Kate Alexa

Born in Melbourne in 1988, Kate Alexa entered the world as the daughter of Australian music promoter Michael Gudinski. The singer and songwriter found herself living out a classic teenage dream by achieving sudden pop stardom while still attending school. Her upbringing immersed her in music because of her parents’ industry positions, prompting her to begin composing and laying down tracks at age 13. Once she inked a contract with the independent label Liberation Music, her debut single “Always There” landed the theme for the summer promotional campaign of the long-running soap Home and Away. That exposure produced four consecutive charting releases, among them the Top Ten success “All I Hear,” and paved the way for her first album, Broken and Beautiful. In 2007 Alexa supplied the soundtrack for the children’s series H20: Just Add Water and joined U.S. rapper Baby Bash for a reinterpretation of Womack & Womack’s “Teardrops.” After opening for Cyndi Lauper and Jesse McCartney on their Australian dates, she started shaping her follow-up album alongside Tom Nichols, known for his work with Kylie Minogue, and Future Cut, recognized for collaborations with Lily Allen. She formalized a management agreement in the U.K. in 2010 with Chris Herbert, the architect behind the Spice Girls, then issued “Infatuation” the next year—her initial single to reach audiences beyond Australia.