But it wasn’t only a label that Amber was separating from: “I had to go through one of those horrible divorces that turned really nasty,” she reveals. “I went through a very difficult period in my life… it was just really nerve-racking.” But the experience informed the recording process: “In dealing with the negative energy that was constantly and purposefully put upon me, I think a lot of the music reflected that.”

Indeed, with its dark, layered complexity and moody, introspective lyrics, Amber’s first non-dance effort seemed to alienate part of her fanbase: “A lot of the fans felt like I abandoned them,” she admits. Though remixes of the album’s three singles (“You Move Me,” “Voodoo,” and “Just Like That”), all performed well on the Billboard Club charts, there was still a contingency that resented Amber’s efforts to move beyond the genre. “If you look at the [online album] reviews, overall they were pretty positive. But then you have the people who are just randomly rambling,” she says, before adopting a gruff New Yawk accent to reiterate one particularly enlightening online post: “What the F happened to ‘Sexual’ and ‘This is Your Night’?” 

Rather than judging the album on its own musical merits, it did seem that listeners were simply criticizing Amber’s decision to try something new. “People have a tendency to put you in this little corner, and that’s very suffocating for me,” she explains. “They tell you, ‘That’s where you’re going to be, that’s where we want you, and you’re not going anywhere else!’” Indeed, it was a disheartening experience when she realized that many fans – too preoccupied with her usual dance sound – refused to listen to the album with an open musical mind:  “It was a very awakening moment for me to see how that was handled. It was a little disappointing, I must honestly say.”

Still, Amber has no regrets: “I wanted to show another side of me, a different facet of me,” she says. “I wanted people to realize that I can write about all kinds of things, and that I have all kinds of emotions that I would like to express musically… I had a ball with it, and I think in the end, that’s all that matters. I want to make honest music.”

Hot on the heels of Amber’s club smash “Melt with the Sun,” Undanced 2 is certainly a return to the dance floor. But despite the limitations of any given genre, Amber always finds a way to distinguish herself as an artist: “I try to approach things differently and I’ve tried to build myself my own little niche,” she says. Unlike the throwaway club tracks of the dance industry’s one-hit wonders, Amber’s songs are created, first and foremost, to be solid and credible pieces of music. No matter the genre, they hold up lyrically, melodically and artistically. “You can strip my songs of all the music and the beat, and you can put a piano to it… or you can put a guitar under it… and you can still have a perfect song,” she says. “It’s built like a real song, not around someone screaming ad-libs, jumping around in a vinyl suit!”

In what box, then, does Amber fit? With a musical repertoire that extends beyond dance, a career that spans eleven years, a catalogue of hits and no signs of slowing down… how does one define her?

Songwriter? Producer? Vocalist? Mother? Businesswoman?

Maybe there is one box that fits Amber:

The one clearly marked, “All of the above.”