During the final two weeks of 2001, liveDaily is looking back by revisiting several notable artist interviews that we've published throughout the year. The following interview first ran on July 5.

Over the last few years, Destiny’s Child has won Grammys, put out a pair of platinum-plus albums and brought the phrase "bootylicious" into the vernacular. Despite this variety of successes, much of the attention goes to the fact that there are as many former Destiny’s Child members (three) as current ones.

Newest member Michelle Williams was working as a back-up singer when she got a call to audition for the group last year. liveDaily correspondent Colin Devenish caught up with Williams to chat about her role in the group, Destiny’s Child’s upcoming Christmas album, meeting Stevie Nicks and covering the Bee Gees.

LiveDaily: How did you prepare for your audition for Destiny’s Child?

Michelle Williams: It was so on the spot. I got the phone call and I had to go the next day, you know what I mean? I used to sing back-up for Monica, and our choreographer referred me to Beyoncé [Knowles] and Kelly [Rowland], because they needed new members. I’d already met Beyoncé and Kelly, and I was familiar with them. They called me and let me know what the deal was, and I came down there, and I sang for them and danced for them. It was so cool, because they came and got me from the airport, I stayed at their house, I had a ball. We went to a seafood restaurant. We had so, so, so much fun. It turned out that I became one of the group, and I shot the video [for "Say My Name"] maybe a week or two after my audition. And the NBA All-Star game in Oakland was our first show together.

Kelly and Beyoncé grew up together, and they’re practically like sisters. What's it like to join in the middle?

It’s just like, say you’ve been at school for five years, and then you gotta go to another school. It’s like meeting new friends. It just takes time to get to know everybody, get situated, get comfortable. With females it’s even more difficult, because for some reason, female groups just don’t work out. We know the number-one reason is because of jealousy, and that’s not the case in Destiny’s Child. I know that I am not the lead singer, and I am perfectly fine with what it is I do. What I did to prepare, they taught me. And they still teach me. They have wonderful management, their family is there for me--Matthew and Tina [Knowles, Beyoncé's parents]--they’re like my parents. As far as I’m concerned, it’s kind of natural. But it took some time.

Did your friends take bets on how long you’d last?

I’m sure they were just wondering what was going on. Everybody was wondering what was going on. Us in the group were wondering what was going on, but the people supposed who are supposed to be here are here, and God worked everything out to where everything was OK.”

I’m sure you get a lot more attention now than when you were singing back-up with Monica. What do you do to keep yourself sane?

This past weekend, we all went to Miami for the weekend. Beyoncé and Kelly, they go to Miami a lot, and so I said, "OK, I’m going to go." Because a lot of times when we have days off, I’ll come home and visit my family in Illinois. But I said, "This time I’m going to go where there’s some water and some hot sun," and we had so much fun. We do things like that. And if we’re in a hotel room, we just try to have time for ourselves.

You’re going to be going out on the TRL tour with Nelly, Eve, Jessica Simpson, Dream and 3LW. What have you been doing to get ready?

The band and dancers have been practicing for a long time, but we have everything scheduled up until a week before the tour. So as far as me, Beyoncé and Kelly are concerned, we have a week to get ready for this tour.

Do you have to learn a bunch of new dances?

We have to learn new routines. We just did a tour last year, and we can’t do the same routines as last year. It’s very stressful--for me it is, I don’t know about Beyoncé and Kelly--but we’ll be all right.

How many different dance routines do you have for this tour?

Just about every song. Some songs will be re-arranged, some verses were taken out. We’re condensing some songs, because we’ve got the new singles "Survivor," "Bootylicious" and "Emotion," [which] we now have to put in the show. So some of the older songs have to be condensed, like maybe "Bills, Bills, Bills," "Bug A Boo," "Say My Name," "Jumpin’ Jumpin'." It’s cool that all those songs were No. 1 singles, so our whole audience knows all the songs. That’s what’s so cool about our shows. Everybody knows all the songs.

Are you going to make them into medleys?

