That bilingual album that Shakira has been yapping about has just been given a concrete release date from Billboard. ‘Sale el Sol‘ was originally due in September, but will now officially arrive in stores on November 2.

The disc will contain production from Lester Mendez, Jim Jonsin and The Neptunes, and will feature appearances from Calle 13, Pitbull, and possibly indie-band The xx. Rumor has it that the first single is due as soon as the end of this month, but no official word has been made yet.

If anybody has listened to Enrique’s new bilingual album Euphoria then you’d know that it’s a wildly uneven affair that can’t decide if it wants to be Spanish-flavored pop-rock or high-NRG euro-pop, but it has been a huge success worldwide and served as a bit of a comeback album for Enrique, so it’ll be interesting to see if Shakira’s ‘Sale el Sol‘ can follow suit and light up the charts where She Wolf couldn’t.

A fluro pink Shakira was snapped on the set of a new photoshoot in Ibiza yesterday.

It’s not yet been revealed exactly what the shoot was for, but with a new album Sale El Sol (Translation: Sunrise) on the way, there’s a good chance that it could be related to that.

The album is currently due this September, and will be bilingual just like Enrique’s latest record Euphoria. According to Glamor magazine, it will only include three English tracks, but I’d wait until the official tracklisting is unveiled before jumping the gun.

Meanwhile, I was flipping through the latest issue of Q magazine this week, and they reported that Shakira is actually set to collaborate with indie band The xx. They didn’t go into much detail, just mentioning that it was happening and quoting Shakira as saying, “I’m not sure I’m supposed to talk about it”. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, then you would’ve heard Shakira’s fabulous cover of The xx’s “Islands”. Perhaps her collaboration means that she’s including the song on her next album?

After her most recent English album She Wolf under-performed on the charts, Shakira’s wasted no time getting back to work on the follow-up, which is due out as early as this September. She’s already let a few details about the bilingual disc slip, but now in a special new 30-minute interview with YouTube, the singer is getting a little more in-depth about the sound and the lyrical content on the new record.

“I’m very excited about the new album — which is about to come out in September — because it reminds me of different eras and different stages of my career. It’s like a synthesis of all these twenty years. It’s got songs that remind me of Pies Descalzos [her 1996 debut album], and Dónde están los ladrones? [1998 sophomore album] and Laundry Service. It’s got a strong rock side, and also romantic songs, and Latino, Latin sounding songs. A little bit of everything.”

“I’m so thrilled about it. It’s been like re-encountering… it’s been quite interesting to make this new album. Re-connecting with myself and my sensibility. It’s very introspective, but at the same time it’s very joyful.”

“[this album] Is very personal. It’s very much about my feelings and the times I’ve felt my heart has broken, and the pieces get sewn again, and recovering and surviving and going through struggles, and coming through those struggles feeling stronger. It’s also about the joy of celebrating my own culture, because I decided to go to Dominican republic and kind of understand a little bit of that part of the Caribbean, and get some of those sounds, and mix them in my music. So it’s very exciting from a sonic point of view, but also, it’s so personal and so much of a reflection of the way I feel, or the way I’ve felt these past two years.”

So far the album sounds like it’s going to be a true return to form for Shakira, and will reflect the early days of when she was on top of the charts. So far the album will contain production from Lester Mendez, The Neptunes, and Jim Jonsin, so I’ thinking it’ll have a very universal and eclectic world pop sound.

You can watch the full interview with the classy, intelligent, talented and beautiful Shakira below.

Sex bomb Shakira played Glastonbury this weekend, busting out a cover of “Islands” by indie-band The xx.

If you remember correctly, a snippet of the studio version of Shakira’s cover leaked a while back, but this is the first time we’ve seen her do it live.

Besides the amazing “Islands”, Shakira’s set also included her World Cup anthem “Waka Waka”, an electro version of “She Wolf”, and a fiery performance of her biggest hit “Hips Don’t Lie”.

Shaki is currently working on her next studio album, which will be completely bilingual, so you can probably expect it to get a simultaneous worldwide release like Enrique Iglesias’ new record.

Anyway, peep “Islands” below then watch the rest of the performances under the cut.

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Not wasting any time since the release of She Wolf, sexpot Shakira has confirmed to Billboard that her next studio album will hit stores this September. The as-yet-untitled album will be bilingual and may even feature her new World Cup single “Waka Waka” (which just debuted at #44 on the Hot 100).

“I see it [the new album] as having two currents,” she says. “One is a lot about love and love experiences and emotions. And the other side of it is very joyful, and upbeat.”

Shakira also revealed that the music on her upcoming set would reflect influences from both the Dominican Republic and Colombia. “It’s a little more Latin on one side and a little more rock ‘n roll on the other side,” she says.

Known producers on the new disc include Shakira’s She Wolf collaborators Lester Mendez and The Neptunes, as well as Jim Jonsin, who recently described the album as “edgy pop” and having “dance records” in a similar vibe to “Whenever, Wherever”.

After the electronic/dance-pop sound of She Wolf failed on the charts (I think due to mishandled promotion and bad timing), Shakira sounds like she’s going back to basics in a bid to top the charts again.

Now clap your hands three times if you thought She Wolf kicked ass and should have done really well.

