"Hello Brighton Argus!" Sia booms cheerfully down the phone in a voice that gives no indication of the husky fragility of which it is capable.

She's speaking over the din of a raucous tour bus and doesn't sound entirely in the mood for an in-depth interview.

Some People Have Real Problems, to be released in January, is the Aussie singer's first album in three years - "I was fart-arsing about"

she admits breezily - and sees her collaborate with Beck, Turin Brakes and her old friends from Zero 7, for whose album Simple Things she provided vocals.

How does this latest album compare to 2004's Colour The Small Ones, I ask her?

"I think it's probably rounder and pointier. It's grown a lot. It's hairier. It's about 11 now," she says, guffawing uncontrollably.

She calms down slightly when discussing Academia, a darkly hypnotic tale of failed love, that features Beck.

"It was one of those vomit songs," she says, "I just went bleurgh' and six minutes later it was there.I actually had to go through it afterwards to check it made sense, but it was about all these things that had obviously been in my mind.

"It was about the intellect and being deprived of love by someone who's ruled by his intellect."

When I comment that it sounds personal, she turns uncharacteristically coy. "I guess I could certainly relate to it, but it wasn't something I set out to write," she says.

It is the second time the 31 year old has worked with Beck, after making The Bully on Colour The Small Ones, and his niece sings on Some People's Little Black Sandals.

"Beck and his family are some of my favourite people in LA - they have always been so nice and supportive and they all came down and we spent a day recording.

"I just think there's this tone he captures when he sings in a particular way and I heard it all over Academia, so I asked him to come in."

It is the song she is most proud of, she tells me, adding: "If I had a million pounds I'd probably make a whole album like that."

But it is hidden track Buttons that has prompted the most coverage so far, thanks to a promotional video that features the blonde singer's face contorted in a kinky array of stockings, condoms, orange nets and Sellotape.

Originally intended as a video treatment for Beth Ditto of the Gossip, it became a YouTube phenomenon after being posted by celebrity gossip blogger Perez Hilton.

Sia says: "It was never intended to be fetishy - it was just a bit bizarre.

"It was only after we saw some of the responses on YouTube I realised I'd probably just earned myself a whole new demographic."

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