On a corridor in a plush Dublin hotel, a young waitress carries a latte towards a large, corporate suite. She is blank-faced, stiffly poised; a professional carrying out her duty. Twenty seconds later she emerges from the suite, having delivered the latte to its recipient. Her face is flushed and transformed with a broad smile and her hands flap as if she's drying imaginary nail varnish as she rushes off on her way, murmuring, "Ohmigod!"

Another employee leans against a pillar in a swooning stance. "He sang in the lounge last night," she tells me. "For one-and-a-half hours!"

The man who has caused all of this commotion is Michael Bublé, the jazz singer whose renditions of classic American crooner favourites and good looks have made him a favourite among housewives everywhere, but also turned him into an unlikely popstar. Perhaps it's best to just get this bit out of the way early on. Bublé is gorgeous. Not just normal gorgeous, but young-Elvis gorgeous. Clammy-hands gorgeous. Tingly gorgeous. You can understand why the demure waitress got into a flap.

He's an outrageous flirt. I've seen television presenters wilt under the blitzkrieg of compliments he unleashes. He tells jokes, budges closer to them on his seat, is funny and charming, yet disarmingly honest, to the extent that he will reveal unflattering things about himself, such as the fact that he would arrange buffet parties after gigs for pretty girls from his audience. Having witnessed this, I was armed and ready to deflect his MO -- arms folded, legs crossed. He, on the other hand, sits wide open, arms flung backwards over his chair, ankle resting on his knee, intermittently leaning in to touch your arm. His eyes are always pleading, his face has the round sweetness of a little boy's.

In an ante room is Bublé's crack team (he says they're his friends) who keep him on a tight schedule. Bublé is a whirlwind of movement and energy. He covers the floor at a break-neck speed, he shouts an order for a glass of water at no-one in particular. It turns up. The Cheeky Girls turn up too -- yes, the real Cheeky Girls -- but even they get shrift shorter than a pair of their own hotpants as they are hustled back out of the room. Today he's dressed in his uniform of skinny jeans and a blazer, although his de rigeur Converse trainers are missing.

Bublé has sold 24 million records since he released his debut in 2003, and, in a world where downloading has seen CD sales drop, his sales just keep notching up. He appeared on The X Factor twice last year, and one of the acts he mentored on the show was Irish phenomenon Jedward. "They're so sweet. The show is called X Factor and they had plenty of it. It's impossible not to like people like that; they're nice kids, they're like little farts in a bottle, little tornados that come out.

"They're talented kids too, they stayed around till almost the end. Do you think they'll ever separate them?" he asks as he pops two pills in his mouth and washes them down. "They're pills: a vitamin and one's a thing called Nexium -- it keeps me from getting heartburn. As a singer, if I get it, it messes me up."

Unfortunately, there's not a pill you can take for heartbreak, something Bublé knows about since his well-publicised break-up from English actress Emily Blunt last year. It seems there were lots of factors at play. He has described his business as "brutal" on relationships. He says he and Blunt were far too naive and open about their relationship and has even gone as far as saying he was jealous and controlling.

Then there was a woman called Tiffany Bromley who alleged an affair and posted camera-phone pictures on the internet of Bublé apparently naked and asleep. It was Bublé's first taste of the sting of modern celebrity. "It sucks because [in] the media now there's not a lot of truth and they don't let the truth get in the way of selling a lot of newspapers. Everyone's feeling the crunch, the tabloids and the culture of celebrity have just gotten downright ugly. I'm reading things about myself every day that are half-truths.

"But, on the other side of it, I wanted to be famous and I've made good money and I don't wait in line when I go to restaurants. That's something that I'm going to have to deal with, that's part of my life."

According to Bublé, the real reason for the break-up is not public knowledge but, judging by the songs selected for his latest album, Crazy Love -- Cry Me A River, All Of Me and Heartache Tonight -- he's not over it yet. But the experience has changed him for the better, he says. "In the past couple of years, where I just went through some heavy things, it gave me the opportunity to wake up a little bit and to maybe enjoy the moment more than I have before and maybe not allow insecurity in different ways to control my life or relationships."

He doesn't seem insecure. "We're all insecure. Yeah, I was insecure. Really. I can't speak for all artists, but I had a conversation with Mika the other day. We had lunch and he disagreed with me a little but I still think I'm right."

He punctuates this with the kind of charming smile the original Rat Pack trademarked. "I think there's a reason why people get to the top in any business and, in men especially, I believe that has a lot to do with insecurity. I think almost the more insecure you are, the more driven you'll be to prove to other people, to prove to yourself. There's some kind of hunger that you feel, there's something that you fill up and surely I did.

