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Valance was born Auckland, New Zealand to a Serbian father and a British mother. She is related to the late British comedian Benny Hill — Hill's cousin was her grandfather (cousins twice removed). Holly was educated at the Star of the Sea College, a Roman Catholic high school located in Melbourne.
Holly's first single as a recording artist was Kiss Kiss, released in 2002. Kiss Kiss is her version of the original song Şımarık by Turkish superstar Tarkan. The video for Kiss Kiss was notable in that Valance appeared to be dancing naked. In fact, she was dancing whilst wearing flesh colored underwear; the footage was then digitally retouched adding strategically placed lighting effects. Her début album Footprints was released on October 14, 2002.
Kiss Kiss debuted at #1 in both the Australia ARIA charts and UK Singles Charts in (April-May 2002). Kiss Kiss scored Holly 4 ARIA nominations. Her next single, Down Boy peaked at #2 in the UK and at #3 in Australia, while her album Footprints debuted and peaked at #9 in the UK and at #15 in Australia. Her third single Naughty Girl peaked at #3 in Australia and at #16 in the UK. The first single State of Mind from her next album of the same name debuted and peaked at #8 in the UK and at #14 in Australia, but the album didn't get into the top 50 of either country.
Desire was, according to some rumours, to be the 2nd official single coming out of Holly's second album and she even made a few performances for the promotion but it would get cancelled due to poor album sales. Following legal problems with her manager/boyfriend, and poor sales from the album "State of Mind," Valance was dropped from her recording company.
She signed a £3 million deal with the hair products company Schwarzkopf Live to front the new line aimed at an early teen to early 20s market. Valance was seen modelling Cosmic Blue, Sahara True Blonde, Hypnotic Red as well as XXL dresses and XXL hats (each colour has a strapline which referenced other popular culture artists). The adverts could be seen across the United Kingdom at bus stops, shopping malls, on buses and in magazines.
During this time, Valance appeared on Har Mar Superstar's album "The Handler" singing on tracks "Body Request" and "Back the Camel up".
In 2002, she won the British GQ Award for "Woman of the Year". Wikipedia |
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