Heidi Montag on working with Timbaland, performing at Hoopla and new album Heidiwood (EXCLUSIVE)

“I would rather work in a restaurant than be famous for being famous,” Heidi Montag‘s pious interviewer told her with a look of faux concern during a sit down with the reality star after her infamous spree of plastic surgery procedures in 2010.

“But that would be your path,” she calmly replies.

This moment is, in many ways, instructive of Montag’s entire life. The TV personality-turned-pop star has always, along with husband Spencer Pratt, sought to carve her own path in the entertainment industry. As early adopters to the power of reality TV, Heidi and Spencer catapulted themselves to the front pages of magazines around the world through both their on-screen antics on MTV’s The Hills and their covert collaborations with the paparazzi. However, in the background to the media circus which surrounded them for a couple of years, Montag was recording a pop album that she hoped would reorient her career into that of a bona fide pop princess.

Sadly, this wasn’t yet to be. The album, Superficial, was largely ignored by critics when it dropped in 2010 and it was reported to have sold less than 1,000 copies in its first week, though it developed something of a cult following amongst mostly gay pop aficiandos in the subsequent years. A strange twist of fate saw album track ‘I’ll Do It’ go viral in 2023, causing a spike in streams which was then further bolstered by a wave of public support for the star following the tragedy of her home burning down in the 2024 California fires. Today, Montag has gained 3.8 million monthly listeners on Spotify and is preparing to hit the mainstage at London’s Mighty Hoopla festival this Sunday (1 June).

Before that, she will release her sophomore album, entitled Heidiwood, tomorrow, and stop by The Clapham Grand for a special performance on Saturday (31 May). In anticipation of all of the above, we caught up with Montag to find out what she has in store for UK audiences and hear how it feels to be finally living her pop star dream.

Hi Heidi! The last time you and I spoke was in 2023 and ‘I’ll Do It’ was just starting to blow up. Did the success you’ve enjoyed since then even seem possible in that moment?

Thank you so much for that piece, it was so great. It’s crazy, I’m hoping this is just the catalyst for so much more. It is incredible what doors have been opened, and to be able to perform at Hoopla in front of 30-60,000 people is to going to be so incredible. It’s opening the gate to being a pop star, and my biggest dream has come true. It’s just pretty shocking and exciting.

You’re in a totally different stratosphere now, performing at these legitimate music events like Coachella and now Hoopla. Is it intimidating being on stage in front of real life crowds, having had relatively limited experience?

Well, the only performance I had prior to this was Miss Universe. I didn’t do small club tours anywhere. I just had Miss Universe, and that was it. That was my only performance. When I performed for the first time in San Francisco at a club, I was so nervous. I was shaking, like so nervous. And to have not had a choreographer and all these people in place, it was really overwhelming figuring out where to even start and how I would execute this. It’s been quite the journey to Hoopla. Now I’ll have a sound check person and sing live, and have my in-ears for the first time. It’s been such a fun opportunity and experience, and what I’ve learned about performing is just really enjoying it in the moment, because you never know how life ends up. I’m just so thankful, no matter what, for these opportunities that I have had, and I hope it’s more for the future. It’s like Elvis says, it’s electrifying – the energy goes through your body, and it kind of transforms you to be able to step out into something other than your everyday self.

Let’s talk about these London performances. You’ve got one in The Clapham Grand and then Hoopla the next day. Can you tell us a bit about what you are preparing for both of these sets?

They are going to be different. Obviously, there’s some songs that you just have to perform everywhere, which I am excited about, but I did want to distinguish them and have them be different. Heidiwood comes out on the 30 May, so I want to incorporate some of the new songs and have an exclusive for Hoopla. I shot a visualiser for Hoopla specifically, the set is a little bit longer, and there is an exclusive song in there. I’m really excited for that. And then the Clapham Grand, I’m so excited for that too. I wanted it to just be a pure club set. I’m going to have different outfits, different energies, different looks for both. Both are going to be very fun, feel good, exciting, entertaining, and, yeah, just a good time.

