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FEATURESHELBY LYNNECOUNTRY MUSIC’S NEW…ERR…TRUE OUTLAW! by Tom Lounges
While Big & Rich, Gretchen Wilson and others like to wave the outlaw banner from the top of the charts, it is kind of hard to accept that the hottest selling commercial artists in Nashville are the real deal. It’s one thing to talk the talk, but another thing all together to walk the walk. Lynne not only walks it, she struts it in her tight denims, while never using her sex appeal to further her musical cause. It is delightful in this Shania Twain world of pre-fab performers, to discover that Lynne is as real and rootsy as they come. “You can be an outlaw or you can pretend to be an outlaw,” chided Lynne during a phone interview from her Palm Springs, California home just days before kicking off her latest national tour. “I certainly don’t pretend to do anything. I love outlaws! I’m a true believer in breaking rules and doing things the hard way.” And she has endured her share of slings and arrows along the way to making her ninth career album, Suit Yourself, released in April of this year. As to how radio has embraced her new songs, Lynne guffs –– “I have no idea. I don’t listen to the radio and I certainly don’t expect to get played on the radio. I really don’t think or worry about radio too much.” Yeah...this gal IS an outlaw. Is it any wonder that Lynne speaks of the last true living outlaw legend, Willie Nelson, as though he were her patron saint of music? Nelson was there for Lynne early on in her career. And he has been an inspiration and mentor during her own recent rebellion against the Nashville machine that for a few years, tried to mold the spirited singer into yet another “cookie-cutter” chart contender with a pretty face. “I’m so honored to know Willie and have him as a friend,” she said. “Hell, we’ve done it all together. He’s taught me so very much over the years. Willie is the Yoda of rock ‘n’ roll. He’s this magical guy who can just do everything and do it amazingly well. He never enters a room and leaves a room without leaving something of himself behind for people. It’s just good for all of us as a whole in the universe to have had him in it.” Lynne may be signed to the mega-imprint, Capitol Records, but she no longer allows anyone to try to tell her how to make her music. Taking home a Grammy for her mantle a few years ago helped give her that edge. “I’m sure they [Capitol] would love for me to be more of a commercial success, but I’m not sure what it would take for that to happen now,” she said. “They really allow me do what I want.” That includes self-producing, along with doing her own songs and picking if and what other songwriter’s works she might like to cover.
These are luxuries
that Lynne was never allowed during her Nashville career, a period that
she looks back on with much disdain. Lynne knew that she had to stand
up for herself, leave Nashville and carry on, because music was the only
thing she has ever wanted to do with her life. “I was born this way,” she said. “I was singing harmonies since I was two years old. I knew in the first grade that I was going to grow up and be a rock star or something.” Lynne’s latest slab of songs –– Suit Yourself –– is a raw and ready collection of “moments” shared while in a recording studio with a few good friends like guitarist Michael Ward of The Wallflowers, keyboardist Benmont Tench of Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers, and ‘60s American rock icon, Tony Joe White (of “Polk Salad Annie” fame). “They’re not special guests on this album,” Lynne drawled. “They were just chosen to be the band on this album. I hand picked these musicians for a reason. There’s no ego involved. They are all just great, tasty musicians that I enjoy making music with. Benmont and Michael are friends and have been for years.” “Tony Joe has been a friend of mine since I lived in Nashville. I’ve wanted to cut his [song] ‘Old Times Sake’ for many years, going back to my Nashville days. Of course, they [her record company at the time] wouldn’t go for it back then, so I kept holding out for the right time when I could have the freedom to do the song myself the way I wanted.” The time was evidently right, considering the man himself was playing guitar on her sessions. Given that scenario, Lynne also included as the closing track of the new CD, a spontaneous recording of her with White on his timeless ‘60s pop music standard, “Rainy Night In Georgia.” “I was making this record and thought, ‘Hell, I’ve got Tony Joe White sitting here, I’m NOT going to pass up this opportunity.’,” she explained. “I didn’t even know if it would be on the album at that point, I just wanted to record it with him because the opportunity was there and because it is such a great, great song.” Suit Yourself defies conventional major label releases. It is a very raw and unpolished disc, where studio talk-back buttons are used almost as much as the microphones. One can hear chatter between Lynne and her musical pals as they roll tape and have at it. “I’ve always fooled around with songwriting, but I didn’t write songs during the Nashville years, because it was not encouraged,” she said, referring to the machine-like process that has become commonplace in the music capital. “The intent here with Suit Yourself, was just to make a damn good record. An honest record,” explained Lynne. “I made enough of those ‘get everything just right’ albums while in Nashville, so now I have a different way of working. Most everything is first or second takes and there was not a lot of editing, additional tracks or touching up. I just decided to leave a lot of it [the studio atmosphere] there on the record.” Her minimalist approach to recording works especially well on the song, “Johnny Met June,” her heart-tugging tribute to the late First Couple of Country Music. “The song is about their relationship and how as an outsider looking in, it appeared to be one of the world’s great love affairs,” she said. “The morning I heard that Johnny had passed, I wrote it and recorded it. I had the song you actually hear on the album done in about two hours. That’s the way I like to do it. It was an emotional moment and I’m so glad I have it on tape. I believe in records that are a collection of ‘moments’ and that was one of the more special ones I’ve had making a record.” As writer, artist, arranger and producer, it would be easy for someone to get too close to the music and lose objectivity. “That’s a very good point Tom,” she said. “I don’t allow myself to get too close to it, because I don’t allow myself to spend too much time on anything. I write the song, put it down and walk away. Everything on the album takes place in the moment. I don’t see the point of beating something to death by doing it over and over, because usually the first take or two are your best anyway.” Lynne and her three-piece touring band will be on the road “on and off” for the rest of 2005, including a visit overseas to visit her steadily growing Euro-fan base. “I’m going to be playing a good deal of the songs from Suit Yourself,” she said. “I keep a basic list of songs, but it’s not a set list. I feel that in order to respect your audience, you have to see how they feel when you get there. I never play the same songs every night from Nashville to Saratoga. It’s different people and different moods at every show, mine and theirs, so you just do songs that fit the time and the place you are in.” Though her personal revolution has enabled her to have more personal freedom in regards to making her music, Lynne has not seen much change in regards to female artists during her nearly 20 years in the music business. “Nothing has really changed,” she said, noting the music business remains a “boys club”. “I don’t see any difference at all. It’s never going to be any different. Women are the same as they’ve always been. Some of us will just keep on doing our thing regardless. We’ll just keep on doin’ it!” And if that mean more remarkable and earthy albums like Suit Yourself, then Lynne and her like-minded sisterhood will continue to find a place among those of us who steadfastly refuse to be spoon-fed the musical gruel de jour by the powers-that-be.
SHELBY LYNNE performs an all ages 7:30pm show on July 10 @ Park West • 322 West Armitage • Chicago, IL
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Grammy
Award winner, Shelby Lynne, is one of the most genuine “outlaw” artists
on the scene today. Her “spit in the eye of Nashville” attitude surely
has the likes of Waylon and Johnny smiling down upon her. 