It’s a lesson that’s not lost on the pop star. In the two months since the release of her third album, Loose, Furtado has done a good job of blotting out the long-held public perception of her as the wholesome, tracksuit-clad tomboy who frolicked in a field while warbling, “I’m like a bird.” In its place, with the help of the super-producer Timbaland, is a hip-hop pin-up dishing out double entendres. As the airwaves are already crowded with oversexed songstresses — Madonna, Christina, er, the Pussycat Dolls — one might be tempted to question this makeover. If, that is, Loose had followed the sales trajectory of the second album, Folklore, which bombed. But it hasn’t. It reached the top of the US charts, and the single Maneater has been declared the pop song of the summer by parts of the British music press. Furtado is suddenly hot.

The singer emerges from the hotel lift, escorted by a hulking bodyguard. Next to him, she looks petite enough to fit into the overhead locker of a plane, but she is photoshoot-perfect in an emerald Stella McCartney empire-line dress. Settling into a couch, she nibbles on a stalk of sugar cane plucked from her cup of camomile tea.

It must be good to be in her shoes now. “I’m in a really good place,” she nods. “But the past year and a half was the hardest of my life. There was no separation between my private and professional life — all the people who worked for me were friends. And I was so disorganised. My manager finally gave me a lecture: he said I was like a leaf that floated from stream to stream — that I had no goals.”

The most significant upheaval in her life was the break-up with Lil’ Jazz, her partner of four years and the father of her three-year-old daughter, Nevis. “We just grew apart,” she says quietly. “But we’re still very much in each other’s lives, because we co-parent.”

Furtado grew up in British Columbia, the youngest of three children of Portuguese immigrants. Both parents are devout Catholics; when asked if they disapprove of her new image, Furtado says: “Actually, my mom encouraged me to change my look. After I had my daughter, I went on tour and was breastfeeding for two years. I was so exhausted, I didn’t care how I looked. I looked awful. And I was going to visit my grandmother, and I looked so terrible, my mother wouldn’t let me leave. She told me, ‘You have to start wearing make-up again.’”

Burnt out and suffering a crisis of confidence, Furtado took a year off to spend time with her daughter. “That year was amazing. I experienced a total rebirth. Having a child, someone else’s welfare to look after, has changed me so much. Before, I just cared about being a rock star. I used to think I could change the world by going on stage. I was obsessed by the idea that the world really needed a revolutionary icon, someone like Malcolm X, to affect politics. Now, I know that music can’t really make that much difference in people’s lives politically. The most it can do is entertain, make people happy for a while.”

Though the video for Promiscuous, co-starring Justin Timberlake, is in heavy rotation on MTV, it won’t be in Furtado’s home. “I don’t have cable. I don’t think it’s good for kids to stare at a box for too long.” Computers are also viewed with suspicion. “I read an article that said exposing children to computers early on causes attention deficit disorder,” she says. “It stimulates a certain kind of thinking.”

So it’s surprising that Furtado credits motherhood with her sexual awakening. “I became more confident about my body than I’ve ever been. I’d look in the mirror and say, ‘My butt looks kinda fat, but I like it.’ I like having curves.” And is this now-single yummy mummy dating around? “I’ve only had four real boyfriends,” she says. She hoots with laughter when asked if she ever dates civilians. “Civilians? I think of myself as a civilian.” Okay, you’re a civilian. But how do celebrities hook up? Don’t they just ask their agents to fix them up? “I’ve done that twice in my life. I won’t name names, but last year I went to the Vanity Fair Oscars party, and I told my manager to tell this actor that I had a crush on to come talk to me. That worked out pretty well. We went on four or five dates.”

The second incident involved a famous musician whose identity she maddeningly refuses to divulge. “At one of my concerts, I heard he was there, so I had my manager tell him to come backstage to say hi.” She grimaces at the recollection and doubles up laughing. “That had cheesy results. At least, with the ‘civilian’ relationships, if they don’t work out, you never have to see the person again. With celebrities, you never know if you might see your ex on a billboard or TV, which makes it hard to move on. You could be almost over them, then see them in a magazine and get totally sucked back in.”

While it’s possible that Furtado’s “Me? A celebrity?” routine is an act — she has been taking acting lessons for a couple of years — it’s convincing. Especially when she shares her theory about class and musical genres. “Working-class people tend to make mainstream music,” she says. “Upper-class people create artsy, indie music, because they have the luxury of being able to. What I don’t get are those people who become successful, then turn into divas who freak out if they don’t have 500-thread-count sheets. What’s that about?” So what thread-count do her sheets have? She considers this for a moment. “I have some nice sheets. But I don’t have to have them. A few months ago, I had an appearance scheduled in New York. The airports were closed because of snow, so I had to drive eight hours from Toronto in a little van. It had been a while since I had to travel like that, but I was curious to try it again. I wanted to see if I could handle it. And now I know that I can.”

Loose by Nelly Furtado is out now on Geffen

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