A version of this story appears in the new Untold Stories issue ofEntertainment Weeklyon stands now.
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“[Even on the runway] I didn’t just walk: I twirled and sashayed.
Credit: Emma McIntyre/Getty Images; Steve Granitz/WireImage; Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images; Neilson Barnard/Getty Images; Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images
Sometimes I’d get in trouble with the designers…but I couldn’t help myself.
“With modeling, I knew that I was fierce.
I knew my runway walk, even in those early days, was amazing.
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It wasn’t just a dream; it was more of a mission,” she continues.
With singing it was like, ‘Oh my gosh, look at J.Lo!
That looks so fun!’
There’s a difference.
I kept pushing [for] six years.
… That was my tenacity and tunnel vision and ‘don’t give up’ attitude.
It should have been six months, not six years.
All the pieces were in play, but one essential element was missing: ace vocal ability.
“If my voice was amazing, I would’ve been a huge pop star,” Banks says.
“Pharrell believed in me, man.
He had to rent that [studio].
He was like, ‘You got this, just loosen up!
It’s okay!’
But it never became okay.
The crazy thing is a lot of it was in my head.
I’d go home and sing it so well.
“I always had top-notch managers that werepreparingme for a record label,” Banks says.
“I had Johnny Wright, who managed Britney Spears and ‘NSYNC.
At the time, Johnny was the No.
1 manager in the world, [readying] me for a deal.
[Sony] was like, ‘The Kobe single is fun, but we need to hearyourdemo!’
and I never followed up because I went down a path with super producers instead.”
“We didn’t sell it as a hit.
It was just a free giveaway withTop Model.
This was before you could just throw a single on the internet like they do today.
There were indicators that I should go forward.
If Janet Jackson or Jennifer Lopez sang it, it would’ve been huge.
… One-hundred percent [I think people wanted me to fail].
It had to have a little more self-realization and more drawing my own conclusions.
“She was like, ‘Sing through your nose!
She was really trying to help me!”
“My mom was just like, ‘Oh Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord.'”
Did she go through with the showcase?
“Oh God, of course not!”
“You would know that.
It’d be all over the internet!”
“We talked about collaborating on a [compilation].
The female-powered fest never got off the ground.
“We ended up not doing it, which was dumb on my part,” she says.
She credits a lunch with J.
Lo’s manager Benny Medina with changing her perspective.
“He asked me what I wanted to feel when I walked into a room.
I realized I didn’t want them to be like, ‘How cool is she?
I just heard her song on the radio!’
… That punch in of power wasn’t attractive to me anymore.
I realized I could use the real gift, which was still my voicejust not with melody!”
“It’s just a big, long, wonderful story of failure, not just one tiny thing.
I can one day show my son and say, ‘Look at your mama!’
I now have a time capsule of a moment.
I’m proud of…looking in the mirror and knowing that it was time to pivot.
I realized that it’s not failure; it’s recognizing that something isn’t right.
And that led me on a path toward what is right.
When I did that, it catapulted my business to a new level.”
