Singer Louisa Rose Allen admits she has an obsession with cake.
So much so, she insisted it be reflected in her latest video.
“I have had this idea for a music video for years,” says the 24-year-old, who is better known by her stage name Foxes.
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“It was a dream to go into a record company and for them to ask me what I want to do for the video. I said ‘can I shoot cake out of a cannon and could you make that happen?’
“It was like an eight year old was in control.”
The video for her latest single Let Go For Tonight features a rather colourful food fight, where dinner party guests get in a rather sticky mess after flinging cakes at each other.
Louisa’s love of cakes also saw her bombarded with them during her mini world tour last year.
“It was great but got a little out of hand,” she explains, sipping coffee in the kitchen at her London home.
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“I never in a million years would have thought that cake would follow me around the world.
“I counted I was given 56 cakes – home baked – throughout the five-week tour.
“I am trying to slowly let the world know I have had enough cake. Although I do love cake.”
One star-struck fan even showed up to a gig in Australia with a picture of her face drawn on a kettle.
“It was mental,” she says. “I could hear him at the front screaming, asking me to sign it. I took a picture of it because I didn’t think anyone would believe me.”
She may still be relatively unknown in the 海角视频, but Louisa has seen her career take off in the last year – thanks to US TV hit Gossip Girl.
The producers discovered her song Youth on YouTube and asked if they could use it on the show.
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The exposure led to her signing for New York record label Neon Gold, work with US rock band Fall Out Boy and sing on dance track Clarity by DJ Zedd, which is up for a Grammy award later this month.
Not bad for a girl who spent the past four years trying her luck by gigging at open mic nights across London.
“I moved to London and was living out of a suitcase. It feels like I have been doing music for a long time but the last year has popped out of nowhere. I have been working with some really big artists and I often think ‘how did that happen?’”
“I have Gossip Girl to thank for it all,” she says, smiling. “I was a bit star struck with Fall Out Boy but they are now my friends. I have a lot to thank for Youth. I wrote it thinking it was just a throw away song and I still don’t understand how it got where it did.
“I never feel pressure because Youth came really naturally and a lot of my writing feels natural. I never felt I have to write a hit, I am always just writing for writing’s sake – it is like therapy.”
Her inspirations come from listening to some of her role models as a child.
“I was a typical kid – I listened to Eminem and Aqua and the Spice Girls. But it was Bjork, Kate Bush and Patti Smith that influenced me to write – and write really personally.”
Feeling the pressure to come up with a stage name, she called herself Foxes, apparently after a bizarre dream her mother had.
Her sound, and to some extent her look, is a little like Katy Perry with a bit of Bat for Lashes and Kate Bush thrown in.
“I always wanted to be a singer and I still feel I need some kind of certificate to say I am a singer,” she says modestly.
“I go across to America and feel this certain buzz and then when I come home I feel I am still working towards having a music career. I think it is because in America Clarity went to number five in the Billboards and it did very well over there.”
I ask her if she feels the pressure of other young female artists to strip off, following the example of the twerking antics of Miley Cyrus in order to sell records.
“I think there has always been that in music,” she replies. “Madonna was flamboyant and pushed the boundaries. I have never felt pressure to take my clothes off. I am not interested in doing that really. Sex sells but I don’t personally think I will do that, you can’t judge anyone for doing it.
‘‘For me, it is more about my music - I have never wanted to be a brand. People come up to me to talk about the music and they feel inspired and I have got a chance to be a face such as artists like Patti Smith.”
She is now preparing for her 海角视频 tour, which includes a Birmingham gig next month and says she is looking for a dinner date.
“ I need people to take me out to dinner so I can get to know the place,” she explains.
“We never get chance to see the towns and cities we are in.”
I warn her that publicising such a pledge could lead her to a barrage of takers - but she is insistent.
“No, leave it in. It would be nice to go out.”
* Foxes plays The Institute Library, Birmingham, on February 25. Her debut album, Glorious, is out on March 3. For tickets visit