Melissa Etheridge

Melissa Etheridge is open, honest and forthcoming, nothing is off limits. We discuss her music, her relationships, her upbringing, her sexuality, Bill Clinton, Al Gore, the Oscars... It's like talking with a friend!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, brolcome back to Bob Left Podcast. My guest today,
You've but one and only Melissa Et Melissa, you have
Ethridge Island coming up on Labor Day. What's that all about? Uh?
This is sort of a little dream come true, you know. Um,
you know, as as I have gone through this music business,

(00:33):
I have seen, uh it changed how you connect with
your fans. Used to be through radio and uh, you know,
record companies, and now I have a direct connection with
my fan base. And for the last about five years,

(00:53):
I've done about four cruises, at which I said I'd
never do. But when I can be so connected with
my fans, I can let them know, hey, going on
a cruise to my super duper fans will join me
on that. And I used to joke with them someday
I'm gonna get an island and we're all gonna go away,
leave this crazy world and we're just gonna, you know,

(01:14):
play music. And so the people that the production company
sixth Man that I did my uh cruises with, said,
you know what, we can actually get an island that
has a resort on it. It's off it's off of Cancun,
and it's a dreams and secrets. Uh, resort there. And
so now I have Ethridge Island and it's a festival

(01:34):
and it's uh, it's music. It's myself and Annie DiFranco
and l King and Larkin Poe and some great great artists.
Everyone's welcome. Uh. You can go to Ethridge Island dot com.
Check it out right now, get a room, go here. Music.
There's a lot of wellness, you know, yoga, food and
all kinds of stuff going on too. But it's just

(01:55):
super serving my fans and people that really love music. Okay,
what's the capacity for the event? Well, there's eight hundred rooms,
so that's uh. I'd say it's about two thousand people
are so two thousand give or take. So how many
hardcore Melissa Ethridge fans are there? Ah, there's thousands of

(02:19):
hardcore and they're all over the world. You know, we've
done I've done things with about four thousand people or so,
and uh, you know, I'd say, let's say right about
that those that there's some that I've known for years,
you know, the really hardcore ones that come to see
hundreds and hundreds of shows. You get to know them,
you get to know their children and you know, so

(02:40):
I have some really really big fans. So talking about
the change in the business and the technological changes, you
can literally have access to your fans. How do you
do this? Do you have an email list? Is it
more on social media? How do you get the message
out different ways? I? UM, I was fortunate enough back
in I had one of the first artist websites that

(03:05):
that was made. I was approached by a company at
the time, fan fan Asylum was the name, and and
and this is you know, the internet wasn't he was
just barely getting started and they said, we'd love to
make a fan club. And I was like, fan club,
you know, this is rock and roll. What are you
talking about? But I said, okay, fine it it. What's
it gonna hurt? And they built and and a mask,

(03:28):
you know, email, email addresses and and a way to
connect with people. And it became one of the number
one fan sites on the Internet for a long time.
And you know, since then, we have kept that email list.
And I myself, UM, I have lots of social media outlets.

(03:49):
I have people that run that, but I myself run
my Twitter. I like to know that there's one place
that they know it's actually me responding, reading and and
right there with him. I I don't I don't do Facebook, Instagram,
but I'm on those through my management. They run that
and keep that going and inform people. But if you

(04:09):
want to really hear what I have to say about something,
it's on Twitter. So you're one of the early technological
adopters from an out facing way, like having a website.
Are you personally very into technology or you someone who
served the web and it's infancy, well, because I, um,

(04:34):
actually I did. Yeah, in the nineties. I was very
interested because I could for the first time, I could
actually get instant feedback from real people, you know, before
the Internet. I would go do a show and the
only review I saw was the guy that was, you
know as signed to cover my show that night, and

(04:57):
who knows if he even stayed for the whole concert,
you know, And I do this great show, and sometimes
I'd get these really weird reviews from you know, one person,
or or reviews on an album. You get one person
listening to the album. That's the only feedback I used
to get, except for when I'd be in concert and
see the people and then I have this other reaction,

(05:18):
you know, live and then I'd leave in four days
later I could read a review and I was like,
oh my god, what was the guy at the same
show as I was? So it was so refreshing too
in the nineties to go on a O L to
go on the fan the Melissa Ethridge, you know board,

(05:40):
and actually see what people were saying. It was the
first time I got to see kind of instantly how
people felt about my music as someone with a profile,
pretty high profile and experience, you know, a couple of things.
One for nine positives, there's always somebody negative and then
negative person is twisting the knife. So how do you

(06:05):
cope with the negative? And to what degree do you
change your behave You're based on this feedback not only
the negative, positive too. Oh I, um, well, I went
through my own personal kind of transformation. I had cancer
eighteen years ago, cancer free for eighteen years now, and

(06:25):
um having gone through that, I realized I had to
let go of really what other people thought about me,
because that would make me crazy. And the more that
I have seen social media come up and again this
instant response to something, and when I went on social
when I went on Twitter, you know, ten years ago

(06:47):
or whatever, I realized right away, oh, you're gonna get unfiltered.
You know, response is positive and negative. And whereas before
cancer I would let the negative get to me, I
would uh, I would, you know, really just think I

(07:07):
would let all the positive go by, but boy, that
one negative person I would focus on that and it
would make me crazy. And it's just a really sad
way to kind of do your work when one negative
thing can mess you up. And I realized I needed
to focus on on what I love. I needed to
make sure that the music I was making, the performing
I was doing made me happy. And as long as

(07:31):
I had that, as long as I could get out
there do my best. I knew that whatever anyone else
was experiencing was their experience going through their filter. Maybe
they had a bad day, maybe they're having a bad
year or life, you know, and that's their filter. And

(07:52):
if they if they don't, you know, feel the love
and the you know, the creativity and what I put
into it. If if it's not for them, then so
be it. And what other people think about me is
really none of my business. I really need to make
the music, make the the creativity that I love. It's

(08:18):
very difficult as an artist in the commercial space to
totally divorce oneself from the audience. So it's just like
playing live, you know what works. But let's say there's
a direction you want to go in or a song
you want to play and it's either not resonating or

(08:38):
you're getting negative feedback online. Would that inhibit you from
playing it? Would you stop playing? Or would you say
this is what I want to do? Oh? I would
if I if I had a lot of feedback, if
if maybe if I saw people that were normally uh,
you know, flowing with the work that I was doing

(09:00):
having a very negative response to it, then I would
I would think, Wow, what what did I overlook on this?
What what am I not seeing? That is is you know,
people are misinterpreting And I would go back and check
and see and and really kind of, uh, look at that.

(09:21):
I what if it was more. But if it's just
a handful of people that I can tell are are
just kind of miserable in nature and they're there are
people that kind of just want to go around stomping things.
If it's if it's that, I really let that be.
I don't mess with that energy. I believe that you know,
whatever you pay attention to you get. So I I
really try to try to look at you know, keep

(09:44):
my my gaze and my attention going towards you know, positive,
good feeling things. But if I were to see a
massive amount of not feeling things, I would have to
I would have to look at myself and go, Wow,
what am I putting out that I that I don't
see here? Let's go back to Twitter. How often do
you post on Twitter? And what kind of stuff? Oh? Wow? Um,

(10:10):
I it can be up to one or two times
a day. And then lately, I, you know, I kinda
I kind of had to take a break off of
Twitter because you know, my own Twitter is fine. I can,
you know, post something and then read what people say.
But boy, once I go into my feed and all

(10:31):
of a sudden I start reading the news and everything,
I just go down into a doom scroll hole, and uh,
I need to give myself a break on that every
now and then. So, um, I would say I at
least post once a week. Um, during football NFL football season,
I'll post a lot because I'm a big Kansas City

(10:52):
Chiefs fan and my uh my, my fans know that,
and so I have a whole section of of Kansas
City chi fans that follow me that that might not
be as familiar with my music, but they know that
we are, you know, in in the in the fandom
together in the arrowhead, you know. So I'm a big
fan of that. So I'll post about that. I'll post

(11:15):
about shows I'm doing. Every night, after a show, I'll
take what we call a melfie and it's just a
little like twenty video of me and the audience, so
that if you were at the show, you could have
a little thing. It's like a selfie with me and
the audience at every show. So I'll do that every

(11:36):
after every show. But you know, on the road, I'll
tweet once a day. I guess, how about a filter?
You know, they're different philosophies about how much to reveal
about your personal life. Do you feel everything's up for
grabs or do you have a wall? Well, I have
lived my life in such a way since the nineties

(11:59):
that I was very open about my personal life. I
felt that there's power in that that if I had
if I had kept uh, you know, silent and hidden
about my sexuality or or anything, and you know, they
come and find you. They they that sort of thing
you start worrying about it. So I said, look, I'm

(12:21):
just gonna be honest about myself about everything, so the
good and the bad. You know, every time I had
a breakup, it was public, and you know those aren't
very much fun. And and then when my son died
a couple of years ago, that was no fun when
that went public because it was you know, it was
opioid addiction. And you know, there's so much judgment or not.

(12:43):
But again, it is my job as as my own
human as a human being, I need to take care
of my inner self. I need to know that people.
I will never be able to get people to you know,
see my way or or you know that they're always
going to have their own opinions and they are welcome

(13:04):
to them. I just don't have to give my attention
or my gaze to that. I can keep it on
what I know and my loved ones, who are you know,
connected to me. So going back to the chiefs, was
Shottenheimer just a loser? Or or as Mahomes just that good? Oh,

(13:28):
you know, we've had coaches, We've I've see I was
born and raised in Leavenworth, Kansas. So my father was
a huge Kansas City Chiefs fan. I remember the first time, well,
no that the first time we won the Super Bowl.
The second time we were in the super Bowl. But um,
you know, nine seventy I remember that game, Lenny Dawson

(13:49):
and everybody, and then um, then fifty years went by,
fifty and I know them. They were my years when
you know, you every year would see we we will
get close. And for the last you know, decade, we
we would get close. We would have some bad season,
but we would get really close. And then, man, once

(14:10):
Andy Reid came, he made a big difference in coaching,
absolutely makes a difference. And and the the the you know,
the culture in that locker room. And you could just
see the team changing when Andy came and put his
coaches together and it was a you could feel, you know.

(14:31):
And we went through Andy, we went through uh Alex Smith,
and boy, once we got Patrick Mahomes, things just quickly
changed and you realized what what one player can do
with it in that position to reach the other talent
that we You've got me talking football, man, I can
talk this all all day. Okay. Do you know the

(14:53):
Chiefs personally? I do not. I I have hugged Andy
Reid numerous times because every time I sing the national anthem,
which I love to do, which has been about three
times now. Um, he's always right in front of me
when I sing. They've got me up on a pedalt
you know this, uh Riser. I'm singing to the crowd

(15:15):
of sixty people, but the team and Andy Reid is
right in front of me. Now, I don't dare look
any team member in the eye because you know they're
concentrating on the game. But Andy Reid always came over
and gave me a big hug. And I know his wife,
So that's that's as close as I've gotten. Do you
have season tickets or you just know when you want

(15:36):
to go you can get a ticket. Yeah, well I
live in Los Angeles, so I don't have season tickets
to Arrowhead. I Um, whenever I am playing or in
the area and there's a game, I know who to
call it ask for tickets. But there they also play
the Chargers, you know, twice a year and once here
in l A. So now I can go to Sophie.

