NEW YORK (Yahoo) - When
Enrique Iglesias traveled to Toronto in 1995 begin recording his 1996 self-titled album, he did it without the blessings of his father, legendary singer
Julio Iglesias.
Enrique made the revelation in the January 13 edition of London's Sunday Times, wherein he said of his father, "He said, 'You're nuts, you're f--ing crazy, you don't know what you're doing.''' Enrique added that to this day he does not talk to his father about his music career, explaining, "I think my father thought that nothing was going to happen, that I wasn't going to be successful, but not because he doesn't believe in me-he was just being realistic about the music industry."
Enrique went on: "When I sold a million copies, he would say, 'You know, you're not going to pass a million copies-that's impossible.' He always pissed me off like that, and then I would end up selling 2 million or 3 million, or 4 million. Then he'd say, 'Oh yeah, you sold that many copies, but you're never going to get a Grammy.'" Enrique won a Grammy Award for best Latin pop performance in 1996. His father won the award in the very same category in 1987.
Enrique noted in the interview that he surpassed just about every expectation that his father held for him, saying, "So every time he would push me, and then there came a time when there were no more obstacles he could put in front of me. It used to be that I competed against that, but now I can compete against myself. It's come to a point where it has nothing to do with my father any more."
Despite their differences in opinion, Enrique said that still keeps in touch with his father. "It's not a normal relationship," Enrique conceded. "It's weird in many ways, but we love each other. I admire him so much."
Enrique is the third child of Julio Iglesias and Philippines-born ex-model Isabel Preysler, although the couple divorced when he was 3. Enrique told recently that he hopes to be a better singer than his father. "I've always wanted to be better than my father as a singer, but I think that's completely normal. I mean, I think that if tomorrow I have kids and one of them was to be a singer, I'd expect him to be better than me," he said.
Journalist asked the younger Iglesias if, as a child, he was treated any differently by his friends because of his world-famous father. "I mean, they knew he was a singer. Maybe if my father would have been the guy from Twisted Sister or someone like that, they would have been, like, 'Oh yeah? Wow!' you know? But since it didn't really hit the generation I grew up with-my father's music-it didn't really change the way people acted around me," he explained.
In related news, 19-year-old Russian tennis star Anna Kournikova appears with Iglesias-Enrique that is-in the music video for the title track and next single from his album Escape. Kournikova shot the video with the singer at the Long Beach Performing Arts Center and the City Walk shopping area in Universal City, California, on December 21 and 22.
