Don't try to write your own songs: Cathy Dennis's wise advice to One Direction

She is the woman behind hits for the likes of Kylie Minogue, Katy Perry and Britney Spears.

Now Cathy Dennis has offered some words of advice to One Direction and warned writing their own songs would be a "kiss of death".

The award-winning songwriter - who penned Britney's Toxic and Kylie's Can't Get You Out of My Head - thinks the boy band will want to show they are credible artists at some point in order to boost their incomes.

But she thinks turning away from the established team of writers behind them could prove fatal for their careers.

She told The Sun: "It will be expected that they will write their own songs at some point.

"Someone is going to say, 'Hang on, the royalties coming in from just singing are not enough'.

"The guys who wrote What Makes You Beautiful are millionaires.

"But if 1D started writing their own songs it could be the kiss of death, let's face it. I am not going to advocate that.

"To emulate the Rolling Stones - you can't have that overnight.

"I would not expect them to come out with anything amazing."

Band member Harry Styles has previously admitted the group - who get some songwriting credits on their tracks but are not the main writers - are keen to take their own writings further.

He said last August: "We've got a couple of writing stuff on the album that we've just done.

"I think we all write. On the road and stuff we're in a lot of planes and in a lot of hotels and obviously you just write there.

"For us it's always been important that the music is going to be authentic and comes from us and doesn't just sound like a 40-year-old man's written it in an office and given it to us."