(15:57):
I haven't been there yet because of COVID. We didn't
we couldn't go. But this year I'm going I'm going
to be there. Okay, are you basically a fan? Now?
Of course we're all older at this point, you and myself,
um or you were? You? Were you very athletic as
a child. Oh? Uh, My father was very athletic. He

(16:20):
he loved uh. He was a basketball coach actually for
the high school, for the high school team, and he
took him to state in the sixties and early seventies.
He was beloved coach Ethridge. He he taught the swimming.
He he played softball. He taught me how to play softball.
I learned. I'm a good lesbian. I learned how to
play softball. I loved it. It was fantastic. Um basketball,

(16:43):
I could, I could do a jump shot really great.
But I wasn't big at running, so I wasn't I
wasn't terribly athletic. And I certainly enjoyed music more than
I did the the sports. And so when it came
to high school, I had to choose. We couldn't do
both because you couldn't do all those electives, and I

(17:03):
definitely chose music. So the sports kind of went, you know, away,
and so I became an observer of sports instead of
a participant. Unfortunately, you know your son passed, but he
was trying to be a professional snowboarder. Was that a
family activity or that was just something he did by himself. Well,

(17:24):
when he was younger, I I was. I used to
ski a lot, and UM I would take him up
and he loved snowboarding so much when he was very young,
ten eleven years old, and I would take him up
as much as I could. And then UM, as a
young teenager, he started going on his own. And then

(17:44):
when he was about seventeen, he uh, well, before then,
he would go to like camps where he met these
professional people and they invited him to come to Aspen
and train, and he did for one season and then
they invited to come back and maybe UM sort of
start to be with the team when he was about seventeen,

(18:05):
and that's when he heard his ankle really bad. How
does one cope with the passing of a child. I
don't know the best that one can just it. There
is not even a word for it. You know, you
have the word for losing your your partner, your your

(18:29):
widow or or you know a widow or you know
or or or when you lose your parents you're an orphan.
But when you're a parent that loses a child, there's
not even a word for it in in the language.
So um, it is so not supposed to be your
your You're not supposed to outlive your children. And um,

(18:54):
you know the the when when you weigh up and
you know that someone who you've seen come into the
world and live for a couple of decades, when they're
not you know, when they're not around anymore, it's not right.
It doesn't feel right, and so every day you just well.

(19:20):
The way that I coped with it, I don't you know,
everyone has their own way. But the way I coped
with it was to understand that he he is not
gone forever and ever his that that spirit which he was,
that that light that he was beyond all his addictions

(19:40):
and troubles. Um, that light is is still alive and
it has always been in existence that spirit and I
and my deep my own spiritual beliefs are one of
you know, we are here in the physical, and then
there is a a place that is the non physical,

(20:01):
where all that spirit lives. So I I do, I
believe that I will and still am in some way
spiritually connected and that helps me. That is a that's
a comfort to me. Your sister, uh, if you go online,

(20:26):
went to Columbia, what is she up to? I know
a story of my own life identical to this. There
were twins though, and one o deed and one is
a very successful medical doctor of the same vintage as
your children. So what is your daughter up to? And

(20:48):
how does she cope? If you know? With the passing,
it was very very hard on my daughter. They were close.
They they used to be considered twins because they look
so much alike, and they're they're only about a year
and a half apart, and so they were very close.
And it's very very hard. And I can't speak for her,
but I do know that, you know, there's a there's

(21:10):
a painful part in her heart and and she she
you know, deals with that on her own and and
and and with us together, we as a family have
agreed that that we're not going when we talk about him,
we're not going to be sad. We're going to remember,
you know, lovingly the fun things. You know, and I

(21:31):
have whether children their fame now they'll be sixteen soon,
they are twins, and um, you know they we we
talked about him, and oh, well, Beckett, we would have
done this or oh Beckett used to do this, and
we tell stories and and it's very loving. And when
we do that, we feel he's close to us. Um,
you know, my daughter, I just I just love her

(21:51):
as much as I can. And yet you I certainly
have learned that when when you hear someone in a
family as has addiction issues, uh, or you know, forbid
they they have lost someone to an opioid addiction, you know,
I no longer look to blame anyone it is. It

(22:15):
is a personal issue. Families deal with us all the time.
You know, Bailey grew up under the same roof, and
she is highly successful. Uh not only did she graduate Columbia,
but she got her masters at the London School of Economics.
And and she's just you know, she's just my delight.
And and you know, people make different choices. Beckett made

(22:39):
a different choice and and um, you know, he left
us way too early. So we as a family, we
hold him, We love him, we remembered, we cherish our
memories with him, and uh, you know, we keep him close.
So you had two children with one partner and two
children with another a partner and ultimately broke up with

(23:02):
both partners. How did you manage the children and being
closed and who had custody and all kinds of things. Ah, well,
the uh, the first one, the first two that was
a little more well, okay, I don't really want to

(23:25):
go into details on it because it's so it's so
cretty kind of and um the what I always had
fifty custody that it was always I definitely wanted to say, look,
these are these are my kids also, and you know,

(23:46):
even though I'm not blood related to them, I am
their mother, And every single one of them would would
look at you funny if if if somehow you said
I wasn't there, like, oh no, she is. And know
I I shared custody. The too older I actually ended
up having more custody for many different reasons. They actually

(24:10):
ended up staying at my house more. The two younger ones,
I get along with their mother a little better. And
I kind of learned from the first one that that
any conflict you have, any sort of pulling and tugging
and and trying to prove something, only hurts the children.
I really saw that, I really saw how hard it

(24:31):
was on the children. So the second time and I
didn't expect to go through it, but I did. The
second time. I was like, Okay, now I'm gonna this
is gonna be a lot easier. I'm going to be
I'm not gonna push against things. I know that children
they go where it's warm, you know, I'm just gonna

(24:52):
love them. I'm gonna do the best I can. And um,
I really believe that the less conflict they have in
their life, the better it is for them. And it
has it has proven out there two delightful children and
they're almost sixteen, and you know, they're they're becoming young adults,
and I'm just very pleased. Now, did you ever consider

(25:16):
or why did you not have biological children yourself? Oh? Um,
First of all, I uh, I when I was hunger,
you know, in the seventies, late seventies, early eighties, when
you decided, not decided, when you realized you were gay,
it meant you weren't going to have kids. That was

(25:37):
part of the deal of being gay, and that was
part of the things that mothers would cry and go,
I'm not going to have grandchildren, you know, stuff like that.
And so as the eighties went on, we realized that
well as women, we could still have children, you know,
we can make this work and and and a lot
of people started doing that, and so um when my

(25:58):
partner at the time then I discussed children she wanted
to carry, and I was fine with that because I
never really had that urge. And then later when I
was thirty five six, I started having um uh uter
insists and things like that. So I actually ended up
having a hysterectomy at my late thirties, so I couldn't

(26:22):
have to I wouldn't have been able to have children anyway.
But you know, and it didn't bother me at all.
Believe me. I was there when they came into this
world and I saw it, and I've never felt not connected,
you know, biologically to my children at all. Okay, so
how did you cope with COVID? I know you did
a lot of live shows on the internet. You know,

(26:44):
what was it like for you? Ah? I remember when
everyone started talking about it, and my first couple of
gigs started to get canceled because we were going out
at the end of March of twenty and we were
gonna tour all summer and we were gonna go to Europe,
and it was everything was planned and and the first

(27:07):
few dates started being canceled and I said, oh, okay,
well this is only gonna be a couple of weeks.
You know, I had no idea of what it would be.
And when I realized after well actually after a few
days when they started canceling them, I I went on
my Facebook because everyone seemed to be kind of it

(27:28):
was really scary what was happening, like real things shutting
down and people not being able to meet and and
so I said, you know what, I'm gonna go on Facebook,
on my little Facebook page, and you know, for I'm
gonna sing a song or two. I'm just going to
connect with my fans every day until this is over,
you know. And so I started doing it, and you know,

(27:49):
after a couple of weeks, I started realizing, wow, we're
in this, and so I I actually went every single
day at three o'clock on Pacific time. I went online
for fifty eight days in a row. And then that's
when my son died, and so I I stopped and

(28:12):
for about four weeks, we mourned, We we UH got
that together. But I came out here. Actually I'm in
my UH garage studio, which then I took my my sadness,
my grief and my oh my gosh, what am I
gonna do now? My son's died and I can't go anywhere,

(28:34):
I can't go perform, you know, and make myself feel better. UM.
So I cleaned out this part of my garage and
made a studio and sound proofd it, and um, I
learned everything about streaming, about cameras, about sound I started

(28:56):
doing my own guitar teching and I built this studio,
which as I was doing and I was realizing I
was kind of doing what nobody else had done before
because we didn't Streaming was kind of a not a
thing that many people did. They would do it every
now and then, but it wasn't a real thing. And
now with COVID it was becoming huge. So I ended

(29:18):
up having steven cameras and uh, you know professional soundboard
that I hooked up that my sound man in Florida.
We we figured a way to have him run the
sound connect through the internet, him run the sound in Florida,
and we presented a thing we called Ethridge TV and
we did it five five days a week. It kept

(29:40):
me and my wife saying I would do Tuesday's were
cover days, and so I would learn like four or
five cover songs that that I hadn't been singing other
people's material for decades, and it was really enjoyable and
I connected with the fans. I now have this, you know,
two years of content now of me singing all kinds

(30:02):
of stuff and and doing stuff with my wife, and
it just it kept our creativity going, It kept me saying,
it kept me connected, it got me through grief. It
was just it was actually a really great experience. And
what about monetization, Well, yeah, then there was that because
because I did realize that after those fifty eight days,

(30:24):
I went, oh my god, I'm not working this year,
and touring is my bread and butter. Touring pays the bills,
and I thought, oh my, how am I going to
pay the bills? And so we Ethirds TV. We ended
up charging a subscription and for fifty dollars a month,
you've got five shows a week, and people were willing

(30:44):
to do that, and so we actually were able to
pay the bills for a year and a half off
of that. How many people subscribe over a thousand, you know,
So yeah, let's go back to the beginning. How did
your family end up in Leavenworth. My father was born
in St. Louis, Missouri too, you know, migrant farmers, very

(31:07):
very poor. He was just you know, poverty. He came
from there. Uh. My mother came from Arkansas, where she
grew up, you know, not as poor. Her father was
an insurance salesman, so she kind of was. And she
ended up going to college at Henderson University in Arkansas.

(31:30):
And my father got a scholarship because he was athletic,
and someone in his high school helped him to understand
that he could go to college on an athletic scholarship.
So he goes there, they meet, he gets a job
coaching in Leavenworth, Kansas, And so I have no other
family in Leavenworth, but they ended up, you know, settling

(31:51):
down in leveryone because he could get a job there.
I've been to Ksey many times, and I've certainly been
to Lawrence. I've never been to Leavenworth. But all anybody
knows about Leavenworth is the prison. Yeah, that's something. Is
that something if you live there that you don't even
think about or is that you know, impact the whole town?
You don't think about it because that prison. The Federal

(32:12):
Penitentiary is huge, and it was about two blocks from
my house and I used to ride my bike by
it all the time, and I just that's just the prison,
and everybody has a prison in their town. I thought,
you know, it was just it was totally normal. But
as i um, as I grew, I actually was a
part of a little talent show that became a variety

(32:33):
show and we would go and perform at the prisons.
So I realized that not only do we have the
Federal penitentiary there, we have the Army penitentiary, the Fort
Leavenworth has an Army penitentiary there. We have the U
in the little town right next to us Lansing. We
have the Kansas State Men's Prison, and then the women's

(32:57):
penitentiary used to be there. It's in Topeka now, but
it used to be there. So I would go around
and I would perform in all of these prisons. And
we're actually looking to um to create a little documentary
and having me go back and performing in the women's
penitentiary there. But yeah, it's everybody's family, you know. They
had their fathers were guards or something at the penitentiary.

(33:19):
Every now and then you'd hear about a break out.
You know, one of my friends actually was picked up
a hitchhiker, which you're not supposed to do around my town,
and and he had escaped and he kind of kidnapped
and forced him to drive him to Nebraska. But he
was fine, you know. So so when you went to
the prisons, what age were you and were you anxious scared?

