Kylie Minogue on finding love at 50 and why she refuses to be the poster girl for ageless beauty

Bow down: Kylie Minogue has owned 2019, what with her Glastonbury triumph, a chart-topping greatest hits and flourishing romance. So who better to look ahead to 2020 with? Naomi Greenaway meets her

‘Remember the Kylie album-cover hat, with the curls sprouting out the top?’ ‘And that slow-mo hug with Jason Donovan in Especially for You?’ It’s a conversation I could be having with anyone who was out of nappies by 1987, but in this brief, surreal moment, I am in fact reminiscing about Kylie with… Kylie. ‘You lived it, so there’s all that nostalgia,’ she says, hand on her heart (no lyrical pun intended), looking genuinely flattered when I tell her that Kylie, her debut album, was my very first cassette, purchased with my own pocket money. ‘I guess those songs have stood the test of time in one form or another.’

Well, if one form or another includes being watched at the world’s most iconic music festival by its largest-ever TV audience (peaking at 3.9 million), then, yes, you could say they have. That mammoth moment was of course Kylie’s performance in the ‘legends’ slot at Glastonbury, hailed as a stonking triumph by both critics and fans. ‘The response just blew my mind,’ she says in her lovely Aussie lilt. It was the highlight in a year that also saw her greatest hits compilation, Step Back in Time, hit number one and the culmination of her global tour for Golden (her country-inspired 2018 album).

If we were studying Kylie-ology, 2019 would surely be the year that the Princess of Pop became a bona-fide legend, but how has it felt from the inside? ‘Busy!’ she says. ‘But the last two years have definitely been some of the best of my life. In 2018, Golden came out, I turned 50, met Paul [Solomons, her boyfriend, more of whom later], but I also worked my backside off and had a really tough schedule. 2019 has felt a bit more settled… although Glastonbury did take up a lot of headspace. This year a lot of things have come full circle. It’s felt like marking a point in time. And I don’t mean that in the sense, “Well, that’s me done, I’m going to do those songs for the rest of my life,’’ rather, “Wow, I got this far. Here I am. What’s next?”’ she says.

What actually did come next was that she managed to own Christmas, too, with only slightly less air time than St Nicholas himself. There was Kylie’s Secret Night on Channel 4, a mash-up of This Is Your Life and You’ve Been Framed, hosted by Alan Carr; followed by the UK TV premiere of her Golden tour. And over on ITV, her Matesong video, part of a campaign to promote tourism to Australia, aired in a three-minute slot right before the Queen’s Speech. The clip, which saw Kylie jet between destinations including Sydney, The Uluru National Park and Rottnest Island, has since become an online sensation with over 1.3 million views. ‘It was such an adventure for me,’ she says of the eight days she spent filming the tongue-in-cheek ode to the friendship between Oz to Britain. ‘I saw parts of Australia I’d never been to before in my life.’

Today, swathed head-to-toe in flowing pink Stella McCartney, wearing chunky mismatched crystal earrings and sky-high Gianvito Rossi gold heels, she looks every bit deserving of her legendary status. She radiates an inner confidence without a hint of arrogance, and is incredibly polite. In fact, her demeanour is so refined, it’s almost impossible to imagine how she transforms into that fearless, sexy performer.

Of course, it’s not only the 51-year-old’s hits that have weathered well. Her petite frame and cheerleader-blonde hair have hardly changed in 30 years (bar a perm or pixie crop or two). When I ask her about being an icon of ageless beauty, her thoughts are clear: ‘I don’t want to be the poster girl for that, it’s too much pressure.’

Does she think there’s excessive emphasis on youth equalling beauty? ‘Thankfully, I think it’s changing,’ she says. ‘That doesn’t mean you have to let everything go. Although I do fantasise sometimes and think, what if I just didn’t dye my roots, or didn’t try to make everything… to the point.’ She mimes a little primping and preening. ‘I think I probably couldn’t do it, but it’s just a personal choice.’ She has previously hinted at having Botox –but yes, her forehead wrinkles when she talks, her chin dimples when she laughs and her eyes crease into a genuine smile, something I discover when I ask her about Paul, the 44-year-old creative director of men’s magazine GQ and her beau of almost two years.