I wouldn’t say medleys. We used to do the whole song to "Bills, Bills, Bills," [but] this time, we might do the first verse, a few choruses and maybe put on a new ending. We like to play around with it.

Like today at soundcheck for the Milwaukee Summerfest, we were playing around and coming up with different things, and sometimes when we’re playing around, we actually keep the stuff that we use just playing around, because some stuff that’s created sounds so hot.

I heard you’re working on a Christmas album?

Yes, we are, we’re in the process. We have to go into the studio [twice this week]. We had those two days off, but we now have to go to the studio because we have no other choice.

What songs are you going to do?

Well, we’re definitely going to do the traditional Christmas songs, and there’s original songs that Beyoncé wrote that we’re going to do. On this album, we’re all doing our favorite Christmas song. They’ll be solo songs, so myself, Beyoncé and Kelly will have featured solo songs on this Christmas album.

What song are you going to do?

When is this interview coming out?

Probably not for a little bit.

I don’t want to give it away. Is that OK?

Well, I’d like it if you did, but if you’re not going to, I can’t make you.

[Laughs.]

In terms of the traditional songs, what ones are going to be on there?

We did a great arrangement of "Carol of the Bells." We already did Donny Hathaway's "This Christmas"; we did that while we were in Tokyo, Japan. And then, let’s see ... I know tomorrow we’ll probably do "Away in a Manger." All those traditional ones--"Silent Night," things like that.

"Outro (DC3 ) Thank You" is the one song on the album three of you wrote together. What was that process like?

What happened was, we needed another song, and they kept saying, "Beyoncé, Beyoncé, we need another song, write another song." She couldn’t write anymore, she was just like, "You guys, let’s just do what we feel, let’s just do our thing." And it was cool because it could dispel some rumors people have about us, like we don’t get along and things like that. We were in the studio in New York, and we each wrote and arranged our own parts.

When Beyoncé has a new song, how does she give it to you guys. Does she make tapes for you?

When we go into the studio, some songs are written on the spot. Some songs she’s already written. She’ll sing the song to us and then if we feel that--which we always do--then we just go in there and do our parts.

Does she write the parts for you, or do you do your own parts?

She comes up with a lot of the arrangements, but she always tell us to put "us" into it, you know what I mean? Make it sound like something we’d do.”

I read where you’d met Stevie Nicks recently, and she was in the video for "Bootylicious"...

We were actually doing "Saturday Night Live," and we were in the NBC studios. She was doing "Rosie O’Donnell," so we met her there. And we asked her to be in the "Bootylicious" video, since we were using her song, and she said, "Sure." She came to the video shoot; she even canceled some things she had to do and came to the video shoot.

Were you a fan of hers at all?

Oh, definitely. I remember Fleetwood Mac. I remember her clothes. She always had those frilly dresses or those cut-up kinds of dresses. She was sexy in her own way. She was always covered and everything--no cleavage out or whatever--but she was, in her own way.

Did she have any advice for you?

She gave us personalized CDs, and she wrote letters to all three of us. She was saying, "Stay like you are and don’t change," and she basically let us know how not to get consumed in the business. "Even though you're in it, don’t let it take away your life." She was telling us to stay prayerful--she’s very spiritual. We got really good vibes from her.

You did a cover of Bee Gee’s “Emotion." Were you fans of the Bee Gees?

Our manager gave us that song. He said, "I think you guys should do it." And we were like, "No, we can’t." You cover a song, you gotta do it right. Definitely with the Bee Gees--you cannot do this song incorrectly.

We went into the studio, Beyoncé arranged them, and it came out great. Hopefully, when that comes out as a single and we do a video, maybe we’ll sing it together somewhere.

I’ve read where you’re each working on solo records. Have you written anything toward yours?

No, actually, we’re still doing our Christmas album, so there’s no way we can possibly focus on solos. ... We don’t even know when they’re going to come out. It will probably be a year-and-a-half, close to two years before they come out.

Do you know who you would want to produce your solo album, if you had your first choice?

I have no idea. We haven’t even thought about things like that.

If you could pick anyone in the world?

Michael Jackson.