Singer-songwriter Alicia Keys says her new disc, As I Am, is the product of a year of discovery about her music and herself.

Everyone knows a hit song when they hear one and Alicia Keys' passionate, soulful new No. 1 single, No One, would seem to qualify.

Even the Grammy-winning, New York-born singer-songwriter-pianist sensed it when she wrote it.

"I think you can feel the energy around the song when you're creating it and, if you're excited about it, then I find that's a good barometer that other people are going to be excited about it as well," said Keys, 27, down the line from her home recently in an exclusive Canadian newspaper chat with Sun Media.

No One is a fine introduction to Keys' strong third album, As I Am, a more rock-influenced, R&B-soul collection in stores Tuesday.

"This album, I was influenced by an even greater array (of artists)," she said. "Prince and Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin, and also I just discovered a really natural connection between R&B-soul, rock-soul, classical-soul. We put all these categories on music and what it is and what it isn't and whatever box it fits in and what chart it fits on. But it's so not like that, it's so connected, and that's what this album is for me."

Keys, who is also a published author, said her songwriting this time out was helped by the four-year break since her previous studio album, 2003's The Diary Of Alicia Keys.

There was a 2005 Unplugged album in the interim plus she appeared in two movies, Smokin' Aces and The Nanny Diaries.

"I'm not like a machine," said Keys, who will start touring arenas in February and has a 2008 movie project that she couldn't yet talk about.

"There's something that's really beautiful about the inspiration of life and you live it and learn more things and you discover more things about yourself, which is what I did this year, without question."

But Keys, the product of an Italian-Irish mother and Jamaican father (long separated), had to get outside of her head and her own high expectations first.

"I found it wasn't other people's expectations of me that I was battling, it's my expectations of myself," she said. "Coupled with a lot of other personal things that were going on, that's when I realized, 'Wow, I need a break.' Like I need time away from everything. From my family, the people I love, myself, my music, my life. I need to just go somewhere and just be. And if music moves me in that place, then great. And if it doesn't, then fine. So when I came back all of those expectations I had for myself, I threw them out the window. I just wanted to be free and totally liberated to express the music that I was feeling and hearing and thinking about."

Keys, whose boyfriend is longtime songwriting collaborator Kerry (Krucial) Brothers, wound up travelling to Egypt and Italy.

"It was actually a pilgrimage for me," she said. "Because I'm half Black and much of my other heritage is Italian so I didn't realize it when I made those choices, but it was like a self-discovery."

The female empowerment anthem, Superwoman, notwithstanding, most of the material for As I Am primarily focused on love, with two songs about being done wrong (Go Ahead, Lessons Learned) and another one about being at a crossroads in a relationship (Where Do We Go).

"I find I've also discovered a lot about love for myself," Keys said. "Like loving myself. It's my time to shine now, it's my time to love myself."

As for Brothers, she said: "It's still a relationship, definitely. And we're all just growing a lot as young people and figuring out the different things that we want for ourselves, so it's definitely a beautiful relationship that's constantly evolving."

Mayer lends his talents to As I Am vibe

Alicia Keys has one notable guest on her disc, As I Am.

Pop-blues, singer-songwriter-guitarist John Mayer appears on Keys' new song, Lessons Learned, after she previously appeared on Mayer's song, Gravity.

"It really kind of started because we had seen each other at different events and had a chance to talk and kind of get to know each other. He's a really great guy, really funny, really intellectual, smart, and so we had a lot to talk about musically," Keys said.

"And then one day he just called me and he was like, "I've got this song and it's just screaming for your voice on it and what if we just did something really cool, and we didn't make it all about labels and managers and lawyers, we just kind of came in and did music?'' Keys said.

"And if he only knew how much I needed that song at that moment. To sing at the end of that song was a relief for me in so many ways.

"And he was like, 'Anytime, anywhere, anything, I'm there.' So when it came time for Mayer to appear on Keys' song, it was a no-brainer.

"With this album, I just wanted us to vibe 'cause I wanted to do things that were not quite expected when it came to collaborations," Keys said. "And so he was like, 'Yeah, let's do that.' "

Apparently there are more Keys-Mayer songs in the can.

"We vibed on like four or five songs, so those will come back," she said.