‘He’s very romantic,’ she says. ‘He’s a thinker and a planner. He’s also a great cook. For years, I’ve been the family joke as far as the kitchen goes. But he’s inspired me.’ They have been known to spend four hours in the kitchen, she says, making their favourite dish – a creation from Australian chef Neil Perry’s restaurant Rockpool, spanner crab with roasted cherry tomatoes and pasta (‘but we replace the spanner crab and the pasta’). I raise an eyebrow at the marathon cooking session. ‘When you have that person that you chose to do those things with, you just like to be close.’

Can she see them growing old together? 
‘I think so, yes,’ she says. ‘It’s a good pace. It’s not crazy wild, that we don’t know where it’s going. I just feel like we’re a really good fit.’ The pair were introduced by mutual friends, but Kylie, who was happily single after her broken engagement to Joshua Sasse in 2017, says she kept putting off the rendezvous. ‘Once you’re single, friends start saying, “How about... What about…” But I didn’t want to meet anyone, I just needed a bit of time. So there was a little build-up to finally meeting. It must have just been the right time.’

I suggest he had an unfair advantage when it came to pre-date googling. ‘Well we had worked together in 2004, but I didn’t really remember. Of course my friends showed me pictures and I thought, “He looks nice!”’

She says she felt they had something special from the first time they met. ‘We talked really easily and there was an attraction. It felt like there was a possibility for a connection. I was trying to be cool, but there was another friend there and he said, “No, you were kind of doing those things that you do,”’ she says, giving her hair an exaggerated flirtatious flick.

Their relationship was sealed with an Instagram snap of them kissing on her 50th birthday. It was Paul by her side when she picked up the Icon Award at GQ’s September Men of the Year ceremony and it was Paul to whom she blew a last kiss as she stepped out on to the Pyramid Stage.

How was she feeling before that epic Glastonbury moment? ‘It was sensory overload: landing in a helicopter, going backstage, everyone’s a bit jittery. But you just have to feel the fear and think, “Let’s do it.”’ Chris Martin and Nick Cave popped to her dressing room, and she says she spent the first three songs thinking: ‘Just breathe normally! Let’s just hope I get through it.’

She more than got through it, but of course that’s only half the story. The subtext is that 14 years earlier Kylie had been due to perform on that stage, but was diagnosed with breast cancer and instead watched the festival from bed in Australia. ‘I wanted to acknowledge the moment on stage, but I never rehearsed anything because even in the final run-through I got too emotional.’ On the day itself, in front of that overwhelming crowd, she managed to reference her cancer battle, but the words seemed to catch in her throat. ‘I got emotional and had to just stop before it got to the point of no return. I just mumbled something or other. I didn’t even say the word cancer. But even without mentioning it, it reached people.’

One of those it reached was a little girl who was dancing along with her mum and dad in her living room at home. She had been going through cancer treatment herself, but had resisted taking her medicine. ‘Her parents paused the show and said, “See that lady on TV? She was sick too, and she took her medicine,”’ Kylie says, voice still poised, but eyes revealing emotion. ‘They got in touch to share that story with a picture of her taking her medicine and I sent her a bunch of goodies back. Those are beautiful moments.

‘What happened after Glastonbury was so amazing to me, so heart-warming. People really felt it. Usually when you’re doing a tour, it’s the most important thing in your life, but most of the world has no idea. A moment like Glastonbury transcended that and I’ll be forever grateful.’

Kylie first shot to fame over 30 years ago when she captured hearts as mechanic Charlene in Neighbours. Twenty million UK viewers watched her wed Jason Donovan’s Scott in 1988 – and when it turned out that they were dating off-screen, too? Well, it was more than most teenage girls could handle. In fact, so deeply invested were we that when last year she invited him on stage in Hyde Park for an impromptu rendition of 
 Especially for You, it turned the crowd into a blithering, sobbing mess. ‘I had fully grown, sensible, smart friends losing it, crying, leaving me messages,’ Kylie says, ‘It did something to people that none of us anticipated. It was nothing but pure joy.’

