<http://schema.org/articleBody>
" GALLERY: How Katy Perry Conquered the Summer  Originally published in the April 2009 issue. Sneak peek at Esquire UK&amp;#039;s new cover here. It&amp;#039;s pissing rain in Larchmont, where Katy Perry lives, just south of Hollywood. The twenty-four-year-old singer gets out of a silver Audi A6 wearing a headband with a black-and-white bow, Wayfarers, and a T-shirt with Mickey and Minnie Mouse holding hands from behind. Pencil-thin black pants with zippers all over them. She looks like a dancer in Lionel Richie&amp;#039;s &amp;quot;Dancing on the Ceiling&amp;quot; video. She takes off her glasses and she has beautiful blue eyes. Big eyes. Her lips are pink and pouty. Somehow it&amp;#039;s impossible to get a sense of her body. Somehow she&amp;#039;s hiding it. But her eyes are gigantic.  We sit down in an empty bistro. She looks like someone in her mid-twenties, but she has the demeanor of someone in her early thirties. Controlled, surprisingly. But not &amp;quot;media-trained&amp;quot; controlled. Controlled like someone who is introspective even when you don&amp;#039;t ask her to be. She acts like a local (she grew up in Santa Barbara, California) who&amp;#039;s taking a break from a long day of work (the first stop on her first world tour is the next day, in Seattle).  She gets a crepe with grapes, a pineapple slice, and a wedge of watermelon. Turns out she really likes fruit. ESQUIRE: I thought your outfit at the MTV Europe awards was great. Your head popped up through an apple. It was cool.  KATY PERRY: My stylist is a continuous burst of &amp;quot;Yes we can.&amp;quot; He dreams just as retarded as I dream. ESQ: What are some of your retarded dreams?  KP: I always wanted to suspend from the ceiling in a twirling banana. I&amp;#039;m going to be inside the banana. So the banana drops into a fruit bowl with the other sparkling, glorious fruit, and their tops pop off and dancers come out and help peel me out of the banana. I have a fascination with fruit.  ESQ: What are you trying to achieve with your persona, with your style of dress? Where does that come from?  KP: It&amp;#039;s Lucille Ball meets Bob Mackie. It&amp;#039;s about innuendo. I want everybody to get the joke, but I want them to think about it for a minute.  ESQ: What do you want to achieve? Do you want to be as big as Gwen Stefani? As big as Madonna? Bigger? KP: I&amp;#039;d like to say I&amp;#039;d like to be as big as a Gwen or a Madonna, but I think those days of achieving that level are over. The media is bringing everybody down.  ESQ: Sorry about that. How are you adjusting to the paparazzi? KP: I don&amp;#039;t ever do anything to try and bring it upon myself. There are ten thousand other restaurants besides the Ivy. I&amp;#039;m not obsessed with getting my picture taken. You know, there&amp;#039;s just so much taken out of context. There&amp;#039;s so much nit-picking. I turned my data alerts off.  ESQ: So you haven&amp;#039;t seen the shot of you in your green bikini? KP: Well, yeah, I read Us Weekly. ESQ: When I was listening to your album, I figured out your favorite chords. KP: A minor? ESQ: G, A minor, F, and C. Are you a guitarhead? KP: I&amp;#039;m not a guitarhead. But I love acoustic guitars. I love Martins and Taylors. I mostly play Taylors. I can&amp;#039;t find my pink SG right now. All my guitars are pretty obnoxiously colored. Except my Taylor, which is just my Taylor.  ESQ: In an interview you said you were influenced by &amp;quot;classic No Doubt.&amp;quot; I almost choked on my \u2014  KP: I&amp;#039;m talking classic No Doubt in the early nineties, when Gwen did &amp;quot;Don&amp;#039;t Speak&amp;quot; in the garage.  ESQ: That&amp;#039;s why I choked. What about the eighties? KP: Pat Benatar, Joan Jett, Chrissie Hynde. I&amp;#039;m obsessed with Freddie Mercury. ESQ: As a showman or a vocalist? KP: In all capacities. He was someone out there who is respected. He&amp;#039;s the real deal. You know how everyone has their one magical moment in hearing something they love? ESQ: And they play it over and over, yeah. KP: That happened with me and Queen. ESQ: With what song?  KP: &amp;quot;Killer Queen.&amp;quot;  ESQ: What are you listening to right now?   KP: Queen, continuously. And the Beach Boys&amp;#039; Pet Sounds. I had a relationship and that&amp;#039;s all we listened to. Patty Griffin. I love all the big pop stuff. I thought Beyonc\u00E9 made a great pop record.  ESQ: Now that you&amp;#039;re single, what type of guy do you want? KP: I have a soft spot for musicians. If a man could ride this roller coaster with me and come out alive, then I guess we&amp;#039;d deserve each other&amp;#039;s company. But I don&amp;#039;t really have the right energy to be with somebody right now, because when I love somebody, I love somebody. Like, I want to marry them. I don&amp;#039;t date around. I haven&amp;#039;t been on a date.  ESQ: You haven&amp;#039;t been on a date?  KP: Not really. I&amp;#039;m not into casual anything.  ESQ: Your folks are conservative. Are they supportive?  KP: People can&amp;#039;t fathom that my pastor parents could actually support the wild-child daughter. But they&amp;#039;re very moderate, you know?  ESQ: Probably made you get the Jesus tattoo. KP: I got that when I was eighteen, on the Sunset Strip. I was with my boyfriend, and I just wanted to get something so I would always remember where I came from. My dad has four tattoos, and they all say &amp;quot;Jesus.&amp;quot; ESQ: Who were you channeling at the photo shoot?  KP: I aimed a little bit sexy with the hair. I wanted to just grow up a little bit. I&amp;#039;ll be twenty-five this year. ESQ: You&amp;#039;re trying to grow out of the banana?  KP: No. But I can&amp;#039;t always play the innocent Lolita sex kitten.  ESQ: Do you think that affects the way people perceive your music?  KP: Yep. It&amp;#039;s the whole package. But people who want to tag along for the ride, they&amp;#039;ll understand and they&amp;#039;ll get the joke and they&amp;#039;ll realize that I wrote the fucking joke. Fashion credits: First photo: Vintage Yves Saint Laurent night coat from The Way We Wore, Los Angeles; Corset &amp;amp;amp; Panties by Agent Provocateur; Stockings by Victoria&amp;#039;s Secret; Ring - stylist&amp;#039;s own; Necklace by Jennifer Meyer. Second photo: Vintage Yves Saint Laurent night coat from The Way We Wore, Los Angeles; Corset &amp;amp;amp; Panties by Agent Provocateur; Necklace by Jennifer Meyer. Third photo: Leopard cat suit by Agent Provocateur; Stockings by H&amp;amp;amp;M; Vintage panther brooch from The Way We Wore, Los Angeles; Ring by Sara Weinstock. Fourth photo: Sweater by Sonia Rykiel. VIDEO: A Supermodel Message Just for You...  "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/interviews/a5659/katy-perry-pics-0409/?click=esq_more>