vivfox
07-17-2010, 10:15 PM
July 9, 2010, 2:38 PM EST
The pop-rock star steers new music toward Southern roots
By Alan Light
Special to MSN Music
"I guess I always considered myself both Midwestern and Southern," says Sheryl Crow, the pride of Kennett, Mo. "I didn't grow up thinking that we were south of the Mason-Dixon line, but to do anything special, we had to drive to Arkansas or Tennessee. The big city nearest to us was Memphis, and that's very Southern to me: the big houses, the restaurants with all the barbecue, and, of course, the music."
Crow's seventh studio album is titled "100 Miles From Memphis," and it's an attempt to bring her back to the soulful, Dixie-fried sounds that first drew her to music. Cut mostly live in the studio, the songs and production evoke both the artists of her native region (Al Green, Delaney & Bonnie) and the soul geniuses whose music was inescapable during Crow's youth (Stevie Wonder, Sly & the Family Stone).
"Once we got into those rhythms and started playing, there was a real feeling of celebration and liberation," she says, over the phone before the opening concert for Lilith Fair in Vancouver. "We wound up with about 35 tracks and picked what we thought would make the best record. We're still going to go through them for the next album, too, which will be fun."
The dozen songs selected for "100 Miles From Memphis" include covers of songs by Terence Trent D'Arby and hip-hop-folk cult hero Citizen Cope, and guest appearances by Keith Richards and Justin Timberlake. Though the album's arrangements feature a number of funked-up string and horn sections, the focus on Crow's voice is tighter than ever before — from the breezy, AM-radio pop of the first single, "Summer Day," to the spare, dramatic ballad "Stop" (the only song on which the singer has sole writing credit).
Though you might assume that her move from Los Angeles to Nashville, and raising her 3-year-old son, Wyatt (plus the recent announcement that she has adopted a second son, Levi), might have served as Crow's motivation for revisiting the music that inspired her, she claims her direction came for a more deliberate reason. "I came off the last record [2008's 'Detours'], and I wanted to make something that wasn't as strident or sociopolitical," she says. "That record had some personal things on it, like 'Lullaby for Wyatt,' but I wanted to make a record that was more sexy, emotional, vulnerable."
Unlike the method on any of her previous albums, the 48-year-old nine-time Grammy winner found herself having to write lyrics to catch up with the rapid flow of grooves that the band was working up in the studio. She struggled with this unfamiliar process until the middle of one night on her Nashville farm, when words flowed out for no less than five of the songs.
"Sometimes when you're really stewing or concerned about something, the inspiration goes out the window," she says. "It was really late, I was really tired, and I kind of let go of it, and that's when the good stuff started coming — which is the way it usually is."
The slinky, intimate "Rose and Moonlight" was the first lyric that came that fateful night. "That was the most challenging one of all," she says. "It's really not the kind of lyric I easily write. It made me feel really naked, writing about yearning and sexual desire. Trying to put that in song form was really hard for me, but it created a mood, and that sort of opened the gates for the rest of it to come."
For the many echoes of classic R&B on "100 Miles From Memphis," certainly the most surprising performance is the note-perfect version of the Jackson 5's "I Want You Back" that's included as a closing bonus track.
Sheryl Crow, of course, first tasted the spotlight as a backup singer for Michael Jackson in the 1980s, including singing the duet "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" with him nightly on the Bad tour.
"There really was something very otherworldly about him, like he had a direct line to divine inspiration," she recalls, just a few days after the first anniversary of Jackson's death. "And I got to watch him every night in his brilliance — and some nights were more brilliant than others, but when he was really tapped into it, we really won't ever see many more like that. Especially in songs like 'Human Nature,' which I think illustrated his life experiences, and the deep pain that had a lot to do with his demise.
"I didn't think about this until we were making the record," she continues, "but when I was little and I would sing and dance, my mom and dad would say, 'She's a regular little Michael Jackson.' He really meant something to me out there in the middle of Missouri. He was one of us: He was a kid, with his family members, singing songs, and that's what my family did. He was doing that thing we all wanted to be doing, so I really did grow up trying to emulate him."
"100 Miles From Memphis" is an album that Crow has been thinking about for a long time — she says that her manager always told her that it was the Southern, rootsy part of her singing that first drew his attention, and so she should be sure to make a record that reflected it someday. (She also says there's another record she still wants to make, a Jimmie Rodgers/Carter Family-style traditional country album, "but I just keep talking about it and talking about it ...")
