Belle Perez is Belgian, but her Spanish parents seem to have influenced a lot of her musical decisions lately; many of her recent songs have been in Spanish and have a definite Latin sound to them. When her career began, though, she was very much a bubblegum pop singer. She's tried to represent Belgium at Eurovision several times, during both phases of her music, but has never been successful. In the late '90's or very early in 2000, her record company tried to build up some U.S. interest around her, but she never ended up taking off here; still, she's gone on to build herself a strong career in Belgium (and to some degree, the Netherlands, I think), even if her singles don't always go top 5, and is currently on her fourth studio album (she's also released a live album and a greatest hits).(I know that's not the greatest picture, but I couldn't find a better one.)
Honeybee--from her bubblegum pop period, "Honeybee," as far as I can tell, doesn't share the same topic as Billie Piper's "Honey To The Bee"--it is actually about a boy, I think. It would have fit right in among the pop music of the late '90's and early 2000's across the world, and it's really a cute catchy song. Mid-tempo but full of bouncy energy, it's instantly appealing but might not get stuck in your head on first listen; still, you'll find yourself coming back to it, and pretty soon, it will be firmly and inescabably lodged in your mind.
You can buy Belle Perez's album The Best Of here (physical).
Next up: Dutch music that I still haven't totally gotten over being embarrassed about liking.