(33:43):
I was not at all. I was I was about
I'd say. And I gotta tell you, the audience was amazing.
I mean, talk about a captive audience, right, But they
were so thrilled to just be entertained that they were
hooting and hollering. Of course, I was thirteen and a
young girl or whatever. I didn't I didn't take it

(34:04):
as that. I just took it as this was a
whole lot of energy that was really loved, that was
loving being entertained. So how far is Leavenworth from Kansas City.
It's about well, I just knew it's about a forty
five minute drive, maybe an hour. It's it's right up
there on the bight of Kansas and Missouri. The Missouri

(34:25):
River is part of Leavenworth, and and you crossed the
Missouri River and you're in Missouri, and how often growing
up there as a teenager would you go to Kansas City? Um?
I I played in bands as a teenager, and I
would work in Kansas City a lot. I would work
in the Ramada in or the you know, I would

(34:47):
play the ski club dances, and so I would go
there once a week, I guess. Okay, So how many
kids in the family. I have one sister, one older sister.
And how many years between the two of you? We
were exactly four years apart. We were born on the
same day, but four years apart, okay, and so four

(35:09):
years is a lot when you were a kid. So
what was your relationship with your sister growing up? Well,
it was not a good relationship. She was troubled also,
Um and uh, we were not close at all. But
she used to listen to the coolest music. She had
Led Zeppelin, she had Humble Pie, she had Rolling Stones,

(35:31):
Exile on Main Street. You know, she had all these
great records that me, as a eleven year old, didn't
quite you know, I wouldn't not to find it, but
I would listen to them, go whoa, this is amazing,
and so hearing those and then my parents music was
you know Mom's and the Papas and Neil Diamond and

(35:51):
Aretha Franklin. So I got this really great mix of
music in the house and then the radio. So even
though I wasn't close to my sister, her music really
influenced me, the music that she listened to. You reference
her as troubled and refer to yourself as trouble. What
does that mean troubled? Troubled? Well, she um, I was.

(36:14):
I wouldn't say I was troubled. I was actually was
a very good child. I didn't mean to say that
I was troubled. Um, I was only troubled in that. Uh.
I just wanted to get away from that small town.
I had a big dream of you know, fame and
fortune and I could be a rock star. Somehow. She
was troubled in that, Um. You know there it was drugs,
it was I think she had an abortion when she

(36:37):
was sixteen. It was you know, she constantly fought with
my parents, she dropped out of high school. You know,
she's still having a hard time. So it's just it's
just just that kind of you know, choices that were made,
and what's your relationship with her now? Not much? I
um uh, I know her daughter more. I her she

(37:00):
had two children, her her oldest son also died of
a overdose. I know, it's it's everywhere and um and
but her youngest was really amazing and it helps a lot.
And so I I connected with her and through her,
I'm still connected with my older sister. But I realized

(37:21):
a long time ago, I I, you know, you don't
choose your family, and you know, so sometimes they're they're
just not the ones that you are are really connected with.
You know, I really sort of built my own family.
So you grew up in a middle class family, certainly
in the sixties, and then you had great financial success.

(37:43):
Did you give your sister money? Did you buy things
for your parents? Well? Yes, I was a good rock star,
you know, of course. Yeah, that's that's where coming from
a place where we we didn't have that much money.
We were lower middle class and my father was a teacher,

(38:04):
and it was it was but we we we were
never went hungry, so that that was fine and and
it was great. So the minute I got some money,
I'm like, WHOA, you know, this is amazing. I can
I I bought my sister a car. I ended up
buying my parents house when they wanted to retire, and
I kind of did that for a while, and then

(38:26):
I realized, I'm not really well with my parents. It
was fine because they had worked hard all their life
and and and I felt, you know, that that was
not a problem, you know. And I ended up supporting
my mother until she passed away a few years ago.
But my sister, I realized, wait, but I'm not helping
my sister because she's not doing anything, you know, and
she's unhappy and and she's still you know, she was

(38:49):
having her own drug issues and her kids. And I
ended up taking her daughter out of her home for
a while and and putting her in her boarding school
and helping her. So when I realized that my this
sort of enabling my sister financially was not helping her,
and I, like I said, when I went through cancer,

(39:11):
I had a real kind of spiritual um m hmm
enlightenment about, Oh, it's not my job to save anybody
else or fix anybody else. They have to, you know,
go through what they need to go through. I finally
called her and said, Okay, you've got a roof over

(39:31):
your head. That's it. I'm not there's not another dime,
and I don't want to hear from you. And I didn't,
you know, and she's you know, like I said, I
go through her daughter. Her daughter now takes care of
her more. And UM, you know you just sort of
you just let that be. So what kind of kid

(39:58):
were you going up? Were you like running around the
neighborhood with good student, bad student, loaner, life of the party. Um.
I was a friendly child. I was a happy child. Uh.
I love music from early on earlier, from my first
memories were the Beatles singing I want to hold your hand,

(40:19):
you know. That's that's so. I was just obsessed with music.
I was a good child because I saw my sister
causing so much havoc and the family. I sort of
just stayed quiet and did my own thing. And I
got along with my father really well. Uh I you know,
I I didn't cause any trouble. Um in high school,

(40:43):
I was friends with everyone. I was known. I mean,
if you ask anyone, nobody is surprised that I became
successful because I was the girl that would walk around
the halls with my guitar case all the time, you know,
and I was missy that you know, made music and
everybody knew that. And I knew the sporty kids. I
knew the the pot smoking kids outside, I knew the

(41:03):
brainy kids. I knew the music and drama geeks, and
and we all hung out. It was, you know, even racially.
I had black friends. I had all all kinds of friends.
Yet I was kind of a loner when it really
came down to it, because I would go off on
the weekends and and play in my bands, and I'd
make money, so I didn't socialize as much as most

(41:26):
kids do. And um, but you know, I look back
and I didn't cause any trouble. I wasn't a straight
a student by any means, but I did fine. You know,
So when did you start playing an instrument? Ah? The
first instrument I played was a guitar. I took guitar

(41:50):
lessons at age eight. The guy didn't want to teach me.
He said my fingers would bleed and i'd quit. I said, no,
I won't, No, I won't, he said, I was too young,
and my fingers bled. But I didn't quit, and I
just kept going and now I have huge calyss. But um,
but then I learned clarinet in school and uh, then

(42:10):
that became I also learned saxophone. I learned all kinds
of stuff, and in like junior high, I was very
interested in all kinds of music. I taught myself how
to play the piano. I made the drummers in my
bands teach me how to play the drums. I just
wanted to learn everything. So I you know, I'm I'm
very good at a couple of instruments, and I'm okay

(42:32):
to a few, and I could make sound out of others.
You know. Okay, so you're playing the guitar. At what
point do you form a band? Ah? Well, I tried
to form form a band when I was in in
like early school, like when I was twelve or thirteen,
but I just couldn't get any of my other friends,

(42:55):
you know interested. I did say, come on, you know here,
play the play this, and I ended up teaching my
best friend how to play bass because I wanted him
to play with me. And then when I finally met
professional musicians through this variety show and and met professionals
that I mean professionals as in guys that had other jobs,

(43:15):
but on the weekends they would go out and and working.
These were grown ups with families, but they would play
on the weekends at dances and would make extra money.
And my mother wasn't supportive of it, but my father was,
and so we won that argument, and uh, I ended
up playing with professional musicians. And so the first band

(43:37):
I played in I was I was about thirteen, and
it was a country band, you know as Chuck Hamersmith
and the Wranglers, and but these cats could play. They
were good and they're still they're old guys now playing
you know in Leavenworth, but they were great. And then
I went on from there and played in a couple
of other bands until I had like my own band

(43:58):
of these grown ups, UH that I played until my
senior year. Then when I was a senior in high school,
I said I want to be a normal kid, and
I stopped playing in bands. Well, when you would play
in bands, since he was, were all professionals. How much
rehearsal would you do during the week? We rehearsed once
a week. We rehearse on Wednesdays, so my father would

(44:20):
drive me there and then on weekends my father would
go to every single show. I never played any anywhere
that my father didn't go. That's a pretty dedicated father. Wow, absolutely,
I owe the performer you see today is because my
father was willing to do that and he loved it too,
and we were very close. It was wonderful. And uh,

(44:43):
what role did you play in these bands? Well? First
I was just the singer, the girls singer, and I
would get up and sing Tammy Wynett, you know, stand
by your man and um. Then as the band's pur gressed,
it got a little bit more pop music and I

(45:04):
we would play guitar. I would play rhythm guitar. Then
in one of my bands, the organ player taught me
how to play bass. And he taught me, uh organ
and you know, synthesizers stuff, and so I would I
would also double He would play bass and I would
double on the keyboards and um. So eventually I was
a keyboard player, organ player. I didn't play much bass

(45:27):
because I was a little but guitar player and singer,
you know, lead singer. And at what point did you
start writing songs? Well, let's started writing when I was
about ten or eleven. Of course they were very simple
songs and and the the beauty of playing in cover

(45:48):
bands is you learn about songs. You play other people's
songs that are popular, and you learn it just becomes
obvious to you what makes them good. You you learned
the form of a song, long you learn the power
behind the song. You know. You keep being playing other
people's material until you start writing and going okay, this

(46:09):
is this is how it is. And it wasn't until
I started playing solo in my twenties that I actually
played my original music for people. Okay, so you're in
high school. Both your parents graduated from college. What were
the expectations and how did you deal with that? Oh,

(46:29):
I was supposed to go to college because my sister
was disappointing, and she was she didn't even graduate high school,
so you know, I was supposed to go to college. Well.
As as my high school years went on, my mother
saw that I was not interested in anything but music.
She insisted I go take like music theory courses at
the University of Missouri, you know, Kansas City, the Conservatory

(46:55):
and stuff, and so I took some and then she said,
you know, then when they said you're going to go
to college, I looked at it as well, that'll get
me out of this little town. And so we went
and looked at colleges but in nine you couldn't. You
couldn't major. You couldn't. I would have had two major

(47:16):
in singing. They only had voice and it was all
operarettic and I was not an opera singer at all.
And so the only college was this kind of new
college in Boston called Berkeley College of Music that was
a jazz h college and they I could major in guitar.

(47:36):
So uh, I'm like, all right, sign me up. And
I didn't even go check out the school. I just
you know, we paid the tuition. At the time, it
was just you didn't even have to audition. They just
took whoever wanted to come. And um, I got in,
and you know, my life changes. I'm in Boston, I'm
on my own. It's I'm eighteen, nineteen years old. And

(48:00):
uh so I went to Brooklyn College Music for about
one semester. That was about it. And then I dropped
out and started working and playing in a restaurant and
making a living. So my parents couldn't say anything. They said,
as long as yourself sufficient, okay, but you know, there
you go. Okay, needless to say, the odds of success

(48:21):
in the music business as a performer, to say they're
low is you know, gross understatement? So along the way,
did people say did you tell them your dream and
then they like roll their eyes and say, You're never
gonna make it? Did you ever think of going straight?
Did people for they say you should go straight? You know?

(48:45):
When I was very young and I'd say, oh, I'm
going to be a singer, I got a lot of
eye rolling or a lot of really confused people like
what you're gonna be? What you know, no girls are
nurses or you know, teachers or something. But the older
that I got and the more that I was actually
performing in bands, people would go, well, good luck, you know,

(49:08):
and even my parents, even my mother, who was not supportive,
she would not tell me, you know, you can't make it.
I remember actually asking her once I was about fourteen
or fifteen, I said, do you think I have a
chance of making it in the music business? And she said, well,
you know, it's a one in a million, but who's
to say you're not that one? And that was enough.

