youngest female soloist to reach #1 in the UK, and the album was certified four-times platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. As of 2009, over 16 million copies had been sold worldwide, more than 6 million of which were sold in the United States. Her breakthrough single, "Complicated", peaked at #1 in many countries around the world, as did the album Let Go.
Her second album, Under My Skin, was released in 2004 and was her first album to peak at #1 on the U.S. Billboard 200 , eventually selling more than 10 million copies worldwide. The Best Damn Thing, Lavigne’s third album, was released in 2007. This album gave Lavigne her third #1 album in the UK Albums Chart and featured her first U.S. Billboard Hot 100 single, "Girlfriend". Lavigne has scored a total of five #1 singles worldwide, including "Complicated", "Sk8er Boi", "I'm With You", "My Happy Ending" and "Girlfriend". Lavigne has sold more than 30 million copies of her albums worldwide and is currently one of the top-selling artists releasing albums in the U.S., with over 10.25 million copies certified by the RIAA.
Billboard named Lavigne the #10 pop artist in the "Best of the 2000s" chart, and she was listed as the 28th overall best act of the decade based on album sales, chart success, and cultural relativity in the U.S. Her fourth studio album, Goodbye Lullaby, will be released in March 2011, with the first single to be released in January.
Lavigne branched out from recording music, pursuing careers in feature film acting and designing clothes and perfumes. She voiced a character in the animated film, Over the Hedge, in 2006. That same year, she made her on-screen feature film debut in Fast Food Nation. In 2008, Lavigne introduced her clothing line, Abbey Dawn; and in 2009, she released her first perfume, Black Star, which was followed by her second perfume, Forbidden Rose, in 2010. Her third fragrance is due out in August 2011.
In July 2006, Lavigne married her boyfriend of two years, Deryck Whibley, lead singer and guitarist for Sum 41. The marriage lasted a little over three years, and in October 2009, Lavigne filed for divorce. Whibley and Lavigne have continued to work together after the divorce, with Whibley producing her upcoming fourth album, as well as Lavigne's single, "Alice", written for Tim Burton's film Alice in Wonderland.
Kat Von D
Kat Von D was born in Nuevo Leon, Her parents were both born in Argentina. Her father, René Drachenberg, is of
German descent and her mother, Sylvia Galeano, is of Italian-Spanish descent.Von D has a sister named Karoline and a brother named Michael.She moved with her family to the Los Angeles area at age 4 and grew up in Colton, California.
She credits the prominent Latino culture of Los Angeles as being a major influence drawing tattoos in her art and style.She began listening to the Ramones, the Misfits and other punk rock bands at the age of 12. She got her first tattoo at 14 and quit school at 16 to become a tattoo artist.
Von D was asked to work at Miami Ink when Darren Brass hurt his elbow preventing him from tattooing.
She appeared in the first three seasons of the same-name reality TV show taped there. She had a falling out with Ami James which led to her being asked to leave the shop. Kat has said she hasn't spoken with members of Miami Ink since her departure.
Following this she got her own series, LA Ink, following her work at her tattoo shop, High Voltage Tattoo, in Hollywood, California.
On the show, she gained the Guinness World Record of most tattoos given by a single person in 24 hours, with a total of 400.This was broken shortly after by her ex-husband Oliver Peck with 415, then Robbie "Coon" Koch with 577, then Derek Kastning with 726, and after that by Hollis Cantrell with 801.
Her book High Voltage Tattoo, compiling her artworks and tattoos, with a foreword by Mötley Crüe's Nikki Sixx, was released in January 2009 and reached #6 on The New York Times Best Seller list. The book traces Von D's career as an artist, from early childhood influences to recent work, along with examples of inspirations, information about the show and her shop, sketches, and personal tattoos. Von D described the book as "not an autobiography, you know, 'cause I'm too young to do that. But this is just kind of like a picture-driven outline of my career as an artist. So, you see everything from my drawings when I was six to tattoos that have never before been seen."
Von D created a make-up line for Sephora,and is the creator of the MusInk Tattoo Convention and Music Festival, which began in 2008.
Von D was married to fellow tattoo artist Oliver Peck, but were separated and preparing for divorce by August 2007.She dated Nikki Sixx from 2008 to Jan 2010. She later began dating motorcycle customizer and reality-show star Jesse James.
Kylie Minogue
Kylie Ann Minogue, OBE (pronounced /ˈkaɪliː mɨˈnoʊɡ/ KYE-lee mə-NOHG; born 28 May 1968), is an Australian pop
singer, songwriter, and actress. After beginning her career as a child actress on Australian television, she achieved recognition through her role in the television soap opera Neighbours, before commencing her career as a recording artist in 1987. Her first single, "Locomotion", spent seven weeks at number one on the Australian singles chart and became the highest selling single of the decade. This led to a contract with songwriters and producers Stock, Aitken & Waterman. Her debut album, Kylie (1988), and the single "I Should Be So Lucky", each reached number one in the United Kingdom, and over the next two years, her first 13 singles reached the British top ten. Her debut film, The Delinquents (1989) was a box-office hit in Australia and the UK despite negative reviews.Initially presented as a "girl next door", Minogue attempted to convey a more mature style in her music and public image. Her singles were well received, but after four albums her record sales were declining, and she left Stock, Aitken & Waterman in 1992 to establish herself as an independent performer.
Her next single, "Confide in Me", reached number one in Australia and was a hit in several European countries in 1994, and a duet with Nick Cave, "Where the Wild Roses Grow", brought Minogue a greater degree of artistic credibility.
Drawing inspiration from a range of musical styles and artists, Minogue took creative control over the songwriting for her next album, Impossible Princess (1997). It failed to attract strong reviews or sales in the UK, but was successful in Australia and Israel where it reached the number 1 position.
Minogue returned to prominence in 2000 with the single "Spinning Around" and the dance-oriented album Light Years, and she performed during the closing ceremonies of the 2000 Sydney Olympics. Her music videos showed a more sexually provocative and flirtatious personality and several hit singles followed. "Can't Get You Out of My Head" reached number one in more than 40 countries, and the album Fever (2001) was a hit throughout the world, including the United States, a market in which Minogue had previously received little recognition.
Minogue embarked on a concert tour but cancelled it when she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2005. After surgery and chemotherapy treatment, she resumed her career in 2006 with Showgirl: The Homecoming Tour. Her tenth studio album X was released in 2007 and was followed by the KylieX2008 tour. In 2009, she embarked upon her For You, For Me Tour, her first concert tour of the US and Canada.
Although she was dismissed by some critics, especially during the early years of her career, she has achieved worldwide record sales of more than 60 million, and has received notable music awards, including multiple ARIA and Brit Awards and a Grammy Award. She has mounted several successful concert tours and received a Mo Award for "Australian Entertainer of the Year" for her live performances. She was awarded the Order of the British Empire "for services to music", and an Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2008.
