In February, Bailey Rae’s debut entered the U.K. album charts at No. 1, making her the first female British artist to do so in history. The record is double platinum already and has worldwide sales above 1 million. Here in the States, she debuted at No. 17 on the Nielsen SoundScan top album charts.

Things are happening quickly for Corinne Bailey Rae – she’s already played “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” and sold out Los Angeles’ Troubadour with Prince in attendance. And she has the prestigious honor of being on the cover of an upcoming issue of Pollstar.

Meanwhile, preparing for her U.S. tour, Bailey Rae says she’s not going to be killing herself with too much travel.

“I’m really aware and I think the record company is really aware that I don’t want to spread myself too thinly,” she told Pollstar from the NBC studios in Burbank. “There have been opportunities for us to go to Japan and Australia, but I think at the moment that won’t be the best thing to do. You have to spend quite a while in a place to get a feel of it and for them to get a feel for you.

“At the moment I’m glad to be in America so early on in the launch of the album,” Bailey Rae added. “It’s nice to be here while the record’s real new and fresh and it’s still a challenge to play all the songs.”

The U.S. tour kicks off July 24th in Seattle and she’ll be in the States through August. Markets include San Francisco, Los Angeles, Dallas, Atlanta, Philadelphia, New York City, Boston and Chicago. Bailey Rae wraps her stay here at Minneapolis’ Varsity Theatre August 30th before heading back and hopefully getting some rest before her October U.K. dates.