(49:31):
That was enough to give me. Well, then you're saying
there's a chance, you know, and and so I was like, yeah,
who's to say I'm not the one in the in
the million, and so I just it was such a
huge desire and calling that I was just I just
was gonna do it wherever it took me. Did you

(49:52):
ever have a straight job? Yeah, I had a couple,
Like when I told you, I didn't play in bands
when I was in my senior year in high school
because I wanted to be a kid and go to
the football games and stuff. I worked at the Kentucky
Fried Chicken and I was a packer back, which is
one of the reasons I'll never eat it a Kentucky
Fried Chicken. But I worked there. And then when I

(50:16):
moved to Boston, when I was at Berkeley, I wanted
to get an apartment, and so first I got a
job as a as a security guard at a at
a hospital, which was really difficult work, and I was
making seven dollars an hour. And that's when I I said,
you know what, I'm gonna take my guitar and I'm
gonna go down to the subway station. I'm gonna open

(50:36):
it up and I'm gonna sing in the subway. And
I made for an hour, I made seven dollars, and
I went, Okay, I can make the same money that
I'm making you know, doing that, and I'm gonna I'm
gonna try music. And that's when I walked down to
a few restaurants on Boylson Street in Boston and I
found one an audition that I got a job and
I was making twenty five bucks a night. So I

(50:59):
and after that I never had a real job. Okay,
anything positive about going to Berkeley other than the fact
that got you to Boston, Um, well, I could have
made it more positive now that I you know, look back,
I think i'd be more a bit more of a

(51:19):
uh a better, more um educated guitar player had I
gotten into it. But at the time I was one
of like two guitar women guitar players, So it was
it really wasn't a place for me now, but I
mean then, but now, man, it's it's a great, great school.
I I they gave me an honorary doctorate, so you know,

(51:42):
I'm good. Did your mother live long enough to see that,
Yes she did? And it was really it was great.
It was wonderful that look mom, now my kids now
of course, and my daughter's like, Mom, that's not real.
I'm like, I know, I know, don't worry. You have
your masters it's all beautiful. It's okay. So how hard

(52:03):
a decision was it? And what was the process deciding
to drop out? Oh, it was not hard at all.
It just happened, you know. I I had um, I
had gotten the job at this restaurant was called Kins
by George, and I was playing in the lounge and
one evening one of my teachers came in and sat

(52:28):
and had a couple of drinks with someone there, and
I was like, oh my god, that's my you know,
uh arrangement teacher or something. And I remember singing and like, oh,
he's gonna recognize me. And he never recognized me. He
never like realized that I was a student in his class.
And I was like, I am just invisible at Berkeley.

(52:49):
And I didn't I didn't enjoy breaking music down into
theory and you know, the jazz theory of you know,
one chord has to go to another, and it was
all this rules on music and I really wasn't into
it at all, and it was just kind of sucking

(53:10):
my energy out and I just went, you know what,
I'm making a living. I'm self sufficient, and I just
stopped going. I just stopped. Okay, what kind of material
were you playing? Oh, I was. It was all cover material.
It was you know, it was lounge music. I was
playing Barry Manilow and Barbara streisand and Neil Diamond and uh.

(53:34):
It was nineteen seventy nine eighty at this point, and
so it was you know, the Doobie Brothers. It was.
It was just whatever was popular at the time and
a bunch of show tunes. And was it always on
the guitar? Do you have a keyboard too? I had
a piano. Most of it was piano. But I did
set up my guitar and play that and and and
the people liked me, and I started to get a following. Okay,

(53:57):
so you've established a base. You made a tweet addition
from Berkeley to being self sustaining. How long do you
do that? And you're earning money? But it's not quite
the path of your dream. Yeah, And I couldn't see
how I could get to my dream, which was that
you know California seventies, uh, folk rock sound, you know

(54:23):
the Eagles, the the you know Fleetwood, mac Bob Seeger,
Bruce Springsteen. This this that was who was calling me.
And that was not the scene. This was nineteen eighty
in Boston, so it was punk, it was uh you know,
and I was playing pop show tunes in you know,
a restaurant. So that was not what I wanted. So I, um,

(54:44):
I went back to Kansas City, got a job at
a hotel They're called the Granada Royale. I played in
the Lavaranda Lounge, made some more money, bought a car,
and then in too drove to l A where I
was going to be discovered and you know, be somehow

(55:07):
meet up with all these you know, uh rock you know,
acoustic rock musicians. But when I got to l A two,
it was all spandex and hair and heavy metal bands,
and I was like, oh, So I found work in
women's bars, in lesbian bars around Los Angeles, like in

(55:29):
Long Beach in Pasadena, and um I worked for five
years in those uh bars, but was able to play
my original music, was able to start performing. The performer
you really see today really came out of the bars
where I felt comfortable, where I've supported, and um I

(55:52):
sort of created my own path like that, and over
the years, many record companies came out to see me,
you know, and whether they didn't sign me because I
was gay, I don't know, but they didn't hear the hit.
And UM, finally Chris Blackwell in six late early UM

(56:13):
signed me. And he said, I don't know why someone
hasn't signed to you yet. You're amazing and and he
said to me, he goes, I think the future of
rock and roll has a female face, and I want
you to be on my label. Let's go back a chapter.
You buy a car, you drive to l A. Do
you know anybody in El? Yes, my my father's sister

(56:35):
and brother. Uh, my aunt and uncle. They were separate.
My my aunt. I slept on her couch for a
few weeks until I got a job in a in
a bar and then I moved down to Long Beach.
But um, yeah, I knew her so but that was
all I only knew her. Okay, you talk about the

(56:56):
lesbian bars. At what age did you realize you were gay? Oh?
My gosh. You know, it was hard to realize you
were gay in the seventies because there was no talk
of gay. You didn't hear it anywhere except the you know,
derogatory comments that oh, she's a lazzie. And I remember going,
what's a leazie? You know? And well that's somebody who

(57:18):
you know, likes girl. That's a girl who likes girls.
I was like, hm, you know. And it wasn't until
high school when I realized all my um, all my
uh m friends were getting kind of boy crazy and
I wasn't. And I just sort of talked it up

(57:40):
too well, I have this different life where I go
out in the weekends and play an adult, you know bars.
But I still I really wasn't boy crazy at all,
but I really needed to be around some girls that
I really liked, you know. And and so as I
grew kind of older in high school, I started to

(58:01):
kind of think, you know, I think I'm different. You
you just you feel different. And then you know, my
senior year, my when I turned seventeen, actually I I
kissed a girl and it was like, oh my god,
I'm that whatever that is. And I just knew that.

(58:21):
I remember seeing h I think it was Time magazine
had a cover. It was it is said the Gay Liberation.
You know, it's ninety nine when that was starting. So
it was the first time I ever saw that when wait,
there's more people like me. So I knew I had
to get to like a big city. And once I
went to Boston. It was like, oh, yeah, you're gay.
So I don't know, I could say I knew I

(58:43):
was gay at thirteen, I could say seventeen, I'm not sure. Okay,
how did you end up kissing the girl? Well, she
was my best friend, you know, kind of that obsessive
best friend that and um, you know, we went everywhere,
I did everything together when I was like sixteen. And

(59:06):
then on my seventeenth birthday, Um, you know, we're girls,
are are lucky. We can you know, hey, we're having
a sleepover, you know. And well that sleepover on my
seventeenth birthday involved a kiss. So okay, but you know,
literature and movies are riddled with people who kiss somebody

(59:28):
and then that person that they kiss pull away and
all kinds of negative things happened. So inspired no, it was.
It was definitely, uh went both ways. And we were
we were tortured girlfriends my whole senior year of high school.
We were you know, we couldn't tell anybody we we were.

(59:48):
We were. We went to a church, you know, we
were involved in church, and and there was a lot
of ice. I saw a lot of I don't know,
you know, there's a lot of fear, and it was
a lot of secrecy, and it's one of the reasons
that I really I'm really grateful that more of the world,
that the people are coming out now and helping younger
gay people, because it's pretty tortuous, you know, to to

(01:00:11):
be different like that, and I feel like you have
no place and you have to keep something secret. So
you know, it was like that for a year, and
then when I left for Boston, it was it was
much better. I was. I was never in the closet
again after that. Once I went to Boston, I was okay.
So you went to Boston, but still, I mean, I
was living in Los Angeles, which was relatively free Los Angeles,

(01:00:33):
New York and San Francisco at the time. What was
it like being gay in Boston? Oh, fantastic. It was.
It was disco. There was gay bars, you know down
the street from me. You know, a couple it was.

(01:00:53):
It was still you weren't public about it, you weren't
out about it, but it was a strong community. Every
night you could go to the bar. I'd go after
I play, I'd go around the corner to the Prelude
that was the women's bars. Buddies was the men's bar
just up the street, and you know, it was it
was community. There was more people, okay a little earlier

(01:01:24):
than you. Uh. The biggest gay artists were in the
folk world, like Holly Neia. So who did you did?
You say? Well, you know, who did you model yourself over?
And you say, well, this being gay doesn't matter? And
I mean not to mention the fact that was Ian Wilson.
But there weren't you know, a plethora of successful female

(01:01:46):
rock artists. Yeah, yeah, it was. Um, I didn't see.
I didn't even know the female artists that the lesbian
music scene until I got to long Each, you know,
in Los Angeles and was asked to play a women's
music festival. I didn't even I hadn't even heard of

(01:02:07):
Chris Williams and and you know, all these great lesbian artists,
this strong sort of lesbian folks scene. Um. I was
a bit of an outcast because I was rocking and
playing and kind of different. But it was very exciting
to the audience, I um. And then other than that,

(01:02:27):
I mean, I was I became a Janis Joplin fan
because I was like, that's the rock I want to do,
you know. I and I would sing a lot of
her songs. Um. Other than that, you know, Linda Ronstaff
was one that I really, you know, enjoyed as a singer.
But there was there was not a lot of women
their heart um Pat Benatar, you know, but there was

(01:02:52):
There really wasn't any that was doing exactly what I wanted,
the songwriting and the acoustic rock and roll that I felt.
I I didn't see that anywhere. Okay, you're living in
Long Beach, which has certainly been a gay stronghold since
I lived in southern California, and the world is different
because of the Internet now, but long Beach. I've a

(01:03:14):
friend who lives in Long Beach. Now I feel the
same thing, you know. You know, it might as well
be San Diego and the music businesses in West Hollywood,
Hollywood now the West side of Los Angeles. To what
degree do you feel displaced? Do you try to integrate,
do you try to make it? Yeah? I still felt

(01:03:35):
like I was outside of Hollywood. But I realized very
quickly when I got here in the early eighties that
you can't make any money unless you are a known artist.
You you can go once a month, maybe you could
go play the the club, you know, the cabaret somewhere
or uh god, not even the troubadoor. You couldn't even

(01:03:57):
get a job at the trouba door. You but you know,
there was a couple of bars you can play, but
it was paid to play. So there was no way
I was going to be able to make a living
and you know, work that sort of circuit. So I
started playing in the in the in these bars I
actually created that they didn't have music. I walked in

(01:04:18):
and said, hey, can I set up my equipment in
your corner and play and you can pay me twenty
five bucks? And they were like okay. So I played
it different different clubs, you know, a couple of nights here,
a couple of nights there. I ended up playing five
nights a week and making a living. But again I knew, okay,
no record executive is gonna accidentally walk into a lesbian bar.

(01:04:38):
You know, that's just not gonna happen. So but I
did believe that as long as I would, you know,
play my music and do a good job, then someday
someone's gonna know somebody who knows somebody who's brother is
in the music business. You know, it's going that's going
to happen. People are gonna talk, they're gonna bring people down.

