British singer Joss Stone performs. (THE ASSOCIATED PRESS/Chris Pizzello/ file)

TORONTO - When Joss Stone has a musical itch, she has to scratch, even if it means getting into trouble with her label.

The powerhouse British soul singer says her new album, "Colour Me Free," is coming out Tuesday after months of delays because her U.S. label, EMI, was upset that she had recorded the tracks on a whim without telling them.

"Oh God, that wasn't very good," Stone said in a recent phone interview. "They didn't love that too much."

It was about two years ago, after the release of her self-titled third album, that the 22-year-old Grammy and Brit Award winner got the urge to hit the studio and jam again.

"I just woke up and was like: 'Man, I really want to make an album,"' said Stone, who has performed on stage with scores of legends including James Brown and Donna Summer.

"It was just a really nice day and I was feeling really energized and it was just cool and my (musician) friends were down, because we were writing.

"I thought: 'Hey, you guys are here, let's do it. Let's make the music."'

And so they did, using a Wellington, England night club that was owned by her mother at the time as their studio, where they recorded live off the floor in about a week.

Problem was, EMI didn't know about it and when Stone told them, "The initial reaction was: 'Hang on a minute, you're supposed to ask us for approval on every single section of everything that you do, are you crazy?"' she recalled.

"So I said: 'Oh, whoops, so sorry, my bad,' and it really was. I didn't ask for approval, I didn't tell them I was making the album.

"I didn't do any of those things so it really was essentially my fault."

The idea of someone trying to control her art was a "horrible feeling and makes you not want to do it at all," admitted Stone, whose vocals often draw comparisons to Janis Joplin and Aretha Franklin.

"But then from a business side of things, I kind of get it ..." she said. "They feel like that's their property and they want to control how the property looks and how it works."

In the end, the two sides worked things out and the tunes weren't changed.

Stone even hit the studio again to do a few more tracks for the album with artists including Nas, Sheila E and Jeff Beck. The result is a rich, organic blend of soul, funk, R&B, disco, gospel hip-hop and even reggae that Stone co-produced.

"Now everybody's on the same page," she said.

With the label woes behind her, Stone has a positive outlook on the situation, saying she likes to "scare" herself into getting things done.

"It actually helps me," she said. "I've got this weird kind of obsession with the way that I do things - I feel the need to do it with a massive amount of pressure and unless I have that pressure, I don't bother."

Such was the case with CBC's "The Tudors," the widely adored series about King Henry VIII, played by Jonathan Rhys Meyers.

Stone signed on to the current season to play Anne of Cleves, the king's fourth wife, without ever having acted on TV before (she has acted on film, though, first in 2006's "Eragon" and then "Snappers" in 2008).

Being on the show was "scary," she said, but she "loved it" as she got to learn a lot in a short period of time - just as she likes it.

"It helps me to just say, 'Look, I have to do this, there's no choice in this,"' said Stone, whose character becomes prominent in the Nov. 4 episode.

"It's not like, 'Let me figure it out.' No, no, no: 'You have to just do it!' So I like that process but at the same time it gives me a very stressful life but it's a very fun life."