Large neon hoop earrings have begun to reappear in mall boutiques, and it seems ’80s pop stars aren’t far behind. But this time around, former teen icon Tiffany says she’s going in a different direction with her music.

“At 10, 11 years old, I heard myself going more with a Sheryl Crow kind of sound,” Tiffany says. “I wanted to pursue mostly country music at that time.”

Tiffany says she hates repeating herself in her music, and her most recent release, “The Color of Silence,” which was released in October 2000, is more the kind of music she wanted to perform as a little girl.

“I don’t want to say the stuff I recorded before I didn’t like,” Tiffany says. “But, I was just given a song, and we’d record it. I’m grateful for those experiences, but as a 32-year-old woman, my music needs to be more personal to me.”

Tiffany says she plans to begin recording a new album in June. Like her last release, she will be doing most of the songwriting, something she says took her several years to work up the nerve to do. She says back in the late ’80s, people would ask her why Debbie Gibson wrote her own music, but Tiffany didn’t.

“I wanted to write my music, but I was really kind of shy,” Tiffany says. “I took about two to three years off and just watched songwriters. I finally found a team of people who did not have a boxed opinion about me and started off on that basis. Now my music is more mature, more of my life and my personality.”

Tiffany says no one ever forced her to sing — it’s just what she loved to do.

“I wasn’t big on geography or too inquisitive about history,” Tiffany says. “I just wanted to sing.”

She says she started singing anywhere she could, and it was really through word-of-mouth that things started to get bigger.

“I was just a local girl that would go from band to band,” Tiffany says. “And then you start meeting people who have studios, who want you to record demos. I didn’t really have a clue what stardom was about before it happened — all I knew was me sitting in my bedroom dreaming about being in front of thousands of people with the lights and everything. I was just a little kid that would sing anywhere they would let me.”

Tiffany says she feels very fortunate her fan base has been open-minded and supportive through her changes over the years. She says her music these days is a little more dance-oriented, not pop dance-oriented. She says part of the reason she’s playing smaller venues right now is to have the closer contact with fans.

“I decided to do the smaller venues in between the transition because it’s a way to kind of strip everything down,” Tiffany says. “I’m doing more intimate ballads. It’s ‘Tiffany’ stripped down as an intimate evening before the summer, when I’ll be playing bigger shows with the band. I wanted to give the fans time to ask me some questions. It’s more personal, and I really like it.”

Tiffany says when you have the right music and the right producers, everything just seems to fall into place.

“I could do other things, but this — music — is my passion,” Tiffany says. “Once it happens, it’s a quick ride to the top. It’s crazy and it’s hectic but you just have to have fun.”