Tiffani Wood

Tiffani Wood (born Tiffany Wood, 1977) is an Australian singer–songwriter who rose to fame as a member of Australia's highest selling girl group Bardot. She has since signed with Warner Music, her debut solo single What R U Waiting 4? charting in the ARIA Top 30, and now manages her own record label Mudhoney Records from which she has released the singles Devil In Your Soul and Spin The Bottle.

Early Years
Tiffani was born in Newcastle, Australia in 1977. From an early age of 4, she liked to mimic the song and dance routines of Janet Jackson and Madonna, and jumped at any opportunity to perform at school talent shows, her parents Christmas and New Year's parties and basically just showing off at any chance she could get. Her parents quickly took note of this and enrolled her into her first jazz dancing class where she continued to dance and eventually also assist teaching younger students until a new talent school came to town.

For many years, there had been a show on Australian television called Young Talent Time. It was a show that every young singer and dancer wished to be on and when they opened a talent school in Newcastle Tiffani, age 12, decided to take up singing. It wasn't long before the teachers noticed Tiffani's natural singing talent and at age 15 she was placed into a show troupe "The Young Stars" which performed at various venues around NSW. During her three year stint in this group, Tiffani had her first taste of recording for an album and performing solo in front of large crowds, her biggest being the opening of the Sydney Harbour Tunnel where she performed in front of over 20 000 people.

During her schooling years, Tiffani would skip school camps and functions to enter many talent quests winning her fair. She also played the lead vocal role in her school musical Murder In The Music Hall in 1994. Doing all this, she still managed to complete her HSC schooling in 1995 with her highest mark of 85% in music.

When 18, Tiffani went back to her "beach babe" routes and entered in various Sydney and Newcastle swimsuit competitions putting under her belt a number of titles such as Miss Indy 96, Miss Beach Girl 97, Miss Hawaiian Tropics 98, Cover Girl 98 and Miss Wild FM 98 and was also accepted into the Newcastle Mariners Super League Cheerleading Squad.

At the same time as this, Tiffani was turning professional in her performances joining the cover band "Quiver", as their lead singer, where she sang a huge range of songs covering from Tracey Chapman, Pearl Jam, Shania Twain, Alanis Morrissette, 80's rock and much more and again had her second taste of vocal recording of original songs with this band.

The taste for the big time was getting to strong so Tiffani packed up her bags and moved to Sydney to follow her dream of becoming a star. There she enrolled in The Australian Institute of Music choosing vocal as her major which included studying such fields as performance studies, music technology, music industry studies and music theory. She completed this in 1999 with a certificate with merit in music performance. During this time she had joined another covers band "The Anthill Mob" performing at various venues throughout NSW and recorded again. As well as this, Tiffani held down many jobs including assistant Latin Dance teacher, Promotions, Hilton Hotel hostess and part time model. It was at this time that her big break was about to arrive.

Bardot
Tiffani landed her big break in 2000 when she auditioned for the first Australian series of Popstars, a reality television show which promised to produce "Australia's very own Spice Girls". After selections for the group had been finalised by the judges, Tiffani just missed out. However, original member Chantelle Barrios was forced out of the group in controversial circumstances and Tiffani was selected to replace her as the fifth member of the band, now known as Bardot.

Popstars was one of the most popular, highest rating TV programs in Australia, 2000 and with the groups overwhelming exposure, Bardot's debut single Poison and self-titled debut album both debuted at number one on the Australian ARIA charts, both achieving multi-platinum sales. Further singles I Should've Never Let You Go and These Days continued the album's successful assault on the Australian charts, scoring the girls consecutive Top 20, gold smash hits. The group went on its first national tour and made a remarkable performance of These Days at the 2000 ARIA Awards for which they were nominated in two categories.

