Mandy Moore is all grown up.
Not only is the 25-year-old singer-actress continuing to leave her bubble-gum pop beginnings behind with a '70s singer songwriter-inspired album, Amanda Leigh -- in stores Tuesday -- but she surprised many with a recent marriage to critically acclaimed alt-country rocker Ryan Adams, 34, in a low-key ceremony in Savannah, Ga., in March.
"I'm the luckiest girl and I'm married to my best friend and life is wonderful and I never could have imagined it would turn out this lovely," said Moore, dressed casually in a blue blazer, white T-shirt, jeans and ballet flats.
"But I was a happy girl before, too. I would never want it to sort of come across as, 'Well, now my life is complete.'
"Certainly it takes on a whole other definition and again, something greater than I could have imagined. But life was really good before I met him.
"It's just better now."
In fact, one of the new songs on Amanda Leigh is called Bug, after her husband's nickname for her.
The couple lives in L.A. and she describes Adams as the home decorator -- "he's got a great aesthetic and style" -- and "a really great, messy cook". While Moore says she likes to do laundry, clean up and take out the garbage.
She say they're in no rush to have children but it's definitely on her wish list for the future.
"I would definitely see in the next couple of years that would be what would happen, I hope. I mean if that's what's meant to be," said Moore, who has two brothers. "But that's always been a huge thing for me. I love family."
As for any future musical collaborations with Adams, Moore isn't ruling it out despite the obvious differences in their musical genres.
"I think potentially down the road it'd be silly to say that wouldn't necessarily happen but I think there are quite a few people who would probably be really confused by the melding of those two worlds," Moore said.
"I love his music and I think he's the best at what he does but I would never put myself under that kind of pressure to have a career like his. I can't imagine what that would feel like. And I'm certainly not trying for it with this record or anything that I would continue to do. But I can't imagine having to go toe to toe in that sense.
"And although I'm sure it could be really wonderful and exciting to share that with one another, to have to share that with everyone, the analysis or attention or just putting it out there. I would never want anything to get in the way of my relationship. It's the most important thing to me."
Amanda Leigh, meanwhile, advances Moore's transformation from a girl who came of age musically during the '90s teen-pop explosion right alongside, if not as successfully, as Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera.
She started her adult makeover with her 2003 album Coverage, which saw her covering songs by the likes of her beloved Joni Mitchell (she named her rescue terrier Joni), Carly Simon and Carole King, (even if Epic ended up dropping her due to poor sales) and continued it with 2007's Wild Hope on EMI.
For the new disc, distributed by Sony, Moore hooked up with Boston-area singer-songwriter-producer-arranger Mike Viola (of Candy Butchers fame), who she met through Inara George (of The Bird and The Bee) and they wound up recording the album together in his friend and engineer Ducky Carlisle's basement studio outside Beantown.
"I felt like a kid at summer camp in the middle of winter in this house in Boston," she said. "(It was) unbelievably educational and kind of like that moment in time that you're like, 'Oh, I don't want it to end.' "
