but it came with a warning from the US pop star herself. "The album is not for any pearl clutchers," she told CBS News, with reference to prim, prudish or easily offended people. "This is just fun - and that's all it has to be," she added of her often risqué live performances.

In June, the singer revealed alternative album artwork "approved by God" after the original cover - which showed her on her hands and knees in a black minidress with a suited man grabbing her hair - sparked controversy. Some argued it pandered to the male gaze and promoted misogynistic stereotypes. CBS News's Gayle King, interviewing Carpenter, praised her "sexual, powerful, vulnerable" and "unapologetic" new music, which includes recent chart-topper Manchild and new single Tears.

But, she offered: "I think there are some people that would listen to the music and they'd be clutching their pearls." "Correct," Carpenter replied. "The album is not for any pearl clutchers. But I also think that even pearl clutchers can listen to an album like that in their own solitude and find something that makes them smirk and chuckle to themselves." She added: "Sometimes people hear the lyrics that are really bold and they go, 'I don't want to sing this in front of other people'. It's almost... TMI.

"But I think about being at a concert, with however many young women I see in the front row that are screaming at the top of their lungs with their best friends and you can go like, we can all sigh of relief. "This is just fun - and that's all it has to be." Of the 12 tracks on her new album, nine of them are labelled as explicit. Carpenter co-produced it with Taylor Swift collaborator Jack Antonoff, along with John Ryan, who also worked on her previous album, last year's Grammy-winning Short n' Sweet, which topped the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. (BBC/ Getty Images)