Perhaps it was just the closure everyone needed, because back in the ’80s, that teen fantasy didn’t last long. Kylie moved on to Michael Hutchence and was never again as synonymous with ‘sweet and innocent’. This year, 22 years after his death, a documentary about the late singer’s life, Mystify, featured Kylie’s own camcorder footage. ‘It was good to share and give more love to that project and I knew it was in safe hands,’ she says, referring to director Richard Lowenstein, who was also a close friend of the INXS frontman. The scenes are intense viewing: the intimacy between them and sense of impending tragedy sets hairs on end.

‘Sex, love, food, drugs, music, travel, books – you name it, he wanted to experience it. As his partner I got to experience a lot of that as well. If you’re a sensual being, all of your senses need stimulation. He definitely awakened my desire for things in my world,’ Kylie says over the footage. But in 1991 the relationship ended. ‘He broke my heart. I have to confess that the hurt stayed for quite a long time.’

For Kylie, a brief fling with Lenny Kravitz followed, then relationships with photographer Stéphane Sednaoui and model James Gooding, who sold the story of his infidelity to the tabloids. She found love again with actor Olivier Martinez, before an amicable split in 2007, post breast cancer.

The constants in her life have been her parents, Carol and Ron, and of course her sister Dannii. ‘They’re just always there. And that’s amazing – always at the end of the phone,’ she tells me. She also has a close group of girlfriends in London, ‘not celebrity friends’ (other than author and fellow Aussie Kathy Lette). ‘Having those people you can be absolutely honest with is so important. There’s a feeling of safety and sisterhood.’ But life is busy and connecting with friends is something she wants to make more time for. Her other New Year’s resolutions? ‘Be fit, be healthy and appreciate small moments.’

In her sixth decade, she says, she’s having to work harder at staying in shape. ‘I wear pretty lightly on my body… but I’m bigger than I used to be, that’s for sure. I need to work out more consistently. You’ve got to be realistic and accepting, but do your best at the same time.’

Her style has also evolved as she’s hit midlife and she points out that we are channelling a similar look, both in floaty dresses with high necks and long hemlines. ‘Nowadays I feel women have a sense of freedom to be covered and still look gorgeous. I’ve definitely become more comfortable with that. But on stage, no one wants to see this,’ she says pulling at her billowy sleeves. ‘An outfit is all about context.’

She admires fellow 50-somethings Gwen Stefani, Jennifer Aniston and especially J Lo, who is ‘still knocking it out the park and isn’t afraid to be sexy’. What are her own rules of sexiness in her 50s? ‘Honestly, I’m trying to work it out myself. It’s about finding that line that’s right for you.’ The gold hotpants, however, have been hung up for good. ‘I would only ruin people’s memory of it,’ she laughs.

It’ll be hard to top a year like 2019, but sitting still is not something Kylie excels at. ‘I want to figure out my work-life balance,’ she says, but that could 
be tricky given there’s more music on the horizon (‘I can’t wait to get into the studio’), she fancies a big-screen appearance (‘If there was some acting to be done, I’d jump 
 at that as well’) and there’s a Kylie musical in the offing (‘It will happen when the time is right’).

But on Tuesday night, at least, she plans to be in her ‘tracky dacks’ on the sofa with Paul watching the fireworks. ‘New Year’s can be stressful. The simpler and easier it is, the better,’ she says.

Talking of simple pleasures, there’s one she’s only recently been introduced to by Paul: the weekend. ‘It fascinates me, to be honest. I’ve just never had an office job… I get really excited to do really mundane stuff.’

When our time is up Kylie is ushered out: she has a packed schedule ahead. Later that evening, pictures of her pop up on my phone. She is on the red carpet at the Fashion Awards, in bright yellow Christopher Kane, and I can’t help but laugh. Because I get it: it’s not easy being mundane when you’re Kylie Minogue. 

Kylie Minogue is an ambassador for Tourism Australia as it launches its Matesong campaign in the UK; see australia.com