the times | Friday July 31 2020 1GT 5
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album only after its intended producer,
her former songwriting collaborator
Bill Bottrell, walked out on the first
day, frustrated that so much of the
equipment at the New Orleans studio
they had booked didn’t work. She
describes her career as akin to being “a
frog in a pot... I didn’t know the water
was heating up until it was boiling.”
Born in Missouri to a piano teacher
mother and a lawyer father, Crow
worked as a music teacher in St Louis
before trying her luck in Los Angeles,
getting her break as a backing singer
on Michael Jackson’s Bad tour of 1987.
“I thought, ‘I’m young, I’m single,
if I’m ever going to go out to LA and
try for this it has to be now,’ ” she
remembers. “I got in my car, drove
there without knowing anyone, and
took my demo tape to every studio
imaginable.
“One day I overheard some singers
talking about the Michael Jackson
audition, which was closed, only on
recommendation, so I found out
where it was and crashed it. The word
‘no’ has never been terrifying for me.
What’s the worst that can happen?
They can call you a lot of names.became a feminist flashpoint after she
was embroiled in disputes over
songwriting credits with her male
collaborators. It resulted in Crow
producing her self-titled second album
in 1996, something that was extremely
rare for female singers at the time.
“With the first album’s success came
doubt that the men in the room hadn’t
made it for me, which is as sexist as
you can get,” Crow says, still sounding
angry at the memory. “Even now,
being a woman in my industry is
largely about how you look. OK, I may
look like an old lady [Crow is 58 and
doesn’t look anything like an old lady],
but you are still expected to utilise
your looks and your sexuality to build
a platform.”
What about the argument used by
so many young, female pop stars that
using their sexuality is a form of
empowerment? “It is reverse
feminism,” she counters. “Yes, you can
say, ‘It’s my body, I can use it to propel
my brand.’ But should you have to?”
Crow’s success in the male-
dominated world of rock has been, she
says, down to a mix of hard work and
serendipity. She produced that second
The experience of working with
Jackson, if only at a hired hand’s
distance, also served as a lesson.
“His emotional development really
did stop when he was young,” she
says. “He lived in a bubble of fame.
I remember meeting an 18-year-old
pop star at the Grammys who was hot
for a while, and she said that if she
opened a magazine and saw photos of
people at a celebrity party she felt a
horrible sense of not being accepted.
If it was me going through it all during
those years when you’re still trying to
figure out who you are, my head
would have exploded.”
Twenty-five years on, Crow has
survived breast cancer, depression
and a six-month engagement to the
disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong,
which ended in 2006 (he was banned
from competitive cycling for life in
2012 after doping violations). And she
finds herself in good company. Her
2019 album Threads features duets
with Keith Richards, Nicks, Neil
Young and Dylan, all of them friends
who have helped and inspired her
along the way.
“It sounds like I’m dropping
names, but Keith Richards is indeed
a friend and he’s exactly as you
would hope he would be,” she says.
“He’s a softie — he loves who he
loves — and when you have a
conversation with Keith it is like
playing tennis with John McEnroe.
He’s irreverent and funny, but
extremely well read and smart.
He’s a kick to be around.”
These days Crow divides her time
between touring (until March this
year at least), making recordings in
her barn studio and looking after the
boys. “The last few years have been
glorious,” she says. “Having gotten
older, no longer having to think
about competing on pop radio means
I can do whatever I want, and that
is an artist’s dream. Having had
cancer, having had life grow with my
boys, it makes for an interesting time
as a writer.”
Do those boys appreciate all that
their mum has achieved? “They
appreciate that what I do puts gas in
the car... well, we have an electric
car,” she replies. “Do they love my
music? No, but my 13-year-old has just
got into the Beatles. He plays bass and
he’s learnt Come Together — which is
not cool when all your friends are
either into rap or country — so my kid
has discovered classic rock. That gives
me a boastful mum moment.”
As to who will be president of the
US later in the year, Crow thinks
Trump still has a strong chance.
“It will be because of sleeper voters:
people who won’t admit they vote
for him,” she says. “He has been
successful in dividing America and
creating a climate of fear. He’s been
sending troops into Portland [deployed
against anti-racism protesters] and
he’s threatening to do it in other cities
too, and you have to remember that
our country was built on peaceful
protest. We are in a dangerous state
right now.”
It does seem, however, with Biden
leading Trump at 55 per cent to 40 per
cent in July’s Washington Post-ABC
News poll, as though a woman may
well enter the White House come
November. “I don’t know what will
happen,” Crow concludes before she
has to leave to get on with mum
duties. “Let’s just say I would love to
see Trump not getting re-elected.”
Woman in the White House by Sheryl
Crow is out today on Big MachineIt’s whether you believe it or not that
matters.”
In many ways Crow was a strange fit
for the musical landscape of the early
Nineties. Here was a fresh-faced
woman reviving the classic rock sound
of an older generation who duly
embraced her, leading to support tours
for the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton
(whom she went out with), Stevie
Nicks and Bob Dylan. “That was the
music I grew up on,” she says. “Grunge
wasn’t my thing, but it was huge in the
early Nineties. It made my album the
most unlikely thing to break through,
but it was also the reason it stood out.”
She was 30 by the time her first
album was released. “And if you follow
the Rolling Stones book of rock’n’roll,
you’re on your way out of the door by
then,” she says.
“I had been working as a musician
and backing singer for ten years, so
my feet were solidly on the ground
and I never lost my head. When I
won my first Grammy, after the party
we got straight on the bus to San
Francisco and played the next concert.
I probably should have stopped and
smelt the roses a little bit more.”2 w Y w a n a w “
lo
c p H e H b y h b g o a I i c b a t a tKeith
Richards
is a softie,
a kick to
be around
Sheryl Crow. From top:
with Keith Richards in
1997; with Bob Dylan
in 1998. Opposite:
performing in 2015COVER AND BELOW: DOVE SHORE; KEVIN MAZUR/WIREIMAGE/GETTY IMAGES