Shakira’s ‘Hips Don’t Lie’ almost never made it onto her album.
The 48-year-old singer had completed work on her 2005 record ‘Oral Fixation, Vol. 2’ but she then got into the studio with Wylcef Jean and knew instantly they had a hit on their hands, so she called her record company boss and begged him to pull the LP so the extra track could be added.
Speaking on ‘The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, she said: “I remember my album was already distributed, and then this idea came up, and Wyclef and I met and we started working on this track.
“I started working with Wyclef, and I knew I had a hit, so I called Donny Lenner, who was in charge at the time of [Epic Records], and I said, ‘Donny, you have to pick up the albums from the stores,’ and he’s like, ‘No way, these albums are already out there.
“I’m like, ‘You’ve got to believe me. You’ve got to trust me. You do that, we have a hit.’ And he said, ‘OK, so I’ll listen to you. I’ll listen to you on this one,’ and he did it and we kind of had to repackage the albums, and it changed my story.”
The collaboration with Wyclef came right after Shakira had spookily had a dream about him.
She said: “You know, the funniest thing is that I had a dream, the most random dream about Wyclef. It wasn’t a sexual dream! It was just a dream. And then I woke up and my manager called me and said, ‘Wyclef wants to work with you.’ “
Meanwhile, Shakira is proud to have sold out 11 shows in Mexico City and have the number one tour in the world for the second month in a row and she thinks its a special experience for fans.
She said: “It’s incredible. I’ve been working on this tour for a year, preparing every single detail, from the visuals to the music. I’ve put together my biggest set list. I’m singing some of my classic songs, from ‘Hips Don’t Lie’ to ‘Whenever, Whatever’ to the most recent ones.
“And it’s a pretty huge production. It’s a huge effort to tour with this production around Latin America. It’s probably the biggest production that’s ever traveled Latin America. It weighs like 93 tons. The screen is huge and it’s 145 people traveling…
“So when you show up and you see so many people dancing and singing and crying and getting emotional. It’s a party, but people really, really connect with this music. It’s been like the soundtrack of their lives, for many of my fans.”