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"After a major lull in the first half of the year, the charts are exploding again with the sound of crackling, explosive dance-pop (back down, Justin Bieber!). The brightest and perhaps most unexpected of these sizzling, Gaga-esque releases is by my girl Kelis, 30.\r\nThe Grammy-nominated NYC native is showing the world there&amp;apos;s a lot more to her than &amp;quot;Milkshake&amp;quot; on her introspective fifth LP, Flesh Tone, in stores Tuesday. I caught up with the diva for the latest issue of Us Weekly to talk her exciting new change in sound, son Knight&amp;apos;s first birthday and if she&amp;apos;s smoothing things out with her ex-hubby, Nas, after a bitter divorce battle. Want the extended version? Dance on over here.\r\nAnd as a special bonus this holiday weekend, check out the singer&amp;apos;s latest video, &amp;quot;4th of July,&amp;quot; here!\r\nUsMagazine.com: This is your fifth album, but your first in four years. Why the wait? \r\nKelis: Honestly up until this point I never felt the need to put a record out every six months. I like to live my life in-between and I like to write my records for them to be something. Its hard for me to stay on the scene all the time -- it&amp;apos;s exhausting!\r\nUs: Lyrically there is a lot of joy and celebration on this album. Where did you draw your inspiration from? \r\nKelis: Pregnancy gives a woman a strong sense of validation. [When you&amp;apos;re pregnant], you wake up everyday and internally everything is working perfectly and you look at the world and everything sort of fits together. It&amp;apos;s hard not to realize there is a creator and he created all of us.\r\nUs: The song &amp;quot;Brave&amp;quot; tackles your divorce from Nas. Was that song therapeutic for you to write?\r\nKelis: After [the split], everyone was like &amp;apos;You are going through a rough time, you should write something personal.&amp;apos; I wear my feelings on my sleeve. The hardest decisions are the best ones and for me that was really the case. I am definitely better today than I was a year ago. And I&amp;apos;ll be better next year.\r\n Us: So you get along with Nas now? \r\nKelis: Yeah everything&amp;apos;s fine. We are divorced, but there is no point to fighting -- there is nothing to fight about. I am super happy; my life is awesome. We are friends, we get along now and it&amp;apos;s all good.\r\nUs: Your son, Knight, is celebrating his first birthday on July 22. What are some of his recent milestones? \r\nKelis: He is hilarious! He claps, he snaps and he waves. He is a shrunken little person and has a lot of personality.\r\nUs: Do you think he&amp;apos;ll follow in your footsteps and be a musician too? \r\nKelis: I don&amp;#x2019;t know. Whatever he does, I will be supportive and be a good mother. He does really have his own taste. He definitely jams!\r\nUs: Speaking of jamming, do you ever get tired of your megasmash &amp;quot;Milkshake&amp;quot;? \r\nKelis: I&amp;apos;m proud of it! Without tooting my own horn, that record changed music. After it came out, so many things came out in that genre or had that sound. I claim it thoroughly. A ton of female performers came out with records and that was their foundation. It&amp;apos;s a great thing. Now I have new music and I&amp;apos;m known for that, but it comes with the territory.\r\nBy Ian Drew for UsMagazine.com. To read more of Ian&amp;apos;s blog, click  here and don&amp;apos;t forget to follow him on Twitter."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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