When the world was first introduced to you on The Hills, it was as this party club girl. Obviously your life has moved on so much from then, you’ve become a mother and got gotten older. Is it nice to have an excuse to be back in the clubs again?

It is really fun to feel that energy. I feel like there’s definitely a difference between being in your 20s in the club, and going when you’re older. Some say that moms turn up harder. But I just think that it’s fun to be able to be all encompassing, and it’s fun to just let loose and let go and be that fantasy too. I always wanted to be a pop star. This is my biggest dream come true. So to be able to step into that glitz and that glam, there’s nothing like it.

Both Mighty Hoopla and The Grand are very queer centric spaces. It’s been a really challenging year for the the queer community here in the UK. What do you think is the role of party spaces and festivals during these scary and challenging times for queer people?

I think it’s really important to be able to let go and be yourself in a safe environment. I feel like that’s one of the reasons I really always have resonated with this community, because that is so much of what I represent, just being able to be authentic and stand strong against hate and anger and being berated and criticised. Obviously physical danger is a very different thing, but that’s definitely what I stand for, and what I represent. I think that love is the most important thing in the world. So I’m very excited to be able to be here and to stand up for that and be part of that, and I don’t think it’s anyone’s place to judge or criticise or tell anyone else what to do in any part of their life. I am excited to have that safe space for everyone to just feel free and enjoy. 

You’ve definitely always stood for being defiant in the face of harsh criticism. I keep seeing your old Nightline interview on TikTok where you expertly respond to your interviewer claiming she’d rather work in a restaurant than be famous for being famous: “But that would be your path”. Is it nice to see that moment be reappraised all these years later?

I love that people appreciate that interview now, especially because then everyone sided with Juju [Chang, Montag’s Nightline interviewer] and I didn’t have a side that was appreciating or understanding what I was saying. It was so lost in the media and translation, and I was so criticised left and right. That was the peak of everyone attacking me, so it’s nice now to have support around that moment. That was a really hard moment for me. I was just putting on my calm, strong, brave face, and it was really challenging. I mean, I could barely talk, I was in so much pain, and sitting there in that moment, I was so vulnerable. I hope it inspires other people to be able to respond in that manner too. I wasn’t defensive or being rude back to her in any way. It’s like what I tell my son, you don’t need to convince other people of how you feel, how you feel is all that matters. It doesn’t matter if other people also believe that.

@thee1xd that would be your path!💋 #fyp #heidimontag #thehills #realitytv #losangeles #hollywod #tv ♬ original sound – Thee1xd

When your old music started blowing up, did you reconnect with any of your old collaborators from that time?

I actually reached out to Stacy Barth, she is also doing her own project. I did just get a really raw record from LP, and we’re going to build it out a little bit. I think she is the most incredible singer in the world. I want to embrace the old and bring in the new. I didn’t want to replicate Superficial again. That was such a timeless project. I wanted the new, updated version of Superficial. I feel like Superficial was so good at that moment because those writers were also so young and fresh too.

There’s been such an impressive volume of new music from you in the last year, where did it all come from?

I have been in a studio for a year. Superficial and ‘I’ll Do It’ had a huge moment in China last year, which then bled over to Tiktok and Spotify streams, and I had like a million monthly listeners, and everything was just shooting up. Slayyyter and all these people were saying that I influenced their albums. So I’d been in the studio for a year, and the timing worked out that I had these songs done and we were going to put them out as singles but then everything happened with the fires. So we just thought, let’s put them on the Superficial deluxe edition that we had ready, like what Taylor Swift does with the waterfall effect. Then with half of them are already out, we thought let’s put them into Heidiwood and make another album.

But I’m also still in the studio, and I’m working on the next album, that’s almost done. We’re just going to keep coming and and hitting and working. The songs on the next album are just shocking and very exciting too. This is the perfect sophomore album, it really gives that pop escapism that I think the world needs and everyone’s looking for right now in the moment, and it hits harder. 

Who are the main players on your new album Heidiwood?