Indie rock band The xx have gotten one step closer to breaking out into the mainstream thanks to pop’s hottest sexpot Shakira, who has decided to record a cover of the band’s latest single “Islands”.

Retitling the song to “Explore”, Shakira gives the song an upbeat dance makeover without eroding the fragility of the original. Her unique phrasing and vocal delivery is a nice contrast from the hushed talk-singing that The xx are known for,  allowing Shakira to really make it her own.

It’s one of the best covers to come out in a long time and the song wasn’t released as a single by The xx then I’d suggest that Shakira put it out for herself.

Take a listen to the leaked 1:37 clip below, and then jump under the cut to hear The xx’s brilliant and beautiful original.

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Shakira already announced at the beginning of the month that she was recording a new album, and now songwriter Rico Love has stepped forward to reveal that he’s working with the sexy singer on the upcoming LP.

“Yeah she’s working on a new album,” he told Rap-Up. “[It's] definitely more pop, edgy. She wanted to just do some dance records. She wanted to really dance on this record and do what made her famous in America, a ‘Whenever, Wherever’-type vibe… I think we might be onto something.”

Shakira previously said that the album will be bilingual, and she’s already been back into the studio for it with her She Wolf collaborators The Neptunes, as well as producer Lester Mendez.

The whole thing sounds interesting, but if they had just gotten the She Wolf era right then Shakira would still be promoting that and there wouldn’t even be talk of a new album so soon.

It was already announced last year that Shakira would drop a Spanish album in 2010 after the release of She Wolf, similar to what she did with Oral Fixation Volumes 1 & 2, but now it looks like the album is shaping up to be more of a bilingual project after Shakira announced that she had penned some English tracks with Pharrell.

“Pharrell is really great. We have lots of chemistry together.

“I learnt a lot from him when we worked on my last album ‘She Wolf’. He’s so fast in the studio, whereas I’m usually so slow. I take so much time on one decision; I go in circles sometimes, whereas he is very immediate.”

She explained: “I’d already written half of this album and it was always the plan to release a Spanish album next. I’ve felt very inspired in the last month, so I went for it. I started writing some material in English, too, which I’m going to use on this album.” {source}

Shakira also confirmed the same news during a recent German interview:

“With this next album that I’m preparing right now, it’s gonna have Spanish songs and English songs as well, and also some Latin songs. Yeah, already working [on my new album].”

Shakira generally releases her Spanish albums separately to her English ones and then just promotes them in Latin America, but after the underwhelming US sales of She Wolf could she perhaps be working on a bilingual album that she plans to release and promote universally?

Producer Lester Mendez recently tweeted that he’s been finishing off some new songs for Shaki, so it’s a pretty much a done deal that we’ll be getting a new album from her this year. I just wonder what type of album it will be exactly.

I’m gonna keep my fingers crossed for another She Wolf because I thought it was a great pop record that really went to waste due to some very poor timing issues.

The super sexy Shakira is still flying around the globe promoting her She Wolf album, stopping by one of Germany’s biggest TV shows Wetten Dass to perform her song “Gypsy”, which is the fourth single from the album.

There are only so many times that we can watch Shakira sitting cross-legged on a carpet singing “Gypsy” like a hippie, so I’m glad to see that she changed things around this time by actually standing up and giving us some of those erection-inducing hip rolls that she’s infamous for.

There aren’t many other pop stars out there that can come across as so incredibly sexy by just performing in a floor-length skirt and singlet.

If you thought that the ridiculously hot Shakira was for some reason going to be less sexy in the video for new single, the organic sounding “Gypsy, then you’re completely wrong.

The simple video basically just consists of Shakira (looking like a walking wet dream) wandering around in a barely-there dress canoodling with Spanish tennis pro Rafael Nadal, before later changing into a slinky little gold number to do a toned-down version of her mesmerizing hip rolls and booty shakes.

“Gypsy” is the third international single (fourth overall) from Shakira’s latest album She Wolf which has yet to even reach a Gold certification in the US. An Argentinian magazine reported a while back that a video for “Men In This Town” may be released at some stage, so the She Wolf project could still have some juice left in it yet.

Some of musics biggest stars were out today for the appropriately titled NBA All-Stars game in Texas.

Kicking it all off was Usher who performed “More”, “She Don’t Know” and “Yeah” at the pre-game opener, followed by sexy Shakira who shook her way through “She Wolf” and “Give It Up To Me”, and then Alicia Keys who followed Shaki with “Try Sleeping with a Broken Heart”, “Empire State of Mind” and “No One”.

Which one was your favorite? I liked them all!

Fans will be happy to know that Shakira hasn’t given up on her new album She Wolf just yet, with PuroShow reporting that the Colombian bombshell is preparing to shoot a video for her next single “Men In This Town”.

Shakira is current trying to decide between Hollywood, Buenos Aires and Punta del Este as the location for the video.

It’s not yet been announced if the song will be released in the US or just internationally, but it’s most likely set to follow up the Timbaland produced “Give It Up To Me” which peaked at #29 on the Hot 100.

“Gypsy” has also been confirmed as a future single from She Wolf.

“Men In This Town” has been a fan favorite since her album She Wolf was released last year so I’m sure people will be happy to hear that it’s getting the single treatment. If you ask me all the songs from She Wolf are single-worthy so I’d honestly be happy what whatever she released.