"This is the way I love to sing, and it's what I sing when I sing with other people — that kind of church and gospel feel," Crow says. "It's such a free-form time in music now that there really aren't any expectations. And I've been around long enough that I think I've earned the right to do what I want to do."
http://music.msn.com/sheryl-crow/story/interview/?GT1=28102
The pop-rock star steers new music toward Southern roots
By Alan Light
Special to MSN Music
"I guess I always considered myself both Midwestern and Southern," says Sheryl Crow, the pride of Kennett, Mo. "I didn't grow up thinking that we were south of the Mason-Dixon line, but to do anything special, we had to drive to Arkansas or Tennessee. The big city nearest to us was Memphis, and that's very Southern to me: the big houses, the restaurants with all the barbecue, and, of course, the music."
Crow's seventh studio album is titled "100 Miles From Memphis," and it's an attempt to bring her back to the soulful, Dixie-fried sounds that first drew her to music. Cut mostly live in the studio, the songs and production evoke both the artists of her native region (Al Green, Delaney & Bonnie) and the soul geniuses whose music was inescapable during Crow's youth (Stevie Wonder, Sly & the Family Stone).
"Once we got into those rhythms and started playing, there was a real feeling of celebration and liberation," she says, over the phone before the opening concert for Lilith Fair in Vancouver. "We wound up with about 35 tracks and picked what we thought would make the best record. We're still going to go through them for the next album, too, which will be fun."
The dozen songs selected for "100 Miles From Memphis" include covers of songs by Terence Trent D'Arby and hip-hop-folk cult hero Citizen Cope, and guest appearances by Keith Richards and Justin Timberlake. Though the album's arrangements feature a number of funked-up string and horn sections, the focus on Crow's voice is tighter than ever before — from the breezy, AM-radio pop of the first single, "Summer Day," to the spare, dramatic ballad "Stop" (the only song on which the singer has sole writing credit).
Though you might assume that her move from Los Angeles to Nashville, and raising her 3-year-old son, Wyatt (plus the recent announcement that she has adopted a second son, Levi), might have served as Crow's motivation for revisiting the music that inspired her, she claims her direction came for a more deliberate reason. "I came off the last record [2008's 'Detours'], and I wanted to make something that wasn't as strident or sociopolitical," she says. "That record had some personal things on it, like 'Lullaby for Wyatt,' but I wanted to make a record that was more sexy, emotional, vulnerable."
Unlike the method on any of her previous albums, the 48-year-old nine-time Grammy winner found herself having to write lyrics to catch up with the rapid flow of grooves that the band was working up in the studio. She struggled with this unfamiliar process until the middle of one night on her Nashville farm, when words flowed out for no less than five of the songs.
"Sometimes when you're really stewing or concerned about something, the inspiration goes out the window," she says. "It was really late, I was really tired, and I kind of let go of it, and that's when the good stuff started coming — which is the way it usually is."
The slinky, intimate "Rose and Moonlight" was the first lyric that came that fateful night. "That was the most challenging one of all," she says. "It's really not the kind of lyric I easily write. It made me feel really naked, writing about yearning and sexual desire. Trying to put that in song form was really hard for me, but it created a mood, and that sort of opened the gates for the rest of it to come."
For the many echoes of classic R&B on "100 Miles From Memphis," certainly the most surprising performance is the note-perfect version of the Jackson 5's "I Want You Back" that's included as a closing bonus track.
Sheryl Crow, of course, first tasted the spotlight as a backup singer for Michael Jackson in the 1980s, including singing the duet "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" with him nightly on the Bad tour.
"There really was something very otherworldly about him, like he had a direct line to divine inspiration," she recalls, just a few days after the first anniversary of Jackson's death. "And I got to watch him every night in his brilliance — and some nights were more brilliant than others, but when he was really tapped into it, we really won't ever see many more like that. Especially in songs like 'Human Nature,' which I think illustrated his life experiences, and the deep pain that had a lot to do with his demise.
"I didn't think about this until we were making the record," she continues, "but when I was little and I would sing and dance, my mom and dad would say, 'She's a regular little Michael Jackson.' He really meant something to me out there in the middle of Missouri. He was one of us: He was a kid, with his family members, singing songs, and that's what my family did. He was doing that thing we all wanted to be doing, so I really did grow up trying to emulate him."
"100 Miles From Memphis" is an album that Crow has been thinking about for a long time — she says that her manager always told her that it was the Southern, rootsy part of her singing that first drew his attention, and so she should be sure to make a record that reflected it someday. (She also says there's another record she still wants to make, a Jimmie Rodgers/Carter Family-style traditional country album, "but I just keep talking about it and talking about it ...")
"This is the way I love to sing, and it's what I sing when I sing with other people — that kind of church and gospel feel," Crow says. "It's such a free-form time in music now that there really aren't any expectations. And I've been around long enough that I think I've earned the right to do what I want to do."
http://music.msn.com/sheryl-crow/story/interview/?GT1=28102