Katie Underwood left Bardot in 2001, but the four remaining members with their determination and new-found confidence made and a successful "comeback" to the charts with ''ASAP, the first single from their second album. ASAP went Top 5 as did the following single, the disco smash, I Need Somebody''. Bardot released its second album Play It Like That, which entered the charts at #16 having already shipped gold status upon release and performed before 45,000 music lovers at the Rumba festivals. In early 2002, they embarked on their second national tour with Australian boy group Human Nature and released their final single Love Will Find A Way, before deciding to "call it day" in April of that year.

At the girl's final public concert, performed live at Channel V, Tiffani broke into tears during the final number, preventing her from being able to sing, sad at the realisation that it was all coming to an end. Later in interviews, she stated that her and former bandmate Belinda Chapple were the two members keen to continue as a group.

What R U Waiting 4
Like former Bardot bandmate Sophie Monk, Tiffani signed a solo contract with Warner Music and changed her name from Tiffany Wood to Tiffani Wood in order to avoid confusion with the 1980's American popstar Tiffany. The debut single, What R U Waiting 4? re-introduced Tiffani back into the music scene, marketed as an organic, light pop-rock singer (similar to the likes of Michelle Branch, Alanis Morissette etc) and debuted at #27 on the ARIA singles charts on March 22, 2004. It was one of the most-played songs on Australian radio in that month.

What R U Waiting 4? is a feel-good, motivational song written by Matthew Gerrard (who has also written hits for Mandy Moore and Delta Goodrem) and is a track that Tiffani connected with instantly despite having no lyrical imput. It inspired her to begin writing material of her own that she would want used for the second and further singles. The two b-sides of the single showed the amazing skills she pocessed both as an artist and songwriter and remain fan favourites. The Mirror speaks of growing up and the pressures encountered such as body image and self identity while U&I is an uplifting, romantic love song about the trials and tribulations of a relationship.

Tensions with Warner Music, who wanted to release someone else's song as the second single, grew and this resulted in Tiffani's decision to leave behind her secure recording contract for the option of artistic freedom.

Going Independent
After leaving Warner, Tiffani decided to take things head on and established her own record label Mudhoney Records which was cristened with the release of her debut independent single Devil In Your Soul on Monday July 18th 2005. Devil In Your Soul is fast-paced pop/rock, complete with exhilarating electrical guitars, strong drum beats, tongue-in-cheek lyrics and a saucy vocal performance by Tiffani. The song, written by Tiffani and Richie Goncalves (who produced the song and looks to be one of Tiffani's biggest musical collaborators) takes a stab at the music industry and how major record labels take advantage of their younger artists in order to make them 'marketable'. The tracks video clip, which featured Tiffani in a 80s inspired bubble dress was also co-produced and directed by her and featured a number of fans in several scenes. The track debuted at #13 on the Australian Independent Music charts and spent numerous weeks in its Top 20. Tiffani has since performed many acoustic, full band and nightclub shows receiveing nothing but praise for her live performances. On April 3rd 2006, she released her second independent single Spin The Bottle with a number of promotional commitments including gigs, magazine/newspaper interviews, and red carpet events. The song was used in several promotional advertisements for Australian long-time TV soap Neighbours in the lead up to the 2006 Logie Awards. Tiffani's debut solo album Bite Your Tongue will be released sometime later this year (September, most likely) and the third single is confirmed to be a cover of the Divinyls early 1990's hit I Touch Myself.

Albums
As part of Bardot Solo
 * Bardot (2000) ARIA #1
 * Play It Like That (2001) ARIA #16
 * Bite Your Tongue (Later 2006) TBA

Singles
As part of Bardot Solo
 * Poison (2000) ARIA #1
 * I Should've Never Let You Go (2000) ARIA #14
 * These Days (2000) ARIA #19
 * ASAP (2001) ARIA #5
 * I Need Somebody (2001) ARIA #5
 * Love Will Find A Way (2002) ARIA #18
 * What R U Waiting 4? (2004) ARIA #27
 * Devil In Your Soul (2005) AIR #13 ARIA #128
 * Spin The Bottle (2006) AIR #2
 * I Touch Myself (August 2006) TBA