Miley Cyrus’ music career has changed a lot over the past decade, but her sixth album, Younger Now, honors her long journey. In a new radio interview with Howard Stern, your girl reflects on how far she’s come since starring on Disney Channel’s Hannah Montana
“I love that I was Hannah Montana,” Miley said on Wednesday (October 4). “That’s what the song ‘Younger Now’ on my album is about. It says, ‘Even though it’s not who I am, I’m not afraid of who I used to be.'”
You can even spot traces of Hannah Montana in Miley’s current endeavors. For example, when the “Younger Now” music video dropped, fans noted similarities between the clip’s choreography and the “Hoedown Throwdown” dance from Hannah Montana: The Movie. But ahead of the 2017 MTV Music Video Awards, Cyrus revealed any resemblance was purely coincidental.
“Even though I wasn’t intentionally trying to reenact something I had already done, it just naturally happened,” Cyrus told MTV News correspondent Gaby Wilson in August. “Because that’s a part of me too.”
Speaking of the VMAs, Cyrus also spoke to Stern about taking the VMA stage with Robin Thicke (and that infamous foam finger) back in 2013. As controversial as their performance was, in a way, it helped her understand what she wanted to do with her massive platform — a realization that indirectly inspired the Happy Hippie Foundation, her nonprofit organization dedicated to fighting injustice.
“The reason why that’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me in my life is that’s when I realized my power,” she told Stern about the 2013 VMAs. “What if that could be a thing that isn’t self-serving to me?”
To drive home just how much she’s grown over the years, Cyrus also performed some of her old hits on “The Stern Show,” including this updated version of “Party In The U.S.A.”
