Celebrity crushes, we all have them but what if you were offered the chance to pretend to date your idol? Would you do it?
‘Who do you fancy?’ a publicist asked a naive then-25-year-old Alexis Strum as her music career began to blossom in the early 00s.
‘It was a bit of a weird left-field question,’ the Cocoon singer told Metro. ‘So I’m like, well, Robbie Williams is my dream man.
‘They replied, “We’re thinking because no one’s going to check it, why don’t we just say that you’ve been dating him or whatever? You don’t have to do it, it doesn’t have to be true”.’
In hopes of drumming up interest in her new album, the publicist had offered to leak that she was dating the Better Man icon — despite the pair having never met.
Alexis, now in her 40s, was gobsmacked but the PR ‘didn’t bat an eyelid’ as this kind of tactic was so prevalent in the industry at the time.
PR relationships have become a buzzword over the last few years with fans increasingly questioning whether celebrity romances are real or fame boosting showmances.
‘There’s a whole slew of us from that generation,’ Alexis sighed, praising Cher Lloyd for her recent admission that her team tried to get her to seduce Justin Bieber.
She continued: ‘People have no clue, absolutely no clue, about how it all worked then and even how music works now. It was just what you were told to do, “Who can we pair you up with so that you both get a bit more publicity?”.
‘It just was quite the norm. I don’t know if anyone had real relationships, I wonder.’
As for her brush with Robbie, Alexis turned down the offer finding it all rather ’embarassing’ and ‘undermining’ — especially as her dad was also atthat meeting.
‘There was no way in hell that I was going to do it,’ she assured us. ‘I’ve got a lot of pride, I would never have done that… some other desperate things probably, but not that.
‘It just really undermined everything that I’d fought for.’
She admitted there was real pressure to ‘go along with everything they suggested’ from how she dressed to the music she made.
However, concerns about the mortifying potential of one day bumping into the Angels star and having lied about dating him convinced her not to take the gamble.
Call it instinct, serendipity, or coincidence, just six years later she met her idol in real life after songwriter Guy Chambers invited her to a party.
‘We turned up at the house in the Hollywood Hills and just as I get out the car, Robbie gets out his car, and we start walking towards each other,’ Alexis recalled.
‘I’m like, “This is the moment” and we’re getting closer and closer. And I realised there’s a woman following him. It was Ayda Field, they had just got together.’
While her dreams of love at first sight may have been dashed, Alexis did get to chat with Robbie as she had just provided the female vocals on a duet.
She revealed: ‘He was asking what I thought of his vocal on it. I was really surprised, because he seemed quite shy. I didn’t expect that, I just imagined he’d be different.
‘It was a really weird thing to meet your idol but in the back of my mind I was just thinking, “Thank God”. Thank God, I didn’t pretend I was in a fauxmance with him. Can you imagine? That would be the worst.’
The Addicted songstress let her singing career take a backseat for many years after her label dropped her thanks to an ice cream mix up on Lorraine.
Producers thought her lyrics about Ben and Jerry’s ‘chunky monkey’ were drug related so Alexis was iced out and her two ready-to-go albums were lost as doors shut in her face every way she turned.
The mum-of-one has since released the albums independently and is now recording fresh tracks under her new label, Absolute Music.
Having written for Robbie, Gary Barlow, Kylie Minogue, and Rachel Stevens — as well as her ‘backup career’ in IT — she is ready to claim the spotlight once more.
Love is still on her mind though with her latest single If You Think I’m Too Much (You Should Go Find Less) out now and a new album on the way.
She’s determined to make a splash in the industry that once turned it’s back on her, with eyes on a Mercury Prize nomination or a best new artist nod.
‘I want to be the oldest person to win a best newcomer award,’ Alexis joked,’I’ve said it now, I’ve put it out there in the universe.’
After all this time, the It Could Be You singer is still a big fan of Robbie but doesn’t regret rejecting an imaginary date with him for one second.
‘She’s still single,’ laughed Alexis, ‘Can you imagine what I’d get? Oh god.’
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