"But now it's different because I really feel like I've learned to control that insecurity, that controlling, very useless part of a personality, and now it allows me really sincerely for the first time to enjoy my life, enjoy how lucky I am, whether it's sitting with you in an interview or singing in front of 40,000 people."

My flattery radar hits a blip and I can't suppress a laugh. "Seriously!" he protests. "I like this. You can tell, I'm not faking this. I have fun! I really have fun. I ask for this. I had a day off yesterday and I was bored. I love doing this."

Bublé is famed for his work ethic. He grew up in a small working-class town outside Vancouver. His father was a fisherman and the young Bublé spent summers deep-sea fishing. In fact, his father still works as a fisherman. Which begs the question, when your son has sold 22 million records, 'why?' "Don't ask me," he says. "He doesn't need to. The man doesn't need the money surely, but it's in his blood. He loves it." It's something Bublé has inherited from his father. "I think if I love what I'm doing, I'll work very hard at it. And I think I'm growing up. I'm a work in progress. I'm not perfect but I'm growing up."

His plumber grandfather introduced him to the classic crooners who changed his path forever, and he spent years playing gigs in clubs and on cruises before finally getting his big break singing at the Canadian Prime Minister's daughter's wedding, where he was spotted by his mentor and producer David Foster. Although on this record he has worked less with Foster to include more diverse producers such as Mark Ronson (he of Amy Winehouse fame) and the Metallica producer Bob Rock.

"Really, when I look at it, this record is far more youthful than my previous record and I'm allowing myself to become who I really am, which is a guy who was influenced more by Michael Jackson than Frank Sinatra; you know, more by the Beastie Boys, Guns N' Roses and AC/DC than by Dean Martin and Bobby Darin."

He is currently dating the 22-year-old Argentine actress Luisana Lopilato, who he met while on tour there. She didn't speak any English, he didn't speak any Spanish, but they managed to hit it off anyway. Is it too early to say whether she might be the one he can settle down with?

"It's too early to say, but I can say she's a really incredible person. I've been really lucky to have the universe sort of, uh ... " He falters, realising he's just mentioned 'the universe' in a spiritual capacity (more of which anon). He changes gear. "I've been able to have relationships with pretty incredible women, and she's a great one, [with a] big heart and a really beautiful family, and she's really close to them. If she wasn't like that then I wouldn't be with her."

So how does such a long- distance relationship work (he lives in Canada)? "She still lives in Argentina, but we see each other quite often. iChat and Skype are the coolest things ever. It makes a huge difference when you can go to sleep with somebody and say goodnight. No hugging the computer," he laughs, "but it's cool, it connects you. It's a nice thing. I imagine how difficult it must have been on the road before cell phones."

At 34, Bublé is still young enough to play the field, but admits he sometimes worries about what he's missing out on when he sees his friends with their wives and children. "Some days it does [make me panic]. Some days I think, 'Look how lucky they are look at what they have: they have this great stability, this great family and they come home every day ... ' but the funny thing is I'm very aware that they also say that they're sitting at work, or driving home and going, 'Oh God, Bublé's out there living and look at what I'm doing'. It goes both ways. What's nice is that I speak to my buddies about it and they're really generous about sharing their true feelings with me, so whenever I get a little down they pick me up by telling me, 'We wish we were doing what you're doing'. One day, of course, I'd like to have both and I think it's really possible."

But I'm still thinking of that mention of the universe. Is he a fan of the Noughties-spawned religion of positive thinking? "I believe that this is something that you do naturally. I'd read the book [The Secret] and I kept saying, 'Well, this is the same thing, they're telling me the same thing over and over again, it's monotonous to me'. I thought, 'Why are people buying this book? Don't people just do this?' The book that I found to be incredibly helpful was The Power Of Now, a great book and something that I still read; I read passages if I forget. When we talked about the insecurity and all that -- that's what I'm talking about, we all do it but I didn't know before I really started to study that you have control over this, that you can stop it -- you can make the conscious decision to hear those negative things coming and say, 'Not today'. It's beautiful. It's changed my life."

How so?

"I'm far more content, and it's very strange when you allow yourself to live in ... " but he breaks off, embarrassed again. "It sounds so stupid, that's why I don't talk about it. It's just as simple as, let's just say, smelling the roses."

As we leave, he is a whirlwind of activity and energy. He makes me admire his friend Susan's handbag -- a gift from Bublé. As he's being ushered out the door, he stops by the upright piano and tickles the ivories a little before darting to the lift. The lift is taking too long so we run down the stairs and out the door, where a few fans are standing guard waiting for a photo and an autograph. He signs and poses graciously, and mischievously suggests they take one of him with me, his "new girlfriend". And for just a second, I allow myself a tiny swoon.

W

Crazy Love is out now

- Edel Coffey

Irish Independent