Neo-folk-rock singer/songwriter Sandi Thom generated publicity and controversy when she landed a major-label record contract on the strength of a three-week live webcast series beamed across the Internet from the basement of her flat. Born Alexandria Thom in Banff, Scotland, on August 11, 1981, she spent her teenage years in a cover band dubbed the Residents (not to be confused with the eyeball-masked avant rock eccentrics of the same name) before attending Aberdeen-based Robert Gordon's College. While attending the Liverpool Institute of the Performing Arts -- the so-called "...