Housefly is one of the producers, and he actually just won a Grammy this year on one of Chris Brown’s songs. I worked with him on several of my songs. He did ‘Animal’, ‘5G’, and he has two other songs that I don’t think are on this album, they’ll be on the next. I’ve worked with Cali Rodi. She is an amazing songwriter, and Sophie Rose. I have a song from Timbaland that she just wrote on, I’m very excited for that one to come out. He sent over three records, and she just wrote on one. So I’m really excited for for that. Sizzy Rocket also worked on a number of songs.

How did you come to be working with all these new collaborators?

We just started to cast our Speidi web, and then started sorting through. You find one person who leads you to the next person. It was really challenging to restart over in the industry, not know who has the songs and who is up and coming. We ended up finding Sherry, an amazing A&R for all these different writers. It took a year to really sort through, song by song. And we do everything ourselves. We have a great lawyer, thankfully, she’s super helpful and instrumental.

After the wave of publicity you experienced after the fires, you teased that a big name producer had sent you a song – is that Timbaland?

I think Timbaland is actually bigger than that producer, name recognition wise, but no. They ended up not giving me the record and taking it back.

How far did you get with it?

It was done! It was like, cut and done. And they were like, ‘We’re gonna think about it’. I’m like, why would you send over the record, have me cut it and pay for the studio and everything, spend my time, leave my kids, get a nanny, etc. I don’t need to be playing games. It was actually a frustrating situation.

Particularly, I guess, at what was already a really difficult moment in your life?

I’m like, good luck with that. I’ll pray for you. It’s pretty shocking, honestly. But I do have Madison Love, who wrote one of the songs that I’ll be producing, and she’s as big as it gets so I’m really excited about what’s next.

I saw she’s also working with Kesha, who’s performing right after you on Sunday at Mighty Hoopla!

I just saw that! She works with everyone.

You appeared at the American Music Awards last weekend wearing a flame-inspired outfit as a nod to what you’d been through. How much of your personal life from the past year is present in your new music?

A lot of it. I mean, you have ‘No Going Home’. That is my experience through the fire. I was able to have an outlet to express that devastation and loss and the feeling of, like, where do you go, and how do you feel, and what is home. It’s definitely very deep, and it starts from where I left off on Superficial until now. There is ‘Forgive and Forget’, and there’s definitely a lot of different themes within there, and they are very expressive. I mean, they’re all a bop, for sure – regardless, you have that workout beat back there, but there are definitely different sides. Some are more fun, and some are a little bit more heartfelt.

Your friend and The Hills castmate Kristen Cavallari has recently returned to reality television. I saw that you and Spencer were developing a show around losing your home and your life since that – what’s the latest on that project?

I’m not sure. You know, there’s a network that has it, and they’re gonna figure that out. The tricky thing with reality TV is it really derails you from what you’re doing, and music is so full time that it’d be really challenging to have to choose where the focus would go. So for right now, it seems like I should just really focus on the music and give  it my full attention because that is my biggest dream. I just want to fully go in on that. I was so pulled apart before with reality TV and music, and when you try to do too many things at once, or for me, it’s hard to be good at one thing. So right now I have my full focus and attention on the music, and so does Spencer. I mean, the amount of emails that he deals with. To shoot a show would definitely be very challenging but if that opportunity came, we’d definitely take that as it comes. We do love reality TV, it’s something we’re really good at, so let’s just see what God has planned.

Was it heartwarming to see your old Hills castmates posting to support ‘I’ll Do It’ in the wake of the fires?

Absolutely, that was incredible for everybody to step up and go out of their way to support. I mean, it was amazing to have J. Lo do a post with my music too, and to wear a Speidi dress. That was incredible. And Emily Ratakowski and Julia Fox and Alix Earle. The whole industry really stepped up, people who I never thought would even know who we were. It’s incredible that they all did.

I know you’ve got a busy week preparing for Hoopla so I won’t keep you any longer but hopefully I’ll see you there!

Yes, absolutely – I’m so excited.

Heidi Montag performs at The Clapham Grand on May 31 and at Mighty Hoopla on 1 June. Heidiwood is released on streaming platforms tomorrow (30 May).