(01:05:00):
And that is what happened after about a year. Um
a soccer team, the women's soccer team that used to
come after the games on Saturday would come in and
have a few drinks and and watch me play. One
of their coaches was married to a manager in the
business and he used to manage bread. His name was

(01:05:20):
Bill Leopold. They finally talked him into coming down to
see me in a lesbian bar and he came in
and he was blown away and he said, look, this
is this is gonna be hard. I don't know if
it's going to take a year or ten years, but
I think that you can make it. And he signed
me as a as as my manager. He was my

(01:05:42):
manager for thirty years after that, and he he was
the one who brought He would bring record companies to
me in these bars. He said, look, you're making a living.
I don't want to take you out of that. If
they have a problem with it, well there you go.
And I tell you every single record in Los Angeles
over those five years came to see me and I

(01:06:04):
would go all the way up and then they bring
the head guy out. And then they'd all say no
over and over and over. And I don't know how
much was because I was gay or how much because
they just couldn't see the hit. But um, it wasn't
until Chris Blackwell he heard four songs. He came in
and heard four songs and went, well, yeah, I want
you on my label, and that was it. Boom done. Okay,

(01:06:26):
So you never did the go to labels with your
cassette demo, get to know the people yourself. No, No,
he was he Uh Bill Leopold had enough contacts and
knew enough heat, he had had enough artists that he
had friends and said hey, and then word of mouth
got around. No, I never did another demo. Well I

(01:06:49):
did do a demo, but they was always horrible on
demos because I didn't it wasn't me. I would always
let somebody else may and it was the eighties and
they were horrible eighties demos, and um, I just it wasn't.
It was my live performance that was the best and
it still is. And um that's what Chris black Well
saw and you never wavered, you stayed this is the dream,

(01:07:13):
I'm gonna do it. Yeah, And I was Hey. It
was enough of the dream to show up in a
bar to know that there were people there just to
hear me sing, which was huge because before, when I'd
be playing in bands, I was the background music. You know,
in high school, I was the I wasn't the reason
you would go to the show. It was a dance,

(01:07:35):
you know. We were we were our job was to
keep people dancing. This was me by myself in the
corner of a bar, and people would come sit and
watch me. And that was amazing and I could have
done that. I would still be doing that if, you know,
if nothing else happened, because that was that was enough
of a dream of how people come to see me. Okay,

(01:07:56):
legendarily you cut the album that was scrapped, and we
cut the album in a matter of days. Now that
I have you here, what exactly happened? Yes, that is
what happened. I Chris Blackwell comes in, and Chris Bogwell
is a man of mystery and and he's a wealthy
he owns Island Records and Island Pictures and he's just

(01:08:17):
this guy. And so he goes, yes, I want you
all my label and then he runs off to Jamaican
I don't see him for months, and so I'm like, okay,
I'm supposed to make a record and I don't know how.
And so, um, my manager knows a producer named Jim Gaines.
Fine producer. He produced uh Steve Miller band. He engineered.
He's more of an engineer that then became a producer

(01:08:39):
and you know, so he worked on you know Journey.
He was a Northern California kind of San Francisco sound
kind of guy, and at the time, again it's there's
a very eight sound going on. So he brings these
musicians together, and um, I I insisted on certain drummer

(01:09:00):
and bass player that I had in my over my
years there in l A. I had done some demos
and they were they were just two of the greatest
musicians I've ever worked with. It was Craig Cramp, who
was this amazing studio musician, and Kevin McCormick, who's this
you know, Jocko Pastorius type bass player. He was amazing.
And so I said, okay, well, I want these two

(01:09:21):
guys at least to you know, play, and so we
bring them out and then he hires a guitar player
and a keyboard player and I go into the studio,
the famous record plant up in Saclito. You know, all
these famous people have been in there. I'm just so
delighted to being there. And he cuts the record and it's, um,

(01:09:43):
it's you know, you play the track, and then the
keyboard player comes in and he lays it just hours
and hours of keyboard sounds. And I think there was
a bit of cocaine happening too, because it kind of
got kind of crazy. And then after days I would
come in and sing and my voice would just kind
of be all processed on the top. And so we finally,

(01:10:05):
you know, got enough tracks together after a couple of weeks,
and I took him to Chris Blackwell and he said, mmmmm,
I hate this and I was like, oh no, I've
lost my chance. He was very very so when the
drummer in the Basebaer Kevin and Craig said, look, we
understand because they had been to the bar to hear

(01:10:27):
me sing live. They said, I think we know what
Chris Blackwell wants. Tell him to give us four days
in the studio. That's all we need, and we'll cut
an album for him. And so I went back to Chris.
I said, please just give me four days cheap studio,
l A. I don't care. Just four days, he said, okay,
and he sent one of his people to bring in.

(01:10:47):
I had already done the photo shoot for the album
cover and we had chosen that remember that red photo
of course, yeah, that you know, and I've got my
head up like that. He the woman actually brought it in.
She put it on the the a console in the
studio and she said, Chris Blackwell wants you to make

(01:11:08):
this album. So it was that picture he wanted, that
rock and roll picture, that woman that he saw in
the bar. That's what he wanted. And so we went
in and drums, bass and guitar. That was It was
just me, Kevin and and Craig and we recorded all
day long and we recorded those ten tracks on that
first album. And we and we brought Wady walk Tell

(01:11:32):
in to just play some guitar, which you know, he's
legendary guitar player, so that you know, bring me some
water and and like the way I do, that's him playing.
And we added a little bit of keyboard later just
for some pad turned it in, he loved it, and
the rest is history. And how did Nicolo get involved.

(01:11:55):
Craig and Kevin knew him, and they said, this is
the guy we want to engineer because Ko was a
madman and he would he would do Neil Young and
Crazy Horse, so he knew he knew how to make
a small live band sound huge, and that's exactly what
he did. He was so good. He he took all
the effects off my voice. If you listen, my voice

(01:12:16):
is so dry. It was. It was revolutionary at the time.
Nothing else was sounding like that. So I was so
grateful for Nico. Okay, give Me Some Water? Was that
written before the red cut? Actually, yes, it was. It
was the original songs after after he didn't like that

(01:12:40):
first record. I had a few weeks before we went
back into the studio again, and that's when I wrote
bring Me Some Water. And I'm so grateful for that
because that ended up being, you know, the huge hit.
And um, I just I just was sitting in my
living room and it was like it was kind of
like a blues riff, but it was, you know, I

(01:13:03):
sped it up a little bit and dat you know,
just this bluesy rock riff, simple song. My girlfriend at
the time was off with somebody else. I was burning
Alive really easy to write the song. And when we
went back in the studio, said, hey, I've wrote this song.
What do you think? And we just bamed. We just
recorded it and there it was. But let's just go

(01:13:25):
back to the inspiration. Your girlfriend? What was too? You know,
what got you going? Uh? Well? I was, Um, how
do I say? I was? I was in a non
monogamous relationship. But we lived together and um for years,
for four or five years we were together, and um,

(01:13:50):
she was wonderful and I really liked her. But we
both you know, we were young, we were in our
twenties and you know, experimenting and moving, just meeting other people.
And she would go off to these uh women's music
festivals by herself, and you know, I just knew that
she was because we had this open relationship. It's like, okay,
I know exactly what you're doing. That's why bring me

(01:14:10):
some water? Is you know tonight? I feels so weak,
but you know, all in love is fair. You know,
I turned the other cheek. But man, this sucks, you know,
and and I know you're only human. I haven't got
talking rome because I've had other girlfriends and all kinds
of stuff so and so it's just like I don't
like this. I can't. I can't say I'm totally been
done wrong because you know I'm doing it too. But

(01:14:33):
somebody bring me some more. I'm just I just don't
like this. Okay, So that's your first hit. Subsequent to that,
how do you write your songs? Do you wait for
the inspiration? Do you sit down and say I need
ten songs? How do you do it? Oh? Well, by
that point I would write all day long. I would.

(01:14:54):
I I had my job at the bar five nights
a week, but I'd wake up at you know, ten
eleven noon, and I'd have a couple of hours. I'd
make myself some food and I would just sit down
and write, and it was whatever I was going through.
Sometimes like bring me some water and like the way
I do and songs like that. I had specific things

(01:15:15):
that I got to write about this. Other times it
was just mining, you know, what was inside? What were
my questions, what were my desires, what were my pains,
what were my hopes? You know, and and just writing
from that. But I wrote all the time. That was then.
But then as time plays out, how do you write? Oh? Yeah,

(01:15:35):
much different now, mama has to make time. Okay, okay, kids, wife, family, managers, everybody.
I'm working from ten to two, do not you know,
and disrupt me. Yeah, I used to. I laugh about that.
I said, Oh my god. I used to have my
notebooks all over my bed and I just all day long,
just you know, just wrote, and I had nothing but that.

(01:15:56):
Now I have to make time, and you make time.
It's a start from scratch. Or are you in the
shower and you get an idea and then have to
run to the piano, or oh my gosh, why is
it that the shower is so inspirational? The shower and
driving the car the two times that I can't stop
and you know, write anything down is when the best

(01:16:20):
inspiration comes. But thank goodness, you know the last decade.
We have a voice memo now because I can just
I can just turn that on and sing the idea
in there and then go back and check it later.
That's that helps me a lot. I have notes and
voice memo that I keep all these little pieces of inspiration.
Is there happening, whether I'm cooking dinner, I'm like, oh

(01:16:41):
my god, that's great, I need to uh and I
just catch it and then when I have the time,
I'll take all those little pieces and I'll put them together. Okay,
So is it more constructing the songs out of your
notes or is it more sitting there with a blank
piece of paper I need to write X number of
songs for a new album. M Well, I try. I've

(01:17:05):
always tried not to make it a job or make
it something I had to do. Uh. I'm grateful when
I get to have it. It's very meditative being by
myself and hooking up to that creative flow that is
there and then using my craft to make a song.

(01:17:26):
That's that's my happy place, other than being on stage.
That's that's the other place I love. And if it's
isn't happening, I go okay, not today, and I walk away.
I don't ever, I'll never call it I have writer's
block or anything like that. It's it's it's just very
you know, this is what I you know I want
to do and um and so I I enjoy it

(01:17:49):
now very much. So okay, so you deliver the album
to Chris Blackwell, then what happens, Well, then then the
whole another world starts. I the album. Let's see I
my I get put on my first tour he Chris album.
Chris black Will always thought that I would break huge

(01:18:13):
in England first, like like Chrissie Hines or Jimmy Hendrix
or there's something you know He's He thought that that's
where they were really gonna get me. So he put
me on as an opening act with a band called
Martin Stevenson and the Dainties, which was very unknown than two.
So I'm the opener for an unknown band, so you

(01:18:33):
just you can't get lower on the wrong. And yet
I'm playing these little clubs in you know, I'm going
to Leads, you know, and and uh Birmingham and Manchester,
and I'm playing all over England and in the meantime
the record is just starting to be played and every

(01:18:57):
English speaking country and some aren't, like you know, Holland
and Germany and but Australia and Canada and even America,
all of them are playing my Bring Me Some Water. England, nothing, Zeros, nothing,
And it's still to this day nothing, you know. And

(01:19:17):
I have like a small cult following there. I can tour,
I can play London and maybe another city. But it
was so funny, so they took me off of that
tour when things started happening in America and I got
on my own tour and I played. I started playing
clubs and it was just wonderful. And then I got
a I got the opening act for Bruce Hornsby when
his music was just taken off. So I did some

(01:19:39):
of that. I came back to Europe. I opened for
Huey Lewis. That was big, and so you know, I
got to play the big things, and then my own
when I would play my own gigs, it went from
the clubs to theaters and it was just a slow,
wonderful experience. Well, the record was successful pretty early in

(01:20:00):
Los Angeles. How long did you work that record and
then in the back of your mind you had to
cut another record? Oh well, I was. I was working
the record, and I had songs. I was already playing
songs live that weren't on the first record. I was
already playing No Souvenirs and Brave and Crazy and skin Deep.

(01:20:21):
These songs were part of my act already, and so
I'm like, when do we get to go back in
the studio. I'm ready, I'm ready. So we were in
the studio recording the second or actually I was rehearsing
to go into the studio when I got the news
that I had been nominated for Grammy for Best Rock Female,

(01:20:43):
and that that performance on that Grammys really sent my
career into another I just it went crazy after that,
not crazy, but you know, it really took a big leap,
and so I went back in the studio, recorded and
just kept I'm basically toured for eight years straight, just touring,

(01:21:06):
going back in the studio for a couple of weeks,
touring for a year, the album comes out, touring just
all the way up til my like you know six.
That was basically the whole thing. So what's the backstory?
Do you can sleep while I drive? Oh? See? That
was I wrote that when I was on tour with

(01:21:28):
Martin Stevens in the Dainties. I'm in um England for weeks, right,
and this is England and there is not Yeah, I mean,
you know the English are are food challenged, right, they
just they just I mean I can only eat so
many Indian food dinners, you know. But I really was

(01:21:50):
missing America. I was missing American food. I was missing America.
I was missing my relationship. And I knew, oh, a
non monogamous relationship where I'm gone for six weeks. I
know she's with somebody doing something and it you can
sleep while I drive. Was written in England and Germany
when I was thinking about a trip I had taken

(01:22:12):
in America with my girlfriend where we drove from California
to New York City and back and I played little
clubs along the way. This was right when Chris black
Will found me. But I had booked this little tour
for the summer because I had to get out of town.
I was just crazy. So I was now in England
looking back, saying let's take that trip again. Come on,

(01:22:34):
let's let's go do this and you can sleep while
I drive. It's like yet, I know she's she's you know,
fading away. So and in the end I'm like, well,
if you won't take me with you, I'll go before
night is through and you can sleep while I leave
and I drive. Okay, that album has some success, not

(01:22:56):
as much as the debut album. Third album comes out
theme Team, They're really first, how do you decide to
be nude on the cover or the album? That was
just that was me. It was the same photographer I
had used for the second album, so I was very

(01:23:17):
familiar with the wonderful guy. I don't remember his name
right now, but um, it was. It was just me
and him in the studio and we've been taking pictures
and I'm of course an absolute Springsteen you know, fan fanatic,
and one of my favorite pictures is him turning around
and that guitar slinging wright that and so I said,
I said, dude, I wanna I wanna like kind of

(01:23:41):
give a nod to that picture, but I want to
do my own way. I said, what if I take
my shirt off? And he's like cool, but you know
I'm not. You know, it was basically, okay, you turned
around and I took I took it off, and I
got I got already and he was, you know, twenty
behind me taking the picture. So and there was no
one else there, so there wasn't anything like that, but

(01:24:02):
it was my idea. We did like, you know, ten
shots of of that, and we then we did some
with my shirt on. And then when he developed the pictures,
I was like, that's cool, come on, let's do that.
And I didn't realize that there was a tiny because
it was it was for C d S, which is

(01:24:24):
you know, it was a tiny picture. It wasn't until
I had a huge poster of it that I realized, oh,
there's a little bit of my girls showing right, you know, right,
just just a tiny bit. Many women, almost all women,
are anxious about being photographed without clothing. Was that's something

(01:24:45):
that crossed your mind? Was there retouching the ultimate product? No? No, no,
we let it. We totally let it fly. And it
wasn't to me. It was just my back, you know,
it wasn't. I didn't think of it as like, oh,
you know, naked e like you know, a playboy or something.
It was there was some power in it. You know,

(01:25:06):
my hair was all long, there was my guitar. I
just didn't have a shirt on, and um, it seemed
powerful to me. I remember at the time when it
came out, there was a moment when Walmart was threatening
to not put it on its on the shelves, and
I was like what And I had to like call

(01:25:27):
the head of the Walmart and I talked, and I
think it was a woman and I'm like, no, no, no, no, no,
it's and I calmed her down and they ended up
selling it. But man, if you don't have Walmart, you're
you're in trouble. Absolutely. So from the outside, it looks
like the third album is not as commercially successful as
the two previous albums. Was that your sensation or it

(01:25:50):
wasn't that way? From the inside, it was my sensation.
At this point, I had UH. I had a certain
amount of success, but it was still that sort of
I had not broken through rock RADI I played rock radio,

(01:26:10):
but I had no pop airplay. I had UH. And
then there was this new you know, grunge music was
coming out, and I'm like and and alternative, and I
was like, hey, I'm alternative. I'm about as alternatives you
can get, you know. And I hadn't come out as
gay yet. But I at that point, after three albums,
I'm like, okay, I'm done writing genderless and and speaking

(01:26:33):
in you know, riddles and things, you know. And and
I told myself, I'm going to come out publicly on
this next record. I'm just gonna do it. And I
had a plan to do it on the Arsenio Hall
Show because he would actually sit and talk to me.
He was the only late night talk show hosted otherwise

(01:26:54):
you know, Letterman and Leno, you just you. I would
just sing and and that's it, and I Ar Senior
would talk to me. So I was like, Okay, when
the album comes out, I'm going to come out on
their center hall. Well, in the meantime i'm making the album,
I'm working with some of the great LGBT leaders, uh,

(01:27:15):
you know in our community, Orbis Evade and and Alan
hergot in these and they keep calling me to do oh,
come do a benefit for this. And I'm really deep
in the in the political because AIDS is raging, you know,
and it's it's this is nineteen and I'm feeling very
called by the community. And so I helped them. And

(01:27:38):
in ninety two I helped uh the Clinton Gore campaign
and all the the gay communities that was coming together
to help them get elected. And so I do a
bunch of benefits and I'm politically involved, and I get
invited to the Clinton inauguration and so um, when I

(01:28:01):
played the night before the inauguration, I do that. I'm
one of the people in the show. It's Michael Jackson
and Ray Charles and all these great singers and things,
and and I'm part of it and I'm loving that.
And then the next day is the inauguration. And then
that night at the inaugural balls, and the gay community
is having a triangle ball. It's the first gay inaugural ball.

(01:28:23):
Was the first time we were invited to Washington, and
so I'm there with my friends and I get handed
a microphone and I say, oh, I'm just so happy
to be lesbian, and bam, that was me coming out.
The next day, you know, the newspapers are all, you know,
Clinton inauguration, and there's a little tiny little blurb says
and at the gay triangle ballm Melissa Ethridge comes out.

(01:28:46):
And so that started a whole another area of my
life that people wanted to talk about now. And so
once my album came out a few months later, I
had a whole new platform. I was out, I had recorded,
I had gone to the studio without Um. Kevin wasn't

(01:29:09):
going to produce anymore. Kevin had been co producer on
my first three and UM. We were trying something new.
Chris Blackwell said, you know, I want to bring in
Hugh Pagum, who had done Sting and so many great records.
He was a very successful producer, and it was a
different experience. We worked at A and M and UM.

(01:29:32):
You know, making these these songs, and so when Yes
I Am comes out, it's kind of okay, it's a
different ballpark. The record company is ready to make it,
take a jump, make it, you know, be big. And
it took over a year for anything to really for

(01:29:53):
it all to go. And I never had a top
ten hit on Yes I Am, but I had the
record for a long time of the of Come to
My Window was the held the record for being on
the charts for the longest time because everyone never played

(01:30:16):
it together. You know how you get all the radio
stations and then you get your number one. I was
always you know, number twenty or thirty or something, but
every radio station ended up playing my music. So it's
this sort of long haul, like Yes I was never
nominated for a Grammy, you know, the album wasn't. The
song Come to My Window was, And I did win

(01:30:38):
for that, but um, you know, but that was a
whole new chapter. I had a whole new band because
Kevin got mad and left, so I put a whole
new band together. So after that third album, making of
and the release of Yes I Am, was a whole
new chapter in my life. Yeah, Okay, whose decision was

(01:31:06):
it to be and I used my air quotes here
people can't see closeted. Prior to the fourth album, that
was uh yeah, that was sort of you know, the
first of the late eighties. You you didn't come Nobody
came out. No one was coming out. You know. It
wasn't something you did. It was either you were either

(01:31:27):
found out there was either a tabloid that that found
you and did a story. But I wasn't famous enough
for tabloids to come chasing after me, and um. I
remember having a meeting with my uh my record company,
in my management. We're all sitting around to you know,
a conference table, and they said, well, what are we

(01:31:49):
gonna do about this gay thing? And I was like
this gay. I said, well, I'm not gonna be anything
but what I am. I'm certainly not going to, you know,
pretend to date the boy ors thing. That's not gonna happen.
They said, well, okay, is as long as you don't
flag wave was what they said. And I was like, okay,
you know whatever that means. And of course four years

(01:32:09):
later I'm flag waving. But you know, at that point,
by the time I came out, I remember calling them
all and going okay, well, um, I think I came out,
so I just want you all to know, and they're like, okay,
we'll tell publicity, we'll just take it from there, and
they made it something that worked for me and I
went from selling less than a million albums to six

(01:32:30):
million albums. So it was a great thing. But it's
not like from you telling the story. It's not like
you were hiding it. You were involved with the organizations.
How did you get involved with Clinton's campaign? Right? Well, Um,
that was that was definitely the gay organizations. And at
the time, I swear it was sort of like, don't ask,

(01:32:54):
don't tell. No one asked me, so I didn't have
to lie. I didn't and I didn't tell. I didn't
open up any then going hey I'm gay now and
I want to talk about it. It just wasn't ever asked. So, Um,
these organizations, the in g LTF and the Human Rights Campaign,
all these people were so these great political leaders of

(01:33:16):
the of the community, we're calling me in and that's
when they said, look, you know, this is the first
presidential candidate that even mentioned gay and lesbian. First time
we've ever heard it come out of a politician's mouth,
and he's willing, and he made of course, he made
the community all these promises and ultimately broke them all.
But at least he you know, acknowledged that we were

(01:33:39):
a voting base that he wanted to uh have on
his side. So we got out. I I played uh
many benefits for him and just raised a lot of money.
Well as a lay person from the outside, he was
constantly mentioned name you, you know, bringing up what kind

(01:34:03):
of relationship did you actually have with him? And after
he got elected, what was your relationship? Like? Oh, well,
I saw him. I went to visit in when I
did Woodstock, so that was I went to visit him
in the in the White House. And he was just

(01:34:25):
such a He was such a it's hard to explain
he was. And I'm sure you've always heard people talk
about what a figure he was, what an imposing figure,
But he was very warm and very Arkansas. So you
always felt like you were his best friend. But still
you were just in awe of him, and he held

(01:34:46):
that power and he was very much like that. So,
you know, the couple of times that I did meet him,
I was still like that, you know, because he just
had this thing about him, you know, subsequent to Clinton.
W Actually he's thirty years ago. Now to what degree
have people called you for political activity and have you

(01:35:06):
participated since then? Oh my gosh, Well, I like to
al Gore, and I became actually closer than I ever
was with Clinton because I I tell people I helped
get him elected in two thousand to be president. But
of course we know what happened, and you know he
Uh so I helped him with his campaign. I've helped

(01:35:27):
oh you know Senators Feinstein and Boxer in California. I've
I'm you know, any any any politician who who has
a track record of you know, lgbt Q rights and
and things like that. I will. I don't do it
as much anymore because I was doing a lot and

(01:35:48):
it sort of waters it down. But um, you know,
I I definitely worked for Obama. I definitely helped him.
That was important to me. And um I did some
work for him lurry, you know, and uh you know.
And so that brings us right up today. Okay, well,
you know we're living in this tumultuous time. Is there

(01:36:10):
any candidate that you would be aligned with for the
national stage? Well, as we as we I mean, as
we come into the next election. Yes, yeah, well, um,
I do know Gavin Knewsom very well. I see him
making moves and kind of conceee where that's going. So
I would definitely support him. He not only has been

(01:36:31):
LGBTQ friendly, but he's he's a cannabis friendly, which which
really we need to move forward on that and um,
you know, women's rights absolutely, so I would definitely help him. Um.
You know, at this point, you know, as I look
at the political parties, you know, I threw my weight

(01:36:52):
behind you know, Joe Biden because it was important to
get him elected, even though he was way behind on
on cannabis reform and everything. It was just really important
to get you know too, because I you know, I
understand politics enough to you know that it's important to
get that party in power. So and that's kind of

(01:37:12):
how I'm approaching it now. A good friend of mine,
had the Mazier, is running against Andy Harris for Congress
in Maryland, and so I give her a lot of
help because she's actually a very close friend of mine.
But um, yeah, you'll see me out there. I think
it's important to you so support How did you how
did you meet al Gore and established such a relationship.

(01:37:34):
Oh well, I met him through when he was vice
president and he he was always of the two. He
was so very gay friendly. He really it became close
friends with friends of mine who ran the Human Rights
Campaign and camp and fund and um. And so then

(01:37:56):
after after I helped him, I was on the patreo
with him for a while after we did that, and
he lost and then he threw his work into the
environment and his his climate change. Uh. He called me
in like two thousand five and and said, look, they're

(01:38:16):
they're making a documentary of my slide show on climate change.
And I said, you know, to myself, I'm like, well
that'll be shown in some high schools or something, you know,
and and um. And he wanted a song for it,
and I said, well, I would be honored. I would
be honored to write a song for it. So, you know,
so they put, you know, put it together and they

(01:38:36):
sent it to me, and I was like, this is
really good. And they were called it, you know, an
Inconvenient Truth, and I was like, well, that's a really
difficult title to work into a song, but I'll do
my best. And so I wrote I need to wake
Up and to my surprise. It ended up winning an Oscar.
And I ended up winning an Oscar, and that was

(01:38:57):
a complete surprise to me. I had no idea that
that little project was going to do that. So what
was it like winning an Oscar? Yeah? That was fun.
That was a dream come true. It was it was
after I had gone through cancer, because cancer really really
changed my life and and I just stopped, you know,

(01:39:17):
chasing this sort of I need to be the biggest
rock star. You know. It changed that sort of dream
into wait, you know, I need to do what makes
me happy and what fulfills me and what makes me
grow and and um. And I remember thinking, wow, okay,
what what are some things that I do want to
experience that I have? And I remember thinking, well, winning

(01:39:37):
an Oscar, that's one that was a childhood you know.
I watched I always watched the Oscars. That was the
the height of the entertainment industry was the Oscars. And
so man, when I got nominated blew my mind and
I was just I couldn't believe it. And then when
I finally went there and and and realized, okay, I

(01:40:00):
am finally at this place that I always thought was
like the epitome of of of the entertainment business. I
realized this is just a TV show, that all this
is a TV show. Most of these people really don't
know each other. I knew more people than I thought.

(01:40:22):
I mean, by that point, Steven Spielberg was a good
friend of mine. I knew you, I knew Okay, how
do you know? Okay, how do you do that? Because
I knew Tom Hanks, because I knew how did I
meet Tom Hanks? Uh? We shared the same lawyer, went
to dinner with it just because I lived in Hollywood,

(01:40:45):
and you just you Brad Pitt was a good friend
of mine because I knew him before he was famous,
and because I hung out there was this young Hollywood Uh,
you know, a group of us that always hung out
together and as our fame group, like Ellen. I knew
Ellen when she was stand up Rosie when she was
a stand up. You know these I just knew all
these people. We've gone through the eighties and the nineties

(01:41:06):
together and so um so I knew half the people
at the Oscars. I knew John Travolta. You know, he's
the one who announced my name when I won. And
so at the end of the night, you know I'm
carrying it's the only place that they'll actually give you
the award that you could take it with you. And

(01:41:26):
it's heavy, and so my arm was sore by the
end of the night because I was carrying it all night.
But you're not gonna let go because there it is
as my oscar. Hey, you know. And I had a
great time. It was a wonderful evening. You know, I
smoked a joint with Sean Penn and Harry Dean Stanton
and Bill Maher. You know, I just had this great
experience and that was that was like, look I did

(01:41:49):
that that, you know, let's bucket list off. That's great.
But I realized it's not really a place. It's it's
a TV show. Where's the oscar right now? Oh, it's
an office on my on my shelf next to my
two Grammys. Okay. What was Kevin McCormick angry about. Well,
he was angry because, um, he didn't get to produce

(01:42:11):
the fourth record. And he was angry because Chris Blackwell
and Denny Cordell, who was the executive producer of the album,
replaced all his parts with Pino Palladino coming in playing bass.
Who's the greatest bass player in the world. And that
made him mad, and so he went away. Okay, he'd
already recorded the parts and then you know, re recorded them. Yes,

(01:42:35):
it was it was like, that's the businessman, that's the business.
And what was it like working with you, Pagum And
what did he add? Oh? He was great. He was
so English, he was so uh. You know, he would
ask for his tuna tuna salad. He would complain because

(01:42:58):
you know, they bring in hot water for tea and
he's like, no, no, no, you bring in a kettle.
I need it boiled. You know. It was very English
and um really brilliant with sound, just really creating a
live sound. And he let me. He did. He took
my acoustic um Ovation guitar, which is not the best acoustic.

(01:43:19):
It's great electric, it's great on stage, but acoustically, you know,
there's you know, your Martins and your Gibsons sound better.
But he he made that Ovation sound wonderful. He took
the time. He took the time to find exactly the
right microphone. He came in one day and just microphones
were lined up and we just tried one at a
time to see which work. He was very meticulous and

(01:43:41):
he loved music. How did you end up playing an
Ovation which first had a bad reputation, then the reputation evolved. Yeah, well,
you know it was made from helicopter parts, you know,
but it fits. I was a young woman, young girl.
I was fourteen when I played my first one, and

(01:44:03):
I was in love with twelve string guitar. So I
had bought a guild which was as big as me
and I couldn't I could barely get my arms around it,
and it was certainly really hard to play. And so
I took it back to the guitar store and that
I brought it from, and I knew the guy was
a local, you know, leven Worth store, and he said, well,
there's this new guitar called the Ovation guitar. And he

(01:44:26):
put one in my lap, and it's rounded back and
it had a smaller neck, and I went, this is
a guitar I can play and I could just plug
it straight in. It was electric, so I could use
it in my band. So it was perfect and I
have always played one since then. Okay, I was totally

(01:44:48):
aware of you, but I knew the fourth album was
gonna go. This is significant from my perspective. I'm interested
in your perspective. You went on Letterman and you played
m the only One, and you were you know, your
foot was stopping in time. It was like you really
meant it. It It was mind blow we I've only seen,

(01:45:08):
said O'Connor did her theme song from In the Name
of the Father on Letterman the Thief of My Heart
or something like that. Those are the two best performances
I ever saw on So was that just another night
or did you feel something too? Ah? Well, Letterman had
always been a supporter of mine. He was a fan

(01:45:29):
of mine, and so he was the first one I
ever played, Bring Me Some Water. He was the first
national television show I ever had, was the old one
he had before he you know, the late, Late, Late
Show or whatever he did. Yeah, And so when I
finally played I'm the only One, I was excited. I
was excited because I loved that song. That song was,

(01:45:53):
that was rock, that was me, and I just knew.
I was like, that's why we thought that was to
be the first single. And well it was the first single,
but it didn't catch on and people started playing come
to My Window, and so they switched to come to
My Window. And then later released I'm the Only One again.
But first I thought because I was like, that's that's

(01:46:15):
got to be the song. That's the great, you know,
I love that people are gonna love it. And so
I went on Letterman and it was just I just
wanted to grab people by the throat and go, you're
gonna remember this, and and I was very excited. I
knew it was a big time and I've recently actually
on YouTube I saw that performance again and I was like, man,
I I was serious. I really I'm meant to whatever

(01:46:37):
I was doing. Okay, you work with you, then you
end up working with John Shanks. How do you end
up working with John Shanks? Ah, well, let's go back
to the first album, and let's go back to Kevin McCormick,
who I went to go see Kevin McCormick's band at
the time in he's playing and his band is called

(01:46:59):
the Uninvited and the band consists of him, Fritz Luik
on drums, who I eventually end up playing with. Craig
Cramp didn't tour with me. I Fritz played with me,
and so Fritz was on my second and third and
fourth album. He plays on all those albums and Scott
Thurston who ends up being a Tom Petty in the

(01:47:23):
in the UH you know those guys, and UM, and
the guitar player is this kid from l A named
John Shanks. And so for my very first tour in
I I saw John and I went, I want him
to be UH in my band. So I tell people

(01:47:43):
I discovered John Shanks at Madam Wong's right, Madam WANs
in Santa Monica. He comes, he does my first tour
with me, and he had some troubles, him and Kevin
and but he had some trouble so he went away.
And then when Kevin left and and I needed to
put a new band together for the Yes I M tour,

(01:48:05):
I run into John Shanks at some little place and
he's he's got his life together, he's trying to get
back into the business. He's playing for UM for a
singer that I don't know, but he was kind of
playing with someone and I said, well, I'm about to
go on tour, come be my guitar player again. So

(01:48:28):
from nine three to about two thousand, it's about two
thousand one, he was my guitar player. He played, he
did my whole Yes I Am tour Your Little Secret,
and then he then when it came time to do
my Breakdown album, I tried to work with somebody and

(01:48:49):
it didn't work, and John said, look, let me produce.
I've been doing, you know, a couple of little projects,
but let me produce your album. So I said okay,
And Breakdown was his first full album. So you did

(01:49:09):
discover him. I did totally. And from that he just
went off. He was he's winning Grammys, he's doing stuff
and and him and I have worked together on and
off many many of my He did Fearless Love, He's
did songs on Lucky, you know, He's done a whole
lot of stuff with me, Medicine Show. Yeah. Okay. So
ultimately Ellen comes out, But prior to that and for

(01:49:33):
years thereafter, you are the face of gay in America.
Is that a good thing or a not good thing? Personally? Well,
personally it was, it was good for a while in that. Um.

(01:49:56):
The part that was hard is that for a couple
of years, that's all I talked about. Any interview was
about being gay, and they were asking me questions that
everyone wanted to know about being gay, because no one
was willing to sit down and talk to anybody about
being gay. And so it was like you know, Rolling Stone, uh,
you know, every newspaper of every town, everything would talk

(01:50:19):
to me. And then I would finally do like you know,
the Advocate that out magazine, these gay publications. So I
talked about being gay for years and it was like, okay,
you know, I'm a musician too, we can talk about
the music too, and the goodness. You know, when Ellen
finally came out and it started to the other people did,
it was like, okay, I'm not the only one anymore.

(01:50:42):
And and then it it changed. And once I actually
went through cancer in two thousand four, then I started
talking about cancer. So I had cancer, gay and music.
And now you know, cancer, gay music, cannabis. And now
it's cancer, gay music, cannabis, opioid addiction. You know. So
I have lots of things that I can talk about.

