Music plays big part in Disney star Emily Osment's life

Photo by BOB D'AMICO

Emily Osment plays "Lilly Truscott" on "Hannah Montana" on the Disney Channel.

Photo by BOB D'AMICO

Emily Osment plays "Lilly Truscott" on "Hannah Montana" on the Disney Channel.

Emily Osment has to pause on the phone.

"Well, I can fax it, can't I?" she says to someone off the phone. "Sorry," she says returning to the call. "I am officially applying to college."

Osment, the 17-year-old actress who plays Lilly Truscott on "Hannah Montana," says she was up well past midnight the night before, finishing up applications and essays.

"I've written four different essays. I'm kind of an overachiever when it comes to things like that."

And, she still needs to pack for her first tour to support her new EP "All the Right Wrongs."

"I'm very excited," says Osment. "I've loved music my whole life and it's been a huge part of everything I do. I've been writing and singing for a long time. About two and a half years ago I met with management because I said it was kind of time to put everything out there. I met with some co-writers and we wrote some amazing songs and put out an EP and now it's released."

The sister of "The Sixth Sense" actor Haley Joel Osment, Emily Osment has been in show business since she was in grade school and began appearing in commercials. She followed with appearances in the movies "The Secret Life of Girls," "Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams," "Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over" and roles in several television shows. In 2006, she joined the cast of the then-new show "Hannah Montana," which became an immediate hit for the Disney Channel.

But, she says, music has always been a big part of her life.

Osment says the first piece of music that she remembers having a big effect on her was when she was 8 or 9 and got The Beatles' "Abbey Road" for her birthday.

"I think that was the first time that I'd ever heard like 'good music.' It was different. It was a different type of music. I'd never heard any rock or anything that had some real history in it and I was trying to figure out what everything meant. I didn't have any clue what I was listening to. And to this day I still try and figure it out."

From that point on, says Osment, she became a fan of classic rock - The Beatles, Tom Petty, David Bowie, Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin.

"This generation is running toward music from the '70s and parents of kids in the '70s thought music was the devil. So if you think about it, would they really appreciate it now?"

She says Alanis Morissette provided a big inspiration when Osment was writing the songs for "All the Right Wrongs."

"Most of the songs were written two years ago. I was in high school and I was dealing with normal high school stuff and her songs really helped me through it and I wanted to turn around and do the same things for my fans."

She says she chose the disc's title for a reason.

"In high school I did make bad decisions. Everybody does. And then they turn out to be beneficial for you. The whole album is about the people that I trusted and now letting other people learn from it. You know, in high school things are never going to go smoothly, but it's what you learn from it makes you who you are."

Osment says she's looking forward to the bumps in her music and acting career.

"I really hope things don't go smoothly," she says. "If things go exactly the way they're supposed to be then everything's planned out. I want surprises. I want to learn from my mistakes and go on a different route from anyone else. If things go too smoothly, I'll get bored!"

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