Apr 27 2005
Wil Marlow Reports
icstaines
Blazin' Squad's Kenzie saw his popularity rocket after Celebrity Big Brother - now he has produced a book.
There's a story Kenzie tells that illustrates how his life has changed since he was runner-up in Celebrity Big Brother. One evening in a nightclub, a man came up to him, stuck his face close to Kenzie's and insulted him.
Kenzie kept his cool and turned away. The man did it again and Kenzie asked where his girlfriend was. The man said he didn't have one and Kenzie motioned to his own girlfriend, glamour model Jodie Marsh, and said, "Well, look at mine."
The man then insulted Jodie but Kenzie kept calm.
"I would have swung for him but I can't now," says the 19-year-old.
"The minute I let my guard down, the next day I'll be in the papers. Because of that I feel like I'm working 24 hours a day now.
"I could get away with things before, with Blazin' Squad. When people mouthed off at us, we'd mouth off back. Now I can't do that. The second I give it back to them is the second it gets twisted round to make me look like a little diva."
Kenzie's been learning fast how to deal with his new-found fame. His close-run race with Happy Mondays' maracas man Bez to win Celebrity Big Brother turned Kenzie from one of boy-band Blazin' Squad's 10 teenage pin-ups to a household name.
Since leaving the house in January his life has become a whirlwind of personal and TV appearances which he has to fit around working with the band, writing his autobiography, Kenzie: My Life, and spending time with his family, yet somehow he's managed to remain calm and collected.
And his new girlfriend, 26-year-old Jodie, has added to that unflappable self-assurance. But it's also given both people and papers even more reason to focus their attention on him.
"We've had a tough time," he says of his fledgling relationship.
"Jodie's my girl, I've got a lot of feelings for her, but it's double the trouble when we go out together. Madness. But, I know it sounds big-headed, but I couldn't see myself without a celebrity girlfriend.
"That way we're on the same level. It's so hard to explain to a girl that isn't in the industry that you've got to work weird hours and you might have to kiss someone on the cheek or sign someone's breast just to keep your fans happy.
"Whereas Jodie knows, she's been in the business longer than me. She's used to a bit of bad press and she does get a bit of stick, but she's a clever girl."
Kenzie's future holds presenting - he's already done Popworld and is lining up jobs with Sky One and Nickelodeon - along with more work with Blazin' Squad.
Reports that he was leaving to go solo were laughed off by Kenzie himself, but it worried the rest of the band.
"They were scared," he says.
"I don't blame them. I'd have been scared if it was one of my boys who was doing what I'm doing."
But the other members of the Squad are fully supportive of his success, he says, and there's no envy.
Having said that, he admits he may want to strike out alone.
"I'd love to go solo at some point," he admits.
"But anything I did solo I'd still be with Blazin' Squad. I'd always come back."