(01:51:04):
But for a while there it was it was just gay.
And it what got really hard is when I went
through my first divorce, because I was, you know, being
held up as this gay you know, this perfect relationship
and we had children and then it all went away.
It was bad, So I didn't that was hard. You know,
the story that came out was that you were with

(01:51:26):
the therapist. And Julie said, well, I'm not really feeling
the gay thing? Is that? Is that true? It was
part of it. She was this kind of an unhappy person. Um.
She did go on to marry a man and uh,
spend most of that in straight relationships. Although you know,

(01:51:47):
I would say she's bisexual. She um, yeah, And I'm
less concerned what was going through her head? This was
going through your head to what the we were you shocked?
And were you shocked in the therapist? Did you see
it coming? What was your Yeah? Yeah, she yeah, I

(01:52:08):
did see it coming. She Oh, you know where do
you think? So songs like I'm the only One you
know came from and and you know, and someone told
me you lose them how you get them? And I
met her when she was married. She was married to
a movie star. I met her that way. I'm married
to a man, you know, And so now I know, oh,

(01:52:31):
you're not ever going to change these people. And so
she kind of had that thing going on where she
was always looking somewhere else and then some something else,
and you know, it would be good for a few months,
and then oh something would happen, and and you know,
I was on the road a lot, and that was
just gonna it's it's just And then I thought when

(01:52:53):
we had kids that I was like, okay, so you're
you're you're done with all that, right, We're having kids
and we're gonna be together. Oh yeah. Well after we
had kids, of course, now she's not happy. She's not happy.
And when someone's not happy, you're just okay. There's nothing
I can't make her happy, you know. So how did
you discover you had cancer? Ah? Well, you know, after

(01:53:17):
that breakup, that was really depressing. I got and you know,
I I was it was just it was just hard.
And music was changing. It's just two thousand, you know,
everything's changing. Everything seems to be just falling apart. In
this family that I thought I had, all of a sudden,
I only see them half the time. It was just horrible.

(01:53:37):
I'm I'm really depressed. And I start a new relationship
with a totally gay person, you know, and I'm like, okay,
I'm doing the right thing now, and but I'm I'm
not happy now. I've I've lost all my Mojoe and everything,
and and um, I uh, I actually I um I had.

(01:54:02):
I started right before I was diagnosed. I started, uh
smoking cannabis, I had. I had never really done it much.
I did it socially a little bit of my life,
but I I started like doing it every weekend and
it was really fun and I enjoyed myself on it.
Just stopped for a second. Were you a drinker? No,
I was not a drinker. You were. You were basically clean.

(01:54:23):
So what was this transition into smoking cannabis on the weekends. Well,
my my partner at the time was I was like, yeah,
I like this as something someone had act actually given
me as a gift, a whole bunch. And I was like, okay,
well let's once, you know, when the kids go to
the other house, let's try this. And I had so
much fun and it was like this is great. And

(01:54:45):
so after a few weeks um I said, have you
ever done, like, uh, pot brownies or cookies or something?
And she's like no, And I'm like, let's bake cookies.
And she's a baker, and so she we end up, oh,
well we're supposed to put this much in. Well, if
that much is good, we'll let's put a bunch of
So she makes these amazing cookies and I like eat

(01:55:05):
three of them because they're delicious. And I have what
I now call a heroic dose of cannabis. And I
am one of those people. You hear them all that,
you hear recordings of people who are like, I'm dying.
I've taken too much, you know, I'm too high and
I'm dying. Because it was this mind blowing, mind altering journeys.

(01:55:26):
So I have this huge spiritual awakening, a light, you know,
and and I started going, wait a minute, my life
is totally not what I think it is. And a
few weeks later, I'm diagnosed with cancer. So it's like
I I become spiritually a where I have this new

(01:55:49):
sort of outlook on life. And then oh, I've got
this disease, this this thing. And so I walked through
the whole process of of cancer. I stop touring, I
stop everything, my whole life stops for the first time
in what thirty years, you know, and I I find

(01:56:11):
this all my answers sort of, all all my inspiration
comes back, just roaring back after after I really I
go through cancer. I I do about five chemo treatments.
I'm bald. I sing on the grammys. I have this
wonderful experience, and I realized that my health is absolutely

(01:56:34):
the most important thing, and my health it has everything
to do with my happiness. So my happiness is the
most important thing. And I start walking this journey with that,
and I start enjoying cannabis so much more regularly. It
like gets me through chemotherapy. It helps me with pain

(01:56:56):
and depression and appetite. And I through that and I
become a huge plant medicine advocate and I still am.
I'm I'm very and it's part of what Ethics Foundation
is is um we we helped research for people to
get people off of opioids, and you know your heroines

(01:57:18):
and methodones and thing they by using a nature, nature
based medicines and plant medicine. So that so the the
cannabis and the cancer sort of hand in hand. Was
this whole life changing experience for me. How did you
literally find out did you find a lump? No? I

(01:57:42):
had actually just had a physical a few months before
and everything was fine, and I was out on tour
and it was really really not happy. And I was
in the shower in the morning and actually felt it
on my breast and went, wow, that wasn't there yesterday.
It felt like I didn't hadn't noticed it. And it

(01:58:03):
was a lump. It was a big lump too. And
then I just went to the doctor and I was like,
what's this and they were like, I think I know
what that is. And it was wonderful. The the woman
who biopsy did this doctor I hadn't realized she had
had a double mestecht to me and she goes, look,
you're gonna be fine. This is the worst that can

(01:58:24):
happen to you. And she showed me her double mistech
to me and I was like, okay, great, I'm gonna
be fine. I'm gonna die, so let's, you know, let's
move through this and see what happens. So you never Okay,
I have cancer and I got it subsequent to me
getting it twelve thirteen years ago. A lot of my
friends have got it. I would say I got it

(01:58:45):
early with the air quotes. But the first thing that
happens is, and I'm good, is that you realize you're
not gonna be here forever. You're gonna die. Yeah, we
are mortal, Yes, we are mortal. Where we are, We're
all gonna die. That's something and and for us to
spend our whole lives afraid of when we're gonna die
is ridiculous. That life is worth living every we're all

(01:59:08):
gonna die. Okay, that's a given. So let's just let's
just leave that over here and then be in the moment,
be right now. And being in the moment is a
huge healer for all the worries I think. I think
my cancer came from worry, from sadness, from uh, my
eating habits and and so much of of you know,

(01:59:33):
putting myself last, putting everybody else first, and trying to
fix everybody else. And finally when I just pulled that
all back into myself, that's when I really found health
and power. Now, you're a very outgoing, verbal person, magnetic,
but you mentioned and of course anybody would be depressed
with what you went through with those times. Are you

(01:59:57):
generally prone to depression or you've always upbeat like this?
I'm upbeat like this is my natural state. I love.
I believe in the goodness of the world. I believe
in in happiness. I believe that the point of living
is to find happiness and joy. I believe joy is

(02:00:18):
is is a human uh blessing in a state that
that one is in and and is where health and
longevity starts. Okay, let's go back to something you said
earlier about the change in the music business really started

(02:00:38):
with Napster the year two thousand. As time goes by,
a lot of stuff changes. The heritage artists from the seventies,
they put out new albums, crickets, the most famous people,
most of them stop making records. Then as we ultimate

(02:00:59):
believe all to Spotify. A lot of them are and
a lot of people who made it before or anti Spotify,
But all of a sudden we wake up and rock
is not the dominant format it was previously. What are
your thoughts about all this, Well, having been a musician

(02:01:20):
through all of it, I I have seen how I
reach people change, you know. I no longer there's no
there's no rock radio. There's not even record companies really
anymore that do that. They're all focused on fifteen year olds,
you know, and where they can sell this product. And

(02:01:43):
then I realized that, oh I was a product to them,
and I'm I like, when we started this conversation, it's
I can reach my fans directly, and I know and
my whole goal has been to be an artist that
when they hear I'm coming to town, they're like, oh,

(02:02:04):
that's a good show. I want to go see that.
I've either seen it before or I've heard that this
is a good time. And if I have that reputation
as a live artist, you can't replicate that. So I
think in this business the winners are the rolling stones. No,

(02:02:29):
they're not making any new records and we're not hearing
them on the radio, but they are selling out you know, stadiums. Uh,
these artists. Because you cannot replicate live music on a
computer in your bedroom. You know you can. You can
make songs that people like to hear, and you can
make moods and you can do that, and that's all good.

(02:02:53):
It's the longevity lives in the artists that connect with people,
that treat them coming to see them as as a gift.
I'm so grateful every audience that comes to see me,
but every audience I play for, no matter where, no
matter how small, those I want those people to want

(02:03:14):
to come back and see me. So that's my career,
is the live performing and and I get I still
get to make albums. I still get to to make music.
And release it and have new things and presented. I still,
you know, I'll present that. Of course every show, I'm
playing my my hits, because you know, we all want
to see come to my window and wave our arms

(02:03:35):
and stuff and and that's part of it. But I
my job is to entertain you and for you to
leave and go, oh, that was great. I can't wait
to see it again. So you're still just as motivated
to record music. Yeah, it's different. And I'm actually in
a place right now where I'm in a in a
writing cycle where I am writing. But I do have

(02:03:58):
the question of wow, do I just release one song
at a time? Now? Is the album actually dead? You know?
And I have realized that I have a choice. I
can I can do ten songs and put out an album,
or I can do four and put out an EP.
I can just release one. I have all these choices.

(02:04:20):
So as I'm writing, I'm gonna see my preference is
to do an album because I think I think my
my fans love to get a collection of songs that
represent what I'm going through and at the times, and
something they can sit and listen to and have an
hour with, you know. So Deborah Tan and this is
not a pop psychologist is a degreed person. She wrote

(02:04:42):
a book you just don't understand difference between men and women,
and you talked about men are always needing a career
arc that goes up, where women can go up and
go down. So you have these huge triumphs which to
a great degree are not available to anybody anymore. How
does it feel do you look back and say, well,

(02:05:03):
I was there and now I'm here. How do you go? Oh?
Very much so, because looking back is is not I
don't ever compare myself to you know what. I celebrate
what I used to do. I look at I still
got goals in front of me. I just got offered
uh to play at stage Coach a festival here, and
that's my That's the first big festival of this sort

(02:05:26):
of festival era, you know, the last ten twenty years
that has asked me to play. And I'm excited. I'm like, yes,
I finally have reached that level. And I'm always I'm
always looking to expand and and I love that I have.
I have younger people coming to see me. The younger
generation is finding me, and so there's still so much

(02:05:49):
to do and so much I want to do? And
how much long are you going to do this? Oh,
I'll go until I can't. I will never say I'm
to retire. You'll never hear me say that, because I
think that's silly. I mean, how do you retire from music?
You know? And and I see my older peers, you know,

(02:06:09):
as long as Bruce goes, I'm gonna go definitely, But
who knows I will go? I I you know, I
did you see you know Joni Mitchell just let the
Newport you know. Yeah, that was beautiful. It made me cry.
It was just gorgeous. You know. I'm my job is
to keep myself healthy and have joy and longevity in

(02:06:31):
my in my life. Well, you talk about stage coach.
You know, this term from the movie has been overused,
but it represents the concept better than anything else, which
is bucket list. Anything you haven't done personally as well
as in your career that you would like to do
in the time you have left. Not a whole lot,

(02:06:53):
because really I've done, you know, I got the Grammys,
I got the Oscar I uh oh, I think I'd
like a tone. I'd like an egot. I would like
to be one of the under twenty people who have
an egot. I think that would that that's something that
I'd like. Yes, well, you know a lot of acts
of your vintage UH have gone to Broadways. That's something

(02:07:14):
on your horizon, Yes, sir, that is, that's something we're
working on right now. You might hear about that in
a couple of weeks. Yeah, we're gonna we're gonna do
something the end of this year off Broadway and hopefully
bring it to Broadway. And you're very involved in your career.
But what do you do when you're not working? I
do my family. I love my family and I do

(02:07:38):
a lot of that, and I do a lot of
um gardening. I love my I just love my house.
When i'm I love traveling with my my family. It's
mostly my family and work. That's really what I am.
And anywhere you haven't been you want to go. I
would like to go to UH, South Africa. I know

(02:08:02):
I have fans there, I have fans in Brazil, never
been there, and the Asian country has never really been
there either. Okay, Melsta, this has been wonderful. I want
to thank you for taking the time. You know, you're
very articulate, very positive, a joy to talk to. Thank
you so much. What a pleasure to go through my
life with you, my friend. It was great for me too,

(02:08:25):
So until next time